DANVILLE — City officials expect the demolition project next to the David S. Palmer Arena to be finished this week.

Bob Scott, service and operations manager for the city, said city crews, who are handling the demolition of the two-story, fire-damaged former auto parts store, made good progress last week.

The crews began demolition one week ago, blocking off some lanes of West Main Street early in the project to give crews space to work and to protect traffic from the operation. Scott said the initial debris was hauled off last week, leaving mostly brick and concrete block and some other rubbish yet to be hauled away for disposal or recycling.

After a December fire destroyed the building, which was being leased to the owners of the River Barge Freight Company, the city bought the property from the Janesky family to tear down, and initially, use as parking for the David S. Palmer Arena, and long term, for possible riverfront development plans.

Scott said the crews worked hard to preserve the building's concrete floor and parking lot, so there should be hard surfaces that hopefully can be used for parking. He said some work may be required around the former foundation of the building to prepare it, but crews will have to evaluate once the site is completely cleared.

The project is another example of how the city's public works department is doing more demolitions in-house rather than bidding the jobs to outside contractors.

Mayor Scott Eisenhauer said it's more cost-effective.

City administrators explained to aldermen, when they approved purchasing the building last month, that buying it as is and allowing city crews to demolish it would be about $10,000 cheaper than the owners paying for demolition before the city buying the site.

Eisenhauer said the purchase of additional equipment and the cross-training of public works staff have allowed the department to handle special projects like last week's demolition. Cross-training enables the city to move workers around to cover the day-to-day city services and special projects, too, he said, adding that the collective bargaining groups that represent the public works employees were instrumental in allowing the cross-training.

The majority of the in-house demolitions have been residential sites.

Eisenhauer said the city will continue to seek bids on some demolition projects due to timing or complexity issues.