Kids Way and Konkrete Lane street signs were installed Monday, showing the way for members of Northampton Area School District board of education during another preview of the Northampton Area Middle School and Secondary Campus Renovation Project.

They liked what they saw.

"It's more than a building. It's a district-changing event," NASD Superintendent of Schools Joseph Kovalchik said to members of the school board and construction management team during the May 18 afternoon tour prior to the school board meeting. A reporter-photographer for Northampton Press was included in the preview tour.

Kovalchik, along with Robert J. Yanders, NASD director of operations; Jay Clough, principal, KCBA Architects, middle school project architecture firm; and Christopher W. Haller, senior project manager, D'Huy Engineering, Inc., project engineer, said the school is still on track to open for classes this fall.

Participating on the tour were NASD school Directors Dr. Michael Baird, Jean Rundle, Darin Arthofer, Chuck Frantz, Roy Maranki and Vice President Jennifer Miller.

Also on the tour was Northampton Borough Mayor Thomas Reenock.

"Thank you for the tour. It was very enlightening," Baird said at the board meeting. "With the controversy going back to the '80s, it's good to see."

"It's just magnificent. My 12 years on the board is very satisfied," said Rundle. "Everyone should be very happy with the building. It was a long, drawn-out battle.

"I know Dave (Gogel) and I made a check list. We improved all the buildings and now we will have a new middle school," Rundle said. "I thank the whole board, the ones who are on it and the ones who were on it. I thank David (Gogel) for being a partner on this."

"The board and the present administration put a board together that got things done," said Baird.

Said board President David Gogel, "We've solved the building dilemma."

"I'm very proud to be a Konkrete Kid. And I always will be," Rundle said.

Nick Politi, NASD representative to the Northampton Community College board of trustees and an NASD school director 1997-2001, said, "It really is a tribute to see this middle school come to a conclusion after so many years of tug of war."

An estimated 100 workers are on-site daily at the $80.6 million project, for which there've been no change-orders to date.

Kovalchik said he's alerted parents and guardians by email that construction necessitates secondary campus traffic flow changes June 14 through Aug. 14. Maps are on the district web- site, northampton.k12.pa.us/board.

Another traffic flow change is to take place Aug. 17 for the 2015-16 school year.

One feature of the middle school design that brought kudos is the abundance of windows, many of them large, which allow a lot of natural light into classrooms, staircases and many hallways.

Perhaps the biggest jaw-dropper on the tour was the approximate 24,000-square-foot multi-use gymnasium, which has a 57-foot-high ceiling. Uses include basketball and volleyball. The west-side portion includes an area that can be partitioned for music and theater performances.

Student stage shows are presented at the elementary and high school levels but not the middle school levels.

Kovalchik hopes to change that.

"It's important for me to fill that in," Kovalchik said.

Later, at the May 18 school board meeting, Frantz lauded Siegfried Elementary School's recent "Seussical Jr." production.

The middle school also has a large auxiliary gym for wrestling, volleyball, cheerleading and physical-education classes.

An emphasis on science is evident, with 12 spacious science labs, four per floor, for each of the middle school's sixth, seventh and eighth grades.

The chorus room and instrumental music room, the latter with one slightly angled wall to improve acoustics, on the second floor overlook the middle school courtyard, which has an amphitheater.

A family-consumer science classroom, which has a no-wax, no-chemical, water-cleansing-only quartz floor, is on the second floor. An art instruction room is on the third floor. A student television studio is on the third floor.

South-facing windows for the third-floor library and cafeteria, which can accommodate 600 students, provide views of Northampton Borough Municipal Park.

"It makes you want to go back to middle school," Kovalchik quipped.

Large-screen TV monitor message centers are in hallways and the cafeteria.

A faculty-community lot is on the building's north side, with steps leading to Al Erdosy Memorial Stadium.

The mechanical room, the "heartbeat of the school," contains four condenser boilers, air-conditioning units and associated equipment. There's a separate electrical system room.

The swimming pool and field house, located on the school's northwest side, were not included on the tour because of construction hazards. School directors are to tour those areas on their next visit.

Abatement (asbestos removal) is set for July and August, with beginning demolition of the old middle school in September and completion expected in December.

Work on new parking, bus drop-off and an athletic field at the site of the old school is to begin in early 2016.