BLUE ASH — On the city's north end, Fire Chief Jim Fehr grins amid the smashing, crashing sounds of demolition.

        Backhoes and bulldozers have spent the past week rumbling across city-owned property at Kenwood and Creek roads, razing pole barns and an uninhabited home to make room for a $5 million, state-of-the-art fire station.

        The 30,000-square-foot facility will be the city's second fire station and will serve its northern half, which has witnessed the bulk of the city's recent residential and industrial growth.

        Mr. Fehr expects the new fire station to shave three minutes from response times now approaching six to nine minutes for firefighters dashing from the city's main station on Cooper Road to Blue Ash's northern neighborhoods.

        “We're anxious to get going with this thing. It's pretty exciting for a fire department. We're getting a station at each end of town that will dramatically improve our response times. (And) the ... service and fire departments are going to end up with facilities that are so much more than we had in the past,” Mr. Fehr said on Friday.

        A backhoe was smashing into an old home that rested for decades on city property once considered home to the city's service department. Another pole barn, a two-car garage, and a main service building still needed to go.

        Construction manager Ken Bail hopes to start required utility work within two weeks so that serious construction can begin.

        While city officials expect the fire station to open by July 1, 2003, Mr. Bail believes he can do better than that, weather permitting.

        “We're projecting ... 10-and-a-half months,” said Mr. Bail, who spoke from inside a 60,000-square-foot warehouse on Interstate Circle. The building, which the city bought and retrofitted for about $4.8 million, will officially become the service department's new home in early August.

        A ribbon-cutting ceremony is tentatively set for Aug. 8. Meanwhile, “it's our top priority to get our second fire station. In order to get it open by this time next year, we've got to get going,” City Manager Marvin Thompson said.

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