Flood-affected Elbow Park students move into portables

Elementary students from flood-damaged Elbow Park School in Calgary now have access to several portable classrooms at the nearby Earl Grey School after four months of delays.

Calgary Board of Education (CBE) spokespersonCalvin Daviessays the original timeline for opening the temporary structures may be been too optimistic.

"In hindsight, if you think about it, the catastrophe happened in the latter part of June and I think they did an amazing job to get the site up and ready in such a short period of time," said Davies.

Originallythe plan was to bus the students from Elbow Park to Eugene CosteSchool in Haysboro, but the CBE decided instead to install portable classrooms at the nearby Earl Grey School.

Dean Miskiman, an Elbow Park School parent,is pleased with the shorter commute for his family and he is also pleasantly surprised by the buildings.

"It doesn't look like portables at all really, it just looks like a normal school," he said.

While the portable classrooms are in place, atemporarygymnasium is still under construction.

Elbow Park School was heavily damaged by the floodwaters from the Elbow River in June. It will either undergo substantial renovations or be torn down and replaced by a new building.