The city will be refining its plans for the construction of the new Two Mile Hill/Takhini fire station as costs for the building exceed the amount budgeted by $1 million.

At their weekly meeting Monday evening, members of council heard from Robert Fendrick, the city's director of administrative services.

He said city officials are looking to slash construction costs for the new $5-million station any way they can. Those options include the elimination of office space in favour of an open-concept floor plan.

'There's a $1-million gap already,' Fendrick said, explaining the city plans to stick to its $5-million construction budget.

In December's budget speech, Mayor Bev Buckway said the city plans to borrow $4 million to construct the new building.

The $4 million, she added, is on top of $1 million that has already been set aside.

Fendrick said the $1-million rise in cost estimates for the current plans for the new station are due to the rising cost of living in the city.

Some of the details of the building will have to be changed to meet the budget, he added.

Fendrick also said the city has made no decision on the number of fire halls it will maintain after the Two Mile Hill/Takhini station is reconstructed.

The $5 million earmarked for the new fire hall didn't mean the downtown station would go, he added.

'We'd like to make it clear at this point on Fire Hall No. 2 that the future of the fire halls will be subject to that construction,' Fendrick said.

Whatever the decision, he added, the fire department would still have to arrive at 90 per cent of its calls in six minutes or better 90 per cent of the time.

Fendrick said a needs analysis will be drafted for the department once the building is completed.

Coun. Dave Stockdale questioned whether drafting a needs analysis after the building is constructed is a good idea.

He said he wondered if the city shouldn't look into its needs before the new station is built.

'There's a direct connection on how we build that fire hall,' Stockdale said.

Fendrick said the fire department has already assessed the situation and that fire officials believe the new fire hall would add to the city's firefighting capabilities.

Fire chief Clive Sparks said this morning his department hasn't done a formal review since the 1990s but is always looking at its service levels and discussing its needs.

The fire department has been running very close to its response time targets and is always striving to improve them, he added.

Sparks said the number of fire halls and whether the downtown fire hall will remain in its current location or be moved elsewhere downtown are always an ongoing discussion.

'When the new fire hall opens, the downtown fire hall will also be open,' he said. The downtown fire hall will still have a pumper truck and rescue vehicle to respond to emergencies, he added.

'Those are the trucks that will respond to a Riverdale emergency,' he said.

The new fire hall will create space for fire department vehicles currently being stored in the former Motorways trucking yard off Second Avenue, he added.

'There's not additional space in there that will be empty,' he said.

The number of fire trucks and their locations, the chief confirmed, have an effect on response times.