“We will bring this building up to 21st-century environmental standards as a museum and maintain certain temperatures and humidity [levels],” says Timothy Hartung, a partner in Ennead Architects and the management partner on the project. “We are building a new building within the building.”

The team is essentially constructing a box within the original walls to keep vapors out and adding a central HVAC system, which will allow the museum to keep the humidity at 50%.

The city plans to seek at minimum LEED-Silver certification in the commercial interior category. The project is close to public transportation and maximizes density on the site, Hartung says. The job also expects to receive points for optimizing energy performance, lighting controls, adding insulation, replacing windows with energy-efficient thermally glazed units, and upgrading to more efficient mechanical equipment.

“It has a lot of attributes that are green, but they are invisible,” adds Richard Olcott, design partner at Ennead Architects.

Phase two should finish in October 2011. The first portion has been completed and the museum has moved into its new offices. The third $16 million phase, renovation of the North Wing, awaits funding.

Remsen Yards

Kiss + Cathcart Architects designed the city’s Department of Environmental Protection’s $38 million, 98,000-sq-ft Remsen Yard Reconstruction. The 2.5-acre maintenance facility in Brooklyn includes equipment and material storage, machine shop, vehicle garages, and administrative and support spaces. The project seeks LEED-Gold certification. Green features include a rooftop rainwater collection system with a 20,000-gallon underground tank. The system will collect 1 million gal of water annually for reuse washing trucks and flushing toilets. Photovoltaic skylight panels will produce electricity. Skylights represent about 20% of the 80-ft, long-span roof and will let daylight into the site. Masonry and metal panels will clad the exterior.

“The ratio of the building to the yard is small, maybe 30%, and the rest is truck and material pile yards,” says Jeff Miles, associate principal with Kiss + Cathcart. “They can work in there in the snow and rain and stay dry.”

URS Corp. of New York serves as construction manager. The five prime contractors are Ruttura and Sons of West Babylon, N.Y, foundation and structural construction; M.A. Angeliades of Long Island City, N.Y., general construction; Maric Mechanical, East Elmhurst, N.Y., plumbing; Planet Mechanical, of Long Island City, mechanical; and Metro York Electrical, of Long Island City, electrical. The project is scheduled for a February 2011 completion.

The Lion’s Den

Hill International provided project management services for the beaux-arts-style Bronx Zoo Lion House, the first New York City project to achieve LEED-Gold certification.

“It was a difficult, difficult project, but I am proud we were able to do that project,” says Michael Brothers, vice president of Hill. “It is something that will be around for another 200 years.”

The $45 million project, completed in 2008, restored the 1903 Astor Court landmark building, preserving its historical properties, while raising it to create a subbasement with a filtration system for the Sea Lion Pool. The reconstruction increased the size of the 350-ft by 80-ft building from 18,000 sq ft to 43,500 sq ft.

“We had to jack the whole facility up,” Brothers says. “There was a tremendous amount of work that had to happen to stabilize the building while we did the jacking procedure.”

The project, designed by FXFowle of New York, incorporated a gray water system, circulating water from the washbasins for use in wastewater. The team added a geothermal well and installed an inflatable Teflon skylight system for ventilation and lighting.

During the project, the team found Gruby tiles, handmade for the zoo with scenes and drawings of animals. The team took thousands of the tiles out, while cataloging them. They then cleaned the tiles and replaced them.

The zoo moved the big cats to a new natural-style exhibit in the 1980s. The Lion House now displays plants and animals from Madagascar and provides space for community meetings and educational activities.