The Cincinnati Fire Department opened its new training facility along the Mill Creek Thursday.
The campus includes a 20,000-square foot office, classroom, and garage building, as well as a seven-story training tower.
During a ribbon cutting event, Mayor Aftab Pureval said the training campus is state-of-the-art.
"Not only is it bringing CFD's training resources all to one common site, it ensures the heroes who keep us safe have access to the latest and greatest as they learn and grow in the profession," he said.
The $14 million site consolidates training functions at other locations including an aging building in the West End.
Prior to the completion of the project, the department's training activities were spread among multiple sites, including a more than 80-year-old building in the West End.
Fire Captain Alexis Mundy says the new indoor training facilities are "tremendous for us."
"Currently, at Station 29 in the West End, we only have outdoor facilities available for training purposes," she said as she gave media a tour.
The garage bays in the new facility will serve to store training vehicles as well as serve as a place for indoor physical training. The building also has an industrial kitchen — so recruits can learn how to cook meals for their future fire houses — a fully-equipped gym and other features.
City Manager Sheryl Long said the upgrade has been a long time coming.
"The building has been more than 15 years in the making," she said at the ribbon cutting. "From appropriating the money to breaking ground to cutting the ribbon, that's been seven years of steadfast work on its own."
The project faced several hurdles, city officials say, including the rising cost of construction.
There also have been concerns about its impact on health and safety in nearby South Cumminsville and Millvale, which hosts Cincinnati Public Schools' Ethel M. Taylor Elementary about 700 feet from the training campus. During a community meeting in 2023, CFD pledged to be careful about when it does trainings that involve smoke or explosives and to give neighbors plenty of warning.
Read more: