MONTICELLO — It’s been more than a year, but after this weekendthe post office here will have a new address.

Ralph Upton, postmaster, said the facility will operate underbroken hours Saturday as they move into a new building, butservices should be restored to normal by Monday.

“This building will close at noon Saturday to move mail from theold boxes to the new and will reopen at 2 p.m. to exchange P.O. boxkeys,” he said.

The office will close at four as normal Saturday and reopen atthe new building at the intersection of Highway 84 and GrahamAvenue at 8 a.m. Monday.

Upton said he does not expect any service delays associated withthe move. He said if they experience any problems he can call inpostal service specialists to get it fixed and continue movingforward.

“I’m excited about getting it over,” he said. “It’s a big job toclose in one location and reopen in another in the time we have. Ithink it’s going to serve this community really well.”

Construction on the new building started in April 1999, Uptonsaid. He said the new building was needed because of the growingnumber of box customers, limited working room and lack ofparking.

“The current building just wasn’t large enough,” Upton said. “Weneeded more P.O. boxes and had nowhere to put them and our routesare growing.”

Parking was also a problem at the present location.

“Basically, if not for the old grocery store parking lot wewould have only eight parking spaces here,” Upton said. “Ourcustomers needed more parking.”

The postmaster said they took future operations and technologyinto consideration when constructing the new building. Even thoughthey will not be adding any new technology at the moment, he said,the new building has more telecommunications capabilities than theold.

Upton said the new location does not mean new services will beintroduced into the area.

“We’re already offering full services for this size postoffice,” he said.

One concern about the move among members of the downtowncommunity has been addressed, Upton said.

The move will take the post office out of the downtown area andbusinesses were concerned about the inconvenience of deliveringmail to the post office. Upton said to help address this concernthe post office will install a drop box in front of city hall.

In order to provide more convenience to its customers, Uptonsaid, another drop box will be located in the post office parkinglot at the exit to Graham Avenue so customers do not have comeinside to mail their correspondence.