The City of Issaquah’s Planning Department Development Commission held a community conference on Wednesday to discuss the planned Fire Station #72, to be located at the Issaquah Transit Center site on NW Maple Street.

The building will have 6,900 square feet for the living and office quarters and 4,500 square feet of support and operation area, including three truck bays in the northeast corner of the Issaquah Transit Center.

Plans call for emergency vehicles to leave the station from the Center’s East Drive and return via Maple Street.

The lot is currently vacant.

Dave Favour, the planning manager for the project, said because of the agreement with Sound Transit to use a portion of the transit center site, the development pad was basically ready to go, allowing the city planners and architects to focus on design aspects. These were discussed at the Wednesday meeting.

Favour said the idea has been to pick up on existing building designs in the area, such as the Maple Street office building and the King County Library service center, all which are nearby and have modern elements.

Another aspect of the discussion was how to give the building a pedestrian friendly face to Maple Street, according to Favour.

Brad Lijequist, an Issaquah public works engineer, said the designers and city have been looking into “fairly cutting edge, but cost effective” ways to make the building green. The ideas, which are still in development, include having more daylighting at the facility, as fire stations tend to use a lot of light energy and that it will include some type of heat pumping system.

“We’re still vetting options, but it’s very efficient,” said Lijequist. “There are some exciting components. It’s a functional building but we’re also trying to make it good looking.”

The project has been in the works for this site since 2006, according to Wes Collins, the deputy fire chief for Eastside Fire and Rescue. Voters approved a bond last fall to build the new station at this location.

Collins said Eastside Fire and Rescue has been looking for a permanent building site on the Northeast side of Issaquah since about 1986, and built the current temporary structure in the 2000. The idea has been, since 2000, to build a new station near the Transit Site, but per an agreement with Sound Transit Fire and Rescue, the city would wait until the transit center was completed.