SOUTHINGTON — Workers are framing a 10,000 square-foot day care and preschool on West Street that will open as The Learning Experience next summer.
The day care at 1268 West St. was approved earlier this year and construction began this fall. It will have a 5,000 square-foot playground area and be able to accommodate 150 children.
Eric Spungin, a property owner partner with the development company Southington West Street LLC, said work is well underway.
“We’re framing. The foundation’s in, steel’s in and we’re framing,” he said Monday. “We plan to deliver it completed probably early summer.”
The daycare will be run by The Learning Experience, an international day care and early childhood education company. The Learning Experience has 11 locations in Connecticut and is developing six more. In addition to Cheshire and Southington, the company is looking to expand to Vernon, Hamden, West Hartford and Wilton.
Town planners initially denied the daycare due to concerns about traffic on West Street, a state road. That led to changes in the plan, Spungin said, which then received town approval.
“We redesigned it to meet the town’s traffic concerns,” he said.
The company staggers pickups and dropoffs to minimize traffic both outside and inside the day care facilities.
The company does extensive demographic analysis to determine where it should add locations and where child care is in the greatest demand, according to a company spokesman. The company couldn’t be reached for comment Monday on its plans for opening. The Learning Experience will join existing day care centers Town & Country Early Learning Center, Stork Club and My Little Rascals Too along West Street.
The Learning Experience operates in the United States and the United Kingdom.
Late last year, Southington planners approved a 30-unit subdivision on a large parcel behind the property at 1268 West St. The development is in a long stretch parallel to Churchill Street with a small portion of West Street frontage.
Spungin said the day care development is separate from the housing subdivision, although nearby.
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