Building Design & Construction articles from May 2009

Building Design & Construction archives from May 2009

The ABCs of Green Acoustics.
May 1, 2009... By Dave Barista, Managing Editor Keep these three sound principles in mind when designing open-plan spaces for your next green office project. For all the attention green buildings get these days, many fall woefully short of...

Serving the Community, At Home and Abroad.(Company overview)
May 1, 2009... Robert Cassidy The Beck Group was founded in Houston in 1912 by Henry C. Beck, as a general contractor. In 1924, Beck opened an office in Dallas, where the company is based today; it also has offices in Atlanta, Austin, Denver, Fort Worth,...

Canadian Design Firm Makes Its Mark.
May 1, 2009... Robert Cassid For a firm of its size--45-50 employees, depending on the number of interns on board at any time--Manasc Isaac Architects Ltd. has done more than its share to raise environmental and social consciousness in its home city of...

Connecting the Firm to the Community.
May 1, 2009... Jay W. Schneider Some time ago, when Deborah Bermond was interviewing a prospective employee for a management position at Roy Anderson Corp, the VP of human resources suggested that the candidate walk the halls to get a feel for the...

9 Rules for Re-cladding with Brick Veneer.(Brick Industry Association)
May 1, 2009... Dave Barista Looking to spice up a dilapidated building with a fresh new brick face? Consider these valuable recommendations from the Brick Industry Association's technical guru, Brian Trimble. 1 Make sure the brick wall is on a sound...

Cronkite Communication School Speaks to Phoenix Redevelopment.
May 1, 2009... By Jay W. Schneider, Senior Editor Phoenix wanted to revitalize its downtown; Arizona State University wanted stronger ties to the city. Together they used building information modeling to plan a new campus and put a media icon at its...

Team Tames Impossible Site.
May 1, 2009... By Jeff Yoders, Senior Associate Editor "For the purpose of instructing persons, who may choose to apply themselves, in the application of science to the common purposes of life." -- Stephen Van Rensselaer, III, in a letter establishing...

Setting the Green Standard For Community Colleges.
May 1, 2009... By Dave Barista, Managing Editor A visionary president and aninnovative Building Team take a community college project to a new level of sustainability. "Ohlone College Newark Campus Is the Greenest College in the World!" That...

Financial Wizardry Builds a Community.
May 1, 2009... Robert Cassidy At 69 square miles, Vineland is New Jersey's largest city, at least in geographic area, and it has a rich history. It was established in 1861 as a planned community (well before there were such things) by the utopian Charles...

'A Very Brave Building'.
May 1, 2009... Robert Cassidy Judson University, located along the Fox River in Elgin, Ill., 45 miles west of Chicago, is the only evangelical Christian university in the U.S. to offer a fully accredited professional architecture degree program,...

Cadets Go off the Grid.
May 1, 2009... Robert Cassidy The Building Team for the Massachusetts Maritime Academy could have taken the easy route: just build a new cadet residence hall on the only remaining open space on the landlocked 55-acre campus at Buzzards Bay, renovate the...

Penn State Completes Its First BIM Project.(Pennsylvania State University)
May 1, 2009... Robert Cassidy In 2000, Pennsylvania State University's law school merged with Dickinson Law School, a 170-year-old independent law school in Carlisle, Pa., about 85 miles southeast of Penn State's University Park campus. Both schools saw...

Building Team Awards Judges.(Brief article)(List)
May 1, 2009... Staff A Dan Huntington, SE, PE, LEED AP Associate Principal KJWW Engineering Consultants Rock Island, Ill. B Corey Wieseman, AIA, LEED AP Principal DLR GroupChicago C Carol Ross Barney, FAIA Principal Ross Barney Architects...

Utah hopes to attract best and brightest with interdisciplinary research facility.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff The University of Utah last month broke ground on a $130 million interdisciplinary research facility, the first of four buildings that will create a new Interdisciplinary Quadrangle planned to attract top faculty researchers and fuel...

Luxury office tower tops out in New York's Meatpacking District.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff CB Developers has topped out its 15-story green office and retail project in New York's Meatpacking District. Designed by Morris Adjmi Architects, the LEED Gold-registered development will be one of the only buildings to offer an...

North American-curriculum school expands in Cairo.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff Located on 11 acres and comprising 13 buildings, Cairo (Egypt) American College provides a North American-based curriculum to 1,400 students ranging from pre-K to twelfth grade. The school adopted a new master plan and commissioned...

Workforce housing under wayin Rancho Cucamonga.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff Construction has commenced on a 166-unit mixed-income apartment community for low-wage workers in Southern California's Inland Empire. Designed by Irvine, Calif.-based KTGY Group, the 10.5-acre Villaggio at Route 66 development will...

FDA consolidating 8,900 people at 19-building Silver Spring campus.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff One of the nation's largest government construction projects is the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Consolidation Project in the White Oak section of Silver Spring, Md. The $1.4 billion project, which is being overseen by the U.S....

South Korea gets animated with new museum complex.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff In a step toward global recognition of South Korea's established animation industry, the city of Bucheon is building the new Korean Animation Museum. Designed by the Los Angeles office of international design firm NBBJ, the...

Retail complex nearly complete in Miami Beach.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff Seven years in the making, the high-profile Fifth and Alton retail and parking complex in Miami Beach, Fla., is nearly complete. Suffolk Construction is putting the final touches on the $50 million, 750,000-sf development, which is...

University of Minnesota's civil engineering building will double as demonstration project.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff The 34,000-sf James I. Swenson Civil Engineering Building at the University of Minnesota Duluth will house offices and instructional and research laboratories to support a new bachelor of science degree the university added to its...

School district plans net-zero building.
May 1, 2009... Staff Camas (Wash.) School District is planning to utilize one of three energy sources--photovoltaics, wind turbine, or geothermal--to help take its new community high school completely off the grid. The school district commissioned...

Green HQ going up in Miami.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff Formgroup, Coral Gables, Fla., has been commissioned by communications company CIMA Telecom to design its 24,000-sf headquarters in Miami. The nine-story, LEED Gold pre-certified office building will get 25% of its power from solar...

Office complex will incorporate a bit of Summit, N.J., history.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff Greenock Capital Management and CB Richard Ellis have broken ground on the 46,570-sf Claremont Corporate Center in Summit, N.J. The two-story, Class A office complex will incorporate the adjacent turn-of-the-century Risk Mansion,...

Cooper Union academic building designed to reach LEED Platinum.(Morphosis Architects and Gruzen Samton are collaborating on an ultra-green academic building )(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff Morphosis Architects and Gruzen Samton are collaborating on an ultra-green academic building for New York's Cooper Union that is designed to achieve LEED Platinum certification. The program for the nine-story facility mixes...

Time to meet urban sprawl's new cousin.
May 1, 2009... Robert Cassidy, Editor-in-Chief OK, get your pencils out for a quick quiz: What do Detroit, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia have in common, besides having Major League Baseball teams? Answer: the highest percentage of "job...

2009: The year of energy analysis.(2009 AIA National Convention and Design Exposition )
May 1, 2009... By Jeff Yoders, Senior Associate Editor One of the most valuable takeaways from the 2009 AIA National Convention and Design Exposition in San Francisco was that, at long last, software manufacturers have become serious about whole-building...

More from AIA 2009.(Survey)(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff - By next year, most architects will be using BIM.BIM modeling is predicted to achieve total marketplace use in the next five years. Currently, 43% of architects say they're heavy BIM users, meaning that more than 60% of their work...

Retail construction continues its plunge.
May 1, 2009... Jim Haughey, BD+C Economist and Chief Economist with Reed Construction Data Retail is the weakest commercial construction market, with jobsite construction spending declining 28% since its September 2007 peak. More than two-thirds of the...

RSMeans cost comparisons.
May 1, 2009... Staff [TABLE OMITTED]

Letters.
May 1, 2009... Staff AIA's McEntee rebuts BD+C on the stimulus package Your editorial ("Congress to AEC industry: Drop dead!" March 2009) is based on missing details about the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. While the design and construction...

Nonresidential building materials prices drop 0.6%.
May 1, 2009... Jim Haughey The construction materials price index for nonresidential buildings fell 0.6% in March extending the decline since the September peak to 12.8%. Materials prices are back to the January 2008 level before the 14% jump in prices...

Roof boards for commercial roofing assemblies.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff DensDeck roof boards are designed to address fire resistance, moisture resistance, strength, and dimensional stability in commercial roofing assemblies. DensDeck Prime's enhanced surface treatment offers a useful substrate for many...

Ceiling and wall tiles stop sound.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff Phonstop Ceiling and Wall Tiles are made from 100% recycled glass sintered to form rigid, lightweight and porous sound absorbers. Phonstop V (for adhesive applications on walls and celings) has an NRC of up to 0.90; Phonstop E...

Not too hot, not too cold.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff Showermaster 7600 Thermostatic Mixing Valves provide dependable control of water temperature for commercial shower applications. Copper-encapsulated thermostat, compensation for supply temperature and pressure fluctuations, built-in...

Panels offer continuous insulation.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff Eco-ficient-brand wall panels provide an attractive exterior profile, insulation, and clean interior profile in one product. Panels provide continuous insulation as required in certain energy codes. Applications : Government...

Glass mats: No mold here.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff CertainTeed GlasRoc Tile Backer features Embedded Glass Reinforced Gypsum technology, which combines reinforcing glass mats fully embedded into a water-resistant gypsum core and a protective acrylic coating. Provides a flat, uniform...

This little light of mine.(Brief article)
May 1, 2009... Staff DanaLite's low-profile DL100 modular, linear LED lighting system provides a miniature directional source for white light applications. Lifespan: 50,000 hours. Applications : Casework, display lighting, retail, grocery,...

'A moral responsibility to use research in design'.(WHR Architects, Inc)(Interview)
May 1, 2009... Staff David H. Watkins , FAIA, is chairman of the board and founding principal of WHR Architects, Inc., a 30-year-old design firm with offices in Houston, Dallas, and Lake Como, N.J. He is the author, with former WHR partner D. Kirk...