| Chicago Planners
OK 124-Story Tower The Chicago Plan Commission has unanimously approved
the 124-story Fordham Spire, a tower that would be the nation's tallest and possibly
the world's tallest if built.
Superstar architect Santiago Calatrava, the
Spanish-born architect who now practice in Zurich, is the designer.
The
2,000-ft.-tall condo and hotel project, which would rise at 420 E. North Water
Street near Lake Michigan and just opposite Navy Pier, depends on whether financing
can be obtained.
Christopher Carley, chairman of the Chicago-based Fordham
Co., said at a news conference in a Loop restaurant after the city meeting that
he is negotiating with two U.S. firms and a European firm on financing deals.
Since the project was announced late last summer, the estimated cost has gone
up 10 percent to $550 million.
Several changes have been implemented to
the swirling design that some say evokes a corkscrew since the original announcement,
including those intended to counter concerns about the threat of terrorism.
A
parking garage will not be located in the building, as originally planned, but
rather in a separate six-story structure nearby.
The tower's spire has
been changed to integrate broadcast antennae for digital broadcasting-a move that
could bring in funds.
Originally, the project called for 250 condominium
units, but plans now call for 300 units and 150 for-sale hotel rooms, in addition
to a traditional hotel.
Carley is negotiating with Chicago-based Walsh
Construction Co. to be the contractor.
The target date for groundbreaking
is the latter part of 2006 or early 2007.
Harley Goes Hog Wild With Urban, Green Design
The
design was unveiled for the Harley-Davidson Museum at the corner of Sixth and
Canal Streets near downtown Milwaukee.
The Harley-Davidson Museum design
has been in development for more than a year and included extensive input from
Milwaukee city officials.
The 130,000-sq.-ft. museum will feature exhibit
space as well as a restaurant, café, retail shop, meeting space, special
event facilities and the Harley-Davidson corporate archives.
The plan for
the Harley-Davidson Museum and its surrounding site incorporates striking urban
design elements. The design engages the surrounding water and green space, and
it unites the city center with the Menomonee Valley, reflecting the industrial
heritage of the area and of Harley-Davidson.
The design is urban and industrial
and includes the following:
The restoration of the historical street
grid to the end of the Menomonee Valley. Canal Street will now reach to the water
and Traser, Seeboth and Fifth streets will be restored.
The museum
will be a collection of three buildings. They are the museum itself, the archives
and annex, and the retail, restaurant and special events building.
The buildings will be located along the street edge to truly establish street
definition.
The building's glass facades will connect the inside and
outside of the Museum and the street - a counterpart to the traditional enclosed
museum.
This will activate the site and create street life and a neighborhood
within the city.
Sustainable design elements include the use of porous
materials in the parking gardens to permit water to percolate into the ground
and lessen storm water runoff for sustainability and light colored roofs and concrete
streets to reflect and reduce heat to moderate summer temperatures in the area.
The
lead design architect is New York-based Pentagram. Other key members of the development
team include the Milwaukee office of Minneapolis-based Hammel, Green and Abrahamson,
Milwaukee as the architect of record and Milwaukee-based M.A. Mortenson Co. as
the construction manager.
Harley-Davidson plans to break ground for the
Museum in the first half of 2006 with anticipated opening in 2008.
Standard Planned for Green Building A standard that
is being developed by three engineering organizations is in the works for high
performance green building.
Proposed Standard 189, Standard for the Design
of High-Performance Green Buildings Except Low-Rise Residential Buildings, will
provide minimum requirements for the design of sustainable buildings to balance
environmental responsibility, resource efficiency, occupant comfort and well-being
and community sensitivity.
The standard will use the Washington, D.C.-based
U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Green
Building Rating System, which addresses the top 25 percent of building practices
as a key resource. The hope is that Standard 189P will provide a baseline that
will drive green building into mainstream practices.
Scheduled for completion
in 2007, the proposed standard will apply to new commercial buildings and major
renovation projects, addressing sustainable sites, water use efficiency, energy
efficiency, a building's impact on the atmosphere, materials and resources, and
indoor environmental quality.
Standard 189P will be an ANSI-accredited
standard that can be incorporated into building code. It is intended that the
standard will eventually become a prerequisite under LEED.
Along with the
USGBC, the sponsors are the Atlanta-based American Society of Heating, Refrigerating
and Air-Conditioning Engineers and the New York-based Illuminating Engineering
Society of North America.
Fermilab
Project Nominated for Civil Engineering Achievement
A project at Fermi
National Accelerator Laboratory in southwest suburban Batavia has been named a
finalist in a civil engineering competition.
The Neutrinos at the Main
Injector project is the world's first high-energy, long-baseline neutrino experiment.
NuMI
project, which leads the neutrino physics program of the U.S. Department of Energy,
will enhance understanding of matter and the universe by sending neutrinos sub-atomic
particles with negligible mass and electric charge 435 mi. from Fermilab through
solid bedrock to a detector in Soudan, Minn., seeking changes during the journey.
The
$170 million project provides underground and aboveground facilities including
three major experimental caverns at Fermilab, which are connected to two subsurface
buildings by vertical access shafts at a maximum of 360 ft. below ground over
approximately 4,200 lin. ft. The Far Detector cavern and tunnels, completed in
2001, are 2,340 ft. below grade at the level 27 of the Soudan Lab. Technical equipment
was installed through 2003, construction was completed in 2004 and experimental
installation began in January 2005.
Design and construction of the underground
research facility posed several major challenges, including:
State-of-the-art
numerical modeling of the caverns.
Large-scale pump tests and groundwater
monitoring;
Composite lining systems with geotextile membranes and
drainage fabrics;
HVAC systems with desiccated air supply;
Use of underground sump water inflow for process cooling;
Chilled-water
cooling systems to maintain stability and alignment of critical project components
under thermal loading; and
A 78-in.-diameter, half-mile-long steel
pipe backfilled with up to eight-feet of controlled, low-strength cementitious
material to contain radiation from particle beam decay during the experiment operations.
Illinois'
Corley Gets Engineering's OPAL
Illinois' W. Gene Corley has received national
recognition as a recipient of the Outstanding Projects and Leaders, or OPAL, award
from the American Society of Civil Engineers in Reston, Va.
Corley, who
received the OPAL in the design category, is senior vice president of CTLGroup
in north suburban Skokie.
In announcing the award, ASCE said Corley has
wide-ranging international experience in consulting on earthquake- and blast-resistant
structures, bridge design and construction. He served as the principal investigator
for the Federal Emergency
Management Agency on the Oklahoma City Bombing
building performance assessment team and was the team leader for the ASCE/FEMA
World Trade Center building performance assessment team.
The OPAL awards
honor outstanding projects and professional civil engineers for lifelong contributions
in five categories-public works, construction, management, design and education.
The
three other OPAL recipients are practice outside the Midwest.
Central
Illinois Town is Main Street Semifinalist
Jacksonville, Ill., in the central
part of the state was named one of the 11 semifinalists for the 2006 Great American
Main Street Awards. Two of the other semifinalists are in Iowa, Charles City and
Waverly, and the rest were in other parts of the country.
The semifinalists
will move to the final round, and a national jury comprised of professionals from
the fields of historic preservation, economic development and community revitalization
will further evaluate the semifinalists and select five winners.
The Great
American Main Street Awards recognize five communities annually for achievement
in revitalizing America's historic and traditional commercial districts following
the National Trust's Main Street Approach to commercial district revitalization.
The winners receive $2,500 and other items.
Since their inception,
the Great American Main Street Awards have recognized 55 communities for their
commitment to historic preservation-based commercial district revitalization.
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