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Baltimore School Named World’s Second-Largest LEED Platinum Project

School News — Tue, 22 Nov 2016 19:15:44 +0000

BALTIMORE — Green Street Academy in West Baltimore was recently recognized as the first project in Maryland to achieve LEED Platinum certification under the USGBC’s Schools v3 rating system. The public charter middle and high school is also the second-largest project in the world to receive this specific honor.

The 111,000-square-foot Green Street Academy in West Baltimore recently celebrated its LEED Platinum certification. Photo Credit: Hord Coplan Macht

Located in a 1920s-era structure that once housed Gwynns Falls High School, Green Street Academy opened in fall 2015 following a $23 million renovation to the landmark building. The academy was developed by Seawall Development Co. and designed by architecture firm Hord Coplan Macht — both of Baltimore. Southway Builders, also of Baltimore, and Washington, D.C.-based MCN Build completed the extensive renovations in a joint venture.

Academy leaders received word of the school’s LEED Platinum certification in May, but were officially awarded the certification in October. School officials and students as well as representatives of the development, design and construction teams attended the award ceremony.

Green Street Academy’s recent honor is a strong example of how the school puts its mission of offering sustainable, future-focused education into action, according to a statement by Dan Schochor, Green Street Academy’s executive director. “Much has been made about the importance of creating 21st century-prepared students through education, and there is no better way to accomplish that goal than to surround those same students with a structure that very literally supports that mission and vision,” Schochor said.

The 111,000-square-foot facility achieved LEED Platinum certification for implementing practical and measurable strategies and solutions aimed at achieving high performance in sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection and indoor-environmental quality. Sustainability and resiliency strategies were integrated throughout the building process. For example, the site offers a variety of connections to the surrounding community and supports public transportation, bikes and pedestrian traffic. Preferred parking was added for fuel-efficient vehicles and carpools, and open spaces were maximized to create outdoor learning areas. The heat-island effect was also reduced with the addition of reflective roofs.

The project team also ensured the responsible use of natural resources via water-efficient landscaping and enhanced commissioning system verification. Nearly 8 percent of the school’s energy is produced through photovoltaic parking canopies.

The careful renovation reused 100 percent of the existing building’s walls, floors and roofs as well as 66 percent of its existing interior non-structural elements. More than 80 percent of construction waste was diverted from landfills, and recycled materials constituted 41 percent of new materials installed. Sustainable strategies were further developed into an overall site master plan, including the addition of a cistern-fed gardens, an entrance canopy with a green roof, a community fruit orchard and a global outdoor classroom, among other initiatives.

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AIA Announces Educational Facility Design Awards

WASHINGTON — The American Institute of Architects’ Committee on Architecture for Education selected 13 educational and cultural facilities for this year’s Educational Facility Design Awards, which aim to identify trends and emerging ideas, honor excellence in planning and design and disseminate knowledge about best practices in educational and community facilities.x

The categories for the awards were divided into levels of Citation, Merit and Excellence.

Photo Credit: Eduard Hueber

The recipients of the Excellence Category include the Royal Conservatory at the Telus Centre for Performance and Learning in Toronto, a historic restoration and adaptive reuse of two Victorian masonry buildings and the addition of a new pavilion which houses practice studios, classrooms and a 1,135-seat hall. The architect is Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects.

The GFS Sustainable Urban Science Center in Philadelphia, designed by SMP Architects, is a lab classroom building featuring rainwater harvesting systems, green roofs and raingarden landscapes.

Photo Credit: Halkin Photography

The design firm worked with the Germantown Friends School to support student engagement in the lab — “within, around, and in some cases, on top of the facility,” according to association officials.

The Saguaro Building at Mesa Community College in Mesa, Ariz., was designed by SmithGroup to organize a wide array of program elements, and is located on a preserved desert campus. Its black box theater is designed as an iconic element to “punctuate the campus’ presence amongst surrounding stucco strip malls,” officials said. Its two-story lobby is designed to serve as the student union with a cyber café and terrariums, along with other student support space.

Photo Credit: Bill Timmerman

The Merit category includes the Learning Spring School in New York, the Springfield Literacy Center in Springfield, Pa., Gary Comer College Prep in Chicago and Marysville Getchell High School in Marysville, Washington .

Also recognized in the Merit category were Park Shops in Raleigh, N.C., the James I Swenson Civil Engineering Building in Duluth, Minn., and the Center for Graduate Fellows in Charlottesville, Va.

Featured in the Citation category were the Mothers’ Club Family Learning Center in Pasadena, Calif., St. Albans School’s Marriott Hall in Washington, D.C., and PACCAR Hall at the Foster School of Business in Seattle.

For more details on the award-winning sites, visit AIA’s website at http://www.aia.org/.

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Bid Date Extended for Oakland Youth Center

OAKLAND, Calif. — The bid date on Alameda County’s Ashland Youth Center was extended to March 21.

The number of beds to be installed in the $14 million, 31,500-square-foot facility, which will be built in Oakland, has not been determined.

Only four bidders — Clark & Sullivan Construction, Hensel Phelps Construction, Turner Construction Co., and Vanir/Otto, a Joint Venture – who prequalified last September via the request for pre-qualification of design build entities are eligible to submit proposals.

The county will receive sealed proposals from pre-qualified bidders on March 21 at 2pm. Howard Johnson is serving as the county’s project manager.

The center will provide youth-oriented programs in arts, culture, recreation, education, career training and health and wellness. A community health clinic, library, child daycare facility, a multi-media room for the production and editing of music and video projects, a dance studio that can double as a performance/theater/gallery space, a fitness room, an arts room and a café will be included to enhance the programs.

The Alameda County Health Care Services Agency will manage the facility and will operate it in conjunction with numerous community partners and stakeholders providing services to youth. All community partners and stakeholders are involved in the master planning and schematic design discussions and are expected to continue their involvement during the design and construction meetings.

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Academic PPP to Convert Methane Gas to Electricity

GASTON, S.C. — Clemson University is partnering with regional utility Santee Cooper and biogas expert Environmental Fabrics Inc. to construct a new renewable energy facility that will generate power from methane gas, according to Clemson officials.

Burrows Hall Renewable Energy Facility will be the first of its kind in South Carolina, capturing methane gas at a Williamsburg County farm and delivering it to electric customers on the Santee Cooper system.

The 180-kilowatt building — the result of a public-private partnership — is expected to begin generating renewable energy for the grid early this summer, averaging power for approximately 90 South Carolina homes.

Other partners involved in the project are Santee Electric Cooperative, the South Carolina Energy Office and the South Carolina Department of Agriculture.

The idea was first proposed by Duffy Connolly, owner of Burrows Hall Farm, who approached Santee Cooper four years ago with an idea of building an Anaerobic Digester that could capture the methane gas produced naturally on his hog form into a fuel source for electricity.

Connolly and Santee Cooper then turned to Clemson University’s South Carolina Institute for Energy Studies to help define and implement the project, using a grant administered by the South Carolina Energy Office and funded by the South Carolina Department of Agriculture.

Clemson’s Institute for Energy Studies evaluated more than 20 different companies and approaches before recommending EFI, a Gaston-based firm, who was chosen to design, build and manage the digester.

Santee Cooper has contracted to purchase the power, which Santee Electric Cooperative will distribute from Burrows Hall to the Santee Cooper transmission network, the statement said.

The venture is expected to benefit the state’s economy by using 100 percent of South Carolina resources, providing cost-effective renewable energy, reducing the need for traditional fuel sources, and outline the potential for similar systems in the state, according to the statement.

“The S.C. Energy Office was glad to work in conjunction with Clemson University and the S.C. Department of Agriculture to facilitate a project that shows the diverse potential for renewable applications in South Carolina,” said Ashlie Lancaster, S.C. Energy Office’s director. “This project taps into indigenous energy resources in our state which not only creates jobs but also helps to reduce harmful emissions.”

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Construction Boondoggle Leaves Classroom Seats Empty

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Schools built through the state’s emergency construction funding resulted in more than 25 percent of empty seats at half the schools, a state report found.

In accordance with Florida law, the state established the Special Facility Construction Account to provide financial assistance to school districts that lack the resources to address urgent construction needs.

However, a report released by the Legislature’s Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability found that the new schools were often larger than justified given expected student population growth patterns.

Between fiscal years 1998-99 and 2009-10, districts received Special Facility Construction Account funds for 25 school projects, but each of these projects “created more student stations than needed to serve the number of students who were enrolled in the 2009-10 school year,” according to the report.

Thirteen of the 25 projects had more than 25 percent excess student stations, which totaled $108 million in additional construction costs, the report stated.

The excess may be due to a decline in the projected student enrollment due to a poor economy, which has affected Florida’s overall population growth, according to the report.

Additionally, because funding was restricted to building new schools rather than expanding current facilities, districts may have had an incentive to request funds for larger schools since they would not be able to obtain program funds in later years for smaller program funds, the report said.

To prevent excess in the future, the report recommends clarifying the types of projects eligible for funding and the department’s role in making decisions, as well as requiring approval for final construction plans for program-funded projects, among others.

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Aquatic Facility Targets LEED Silver

SAN MATEO, Calif. — An educational building that opens out to a competition swimming pool is not the typical layout a person might expect to find in a high school setting.

But at the private Junipero Serra High School in San Mateo, Calif., the academic and aqua pairing is presently under construction as part of a four-phase master plan designed to upgrade the school’s facilities and programs, and to improve its outdoors spaces.

“It is kind of an unusual pairing — usually you don’t want athletics mixed with classrooms,” says Dan Wetherell, principal and director of business development at the Ratcliff architectural firm, in nearby Emeryville. ╥The facilities work well together in space and on paper. The main link between the two is the outdoor spaces. Given the limitations of the site we were able to make it work.╙

The $21 million Center for the Arts and Sciences and Aquatics Facility features a 24,000-square-foot classroom building, and a 38-meter by 25-yard pool. The center’s outdoor promenade links to the school’s drop-off site and parking garage, providing a main entrance to the campus and to the pool for swim competitions. An outdoor courtyard adjacent to the pool and academic building provides space for swim teams and social gatherings, as does a quad next to the center’s art room. Included in Phase One of the project, both are slated for completion by June 2011.

Designed to LEED Silver standards by Ratcliff, and being constructed by Hathaway Dinwiddie of San Francisco, the arts and science building will feature five science lecture laboratories; new facilities for school yearbook, newspaper and film production; and a large art room and new ceramics area. High-tech music and theater spaces include a band rehearsal and choral room, recording studio, and a green room.

When completed, the classroom building will be outfitted to handle smart board technology and wireless computer connectivity stations.

“Part of integrating all this technology allows the teachers to use different instructional pedagogies,” Wetherell says. “What we believe is key in good classroom design is flexibility — not every teacher wants to teach the same way. We tried to make the spaces large enough so teachers can be pretty flexible in them.?

Acoustical design was also important in a building that contains rooms for band rehearsal, science instruction, and painting — all side-by-side, says Wetherell.

Having a large building mass also contributes to the center’s green features, providing for passive solar heat gain ╤ or the ability to store heat within the walls and floors even though the sun isn’t shining. Other sustainable elements include a naturally daylit design and recycled building materials.

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