A 65-foot-long hole in the third-floor ceiling of the city-owned Lower Locks Garage in Lowell. (Courtesy Melanie Gilbert for Inside Lowell)

by Melanie Gilbert

LOWELL – The deterioration in the Lower Locks Garage is so advanced that daylight streams through a 65-foot-long hole in the third-floor ceiling of the structure.

Several areas are roped off to protect people and cars from falling chunks of concrete and gaps in the flooring, but the city recently issued a bid to fix the problem, part of a $3.6 million capital investment in Lowell’s parking garages.

“The City of Lowell is seeking bids for the labor, equipment and material to repair five locations with significant spalling of cement,” Michael Vaughn, the chief procurement officer for the city of Lowell, said in a Lower Locks Cement Project bid document released Nov. 11.

According to design plans accompanying the bid, the five holes span the third and fourth floors of the four-story garage.

“The spalling is exposing the wire mesh and strands within the tee flange,” the bid documents said.  “At the roof level of the main garage, tee-to-tee connections along two (4) joints are also showing signs of failure and are in need of repair.”

Safety cones and caution tape rope off areas of the Lower Locks Garage due to crumbling concrete in the city-owned structure. (Courtesy Melanie Gilbert for Inside Lowell)

The work, which is not priced out in the bid, is extensive and requires scaffolding to access and tarping to protect the proposed work areas, removing approximately 350 linear feet of sealant at tee-to-tee joints, saw cut and demolition for full-depth repairs, and reinforcing and repouring the repair areas.

The 960-space facility located on the eastern fringe of Lowell’s Central Business District was built in 1985, and serves the needs of Middlesex Community College, the Lowell Memorial Auditorium, the former UMass Lowell Inn and Conference Center and the surrounding community.

The Lower Locks name refers to the historic lock chamber and gatehouse that is part of the Lowell Locks and Canals National Historical Landmark District. All canals in the system converge and travel through Lower Locks before emptying into the nearby Concord River behind the garage.

The massive complex of gates, locks, and spillways offer a visually dramatic gathering point, and is accessible via the garage’s location.

“Prodigious granite walls rise up from the base of the locks within site of the confluence of the Concord River,” the Revitalizing Lower Locks section of the city website said. “An elegant gatehouse perches atop the locks, masking the serene mill pond above the sheets of water pouring down to the canal bed. The Pawtucket Canal was originally built as a transportation canal in 1796 to route goods around the Pawtucket Falls on the Merrimack River. With the construction of the Lower Locks in 1823, the canal was incorporated into a water control system to power mills.”

During a visit on Friday, the garage was largely empty. All the facilities are available for parking 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

Areas of deterioration on the 4th-floor deck of the city-owned Lower Locks Garage in Lowell. (Courtesy Melanie Gilbert for Inside Lowell)

When the city declares snow emergency parking bans, the six city-owned garages – Lower Locks, Hamiliton Canal Innovation District Garage off Dutton Street, the Roy Garage on Market Street, the Ayotte Garage by the Tsongas Arena, the Downes Garage on Johns Street and the Early Garage on Middlesex Street – are designated as a free parking option for Lowell residents who lack off-street parking.

The sealed bids will be publicly opened on Nov. 30, at City Hall in the Purchasing Department, Room 60, 375 Merrimack St.

The contract has a quick turnaround time for the repairs, which should begin on or about Dec. 7, 2026 and end on or before Jan. 31, 2027.