Sports/Entertainment Award of Merit/Excellence in Safety Award of Merit: MGM National Harbor Resort

The $1.4-billion casino and resort complex includes a 23-story hotel, 125,000 sq ft of gaming space, several restaurants, a 3,000-seat entertainment venue, a 15,000-sq-ft conservatory, a two-level spa, meeting and event space, a 4,700-space parking structure and retail stores.

Photo by Stephen Wilkes, courtesy of ECS Mid-Atlantic LLC

MGM National Harbor Resort
Oxon Hill, Md.
Award of Merit

Owner: MGM National Harbor
Lead Design Firm/MEP Engineer: SmithGroupJJR
General Contractor: The Whiting-Turner Contracting Co.
Civil Engineer: Soltesz Inc.
Structural Engineer: Cagley & Associates Inc.
Architect: Hamilton-Anderson Associates
Project Manager: McKissack & McKissack
Geotechnical Engineer: ECS Mid-Atlantic LLC
Design Architect: HKS Hospitality Group
Subcontractor: Schuster Concrete Construction; Banker Steel Co.; Rosendin Electric Inc.; Phalcon Integrated Ltd. (Mechanical/Central Utility Plant)

The $1.4-billion casino and resort complex overlooking the Potomac River and the District of Columbia is one of the only casinos in the world to achieve a LEED Gold certification. The team reduced the building’s overall energy usage by 30%. A combined heat and power tri-generation plant includes a natural gas generator, absorption chiller and heat-recovery boiler that produces electricity as well as chilled and hot water for use on site.

A low-voltage distribution scheme was developed to reduce the risk of a single utility failure and avoided the cost of a fully redundant distribution system. With the building occupying nearly 90% of the property, stormwater runoff is captured by two cisterns totaling 700,000 gallons and then used for drip irrigation, flushing toilets and cooling towers.

The project includes a 23-story hotel, 125,000 sq ft of gaming space, several restaurants, a 3,000-seat entertainment venue, a 15,000-sq-ft conservatory, a two-level spa, meeting and event space, a 4,700-space parking structure and retail stores. The project was also chosen by the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration to participate in the National Safety Stand Down in 2016. Although the team moved quickly to meet the owner’s 30-month schedule, the project had a 0.73 lost-time accident rate during more than 5.5 million hours worked. A written, project-specific safety program included 100% onsite drug testing.

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