FORT WAYNE – The Allen County commissioners Friday approved a change order for work at Memorial Coliseum – a project officials said has been a real battle.

The $604,150 project covers several small projects, such as adding new parking booths and gates, putting a roof on the lounge patio deck and expanding a storage area.

But it has not been easy, and Friday, officials approved adding $36,668 to the bill.

Coliseum General Manager Randy Brown said the contractor, Harold McComb & Sons, did representative borings to ensure the soil could be built on for the expanded storage area, but when workers began digging they found poor soil in areas they hadn’t bored.

“We typically do soil borings” so this doesn’t happen, Brown said, “but some times your luck runs out.”

And within those soils, workers found a water line, which then had to be replaced because they found it with an excavator.

Then workers found a fiber optic cable.

“If it’s underground, we hit it,” Brown said.

Workers also found that the current storage area didn’t have soil under it at all, so that had to be filled.

“This has been a difficult project,” Commissioner Linda Bloom said. “I’m surprised (the cost) isn’t more.”

The good news, Brown said, is “we’re now out of the dirt,” and he expects things will go smoothly from here on out.

For all the problems and costs, the area under construction won’t even be seen by the public – it will be used to store chairs and the basketball court.

dstockman@jg.net