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A Greensburg vocational-technical school plans to construct a new training center in the city for students to learn how to build houses.

Triangle Tech wants to build the 6,200-square-foot metal building in a parking lot at the intersection of Wilson Avenue and Nashua Street, Joseph P. Bleehash, an architect for Triangle Tech, told the city planning commission Monday. The site is about a block from the school's location at 222 E. Pittsburgh St.

The advisory panel recommended approval of the plans to construct the building on a section of a parking lot that Triangle Tech already owns. City council is expected to consider approving the plans at a Jan. 10 meeting.

If Triangle Tech's building plans are approved next month, the school would begin construction in January. It would aim to complete the project by spring, Bleehash said. The cost of developing the project has not yet been determined, he said.

Triangle Tech wants the building for its new carpentry program. The school expects that the initial enrollment will be about 15 students and will increase to about 25 students, Bleehash said. Students will build the houses the old-fashioned way -- without power tools, he said.

The site will have parking for 19 vehicles, which is 16 more than is required under the city's zoning ordinance for a building of that size, Bleehash said.

The building will have an unusual stormwater retention system that does not involve piping the rainwater off the site. Bleehash said he has worked with the Westmoreland Conservation District on a plan to channel the stormwater to small "rain gardens" -- depressions on the site where the water will be collected to sustain vegetation.

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