ROCKPORT — Granite Savings Bank is scheduled to open its new $3.7 million home next week, bank officials say, moving the facility up Main Street and out of the downtown for the first time in the institution's 125-year history.

The bank, at 26 Broadway, will be closed Saturday as employees move into their new workspace at 247 Main St., adjacent to Sandy Bay Service Center.

Bank officials said Granite Savings Bank's mortgage department will be closed today and tomorrow as a result of the move. They also said telephone service over the weekend may be intermittent as Verizon works to switch the bank's telephone number to the new location.

The bank, which has assets estimated at $65 million, will open for business in its new, 10,453-square-foot structure Monday.

The move, though only 1.1 miles up the street, is big symbolically for the small mutual savings bank

This is the bank's fourth main office in Rockport. Prior to its last move along Broadway, the bank spent 1927 to 1970 in the Main Street building housing Toad Hall Bookstore. When the bank first opened in 1885, it called Richardson's Store home.

The new location was originally intended to open in late February or early March, but was delayed by problems incurred during the ledge removal process, bank President Norm Seppala said.

"No project of this size and magnitude goes according to schedule and ours was no exception," Seppala said.

The bank plans to sell both of its buildings on Broadway, but as of Tuesday, neither property had been listed with a real estate agency. Some potential buyers have already expressed interest in both buildings, Seppala said, though he did not identify interested parties.

The town of Rockport previously explored acquiring the bank's primary Broadway building, first as a potential site for a new senior center, then as a municipal building to house Town Hall departments on either a temporary or permanent basis.

But selectmen instead approved a plan to house the senior center in a renovated Community House, and — when a ballot question regarding the $894,400 purchase of the bank building referred only to its use as a municipal building — voters emphatically shot it down last November.

A convenient feature of the new bank building will be the two, covered drive-through lanes on the building's western side, serviced by an automatic teller machine and teller window. Customers will enter the property from Wildon Heights and exit onto Main Street, Seppala said.

Customers will enter the "attractively designed lobby area" at ground level and find customer representatives and private offices. The second floor of the building will house the core of the bank's lending department, which is now located in a second bank-owned building on Broadway.

"It's a location that offers much more space and convenience and so much more in terms of parking and the like," Seppala said. "The benefits outweigh our present location."

The new office building offers 46 parking spaces, nearly three dozen more than the 12 spaces offered at the Broadway location.

All 16 part- and full-time employees will keep their jobs after the move to the new location, Seppala said, adding the bank has plans to expand business hours and increase personnel in the coming months.

The building was designed to fit in with the residential nature of the Wildon Heights neighborhood that it is joining.

"It has a very nice, traditional, New England design that you might see along the Back Shore or on the larger homes in town located on the water," Seppala said. "When we set out to do it, we wanted to present it in a way that when you came into town, it was a really nice entryway into Rockport."

The former Donut Dream coffee shop and the neighboring house at 249 Main St. were both demolished to clear the 1-acre plot for the bank's new two-story office building.

The bank purchased the land from developer Alan Battistelli in spring 2006 for $1.2 million. Battistelli had proposed condominiums for the land.

The bank plans to commemorate its 125th anniversary with a special ceremony in August.

Jonathan L'Ecuyer can be reached at jlecuyer@gloucestertimes.com.

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