At SmithGroupJJR's Phoenix office, design excellence and sustainability are synonymous. The office has been responsible for 11 LEED-certified projects and has 12 more pending, but the firm's design philosophy has also brought some of the same sustainable features that SmithGroupJJR would employ on a LEED-Platinum project—high-performance building envelopes, energy modeling, daylight analysis and natural ventilation—to most of their other projects.. Related Links: ENR Southwest's Top 70 Design Firms Other Top Southwest Firms "I joke with clients [that] if you don't want a sustainable building, you're going to get one regardless because that's who we are and how we think about
The City of Mesa and Chicago Cubs this week announced plans to break ground on their new spring training baseball facility on July 11. The stadium will become the western headquarters for the Chicago Cubs. In addition, the City and Cubs are in final stages of an agreement that will make the complex the new home for the Arizona State University baseball program. Image courtesy City of Mesa The new spring training facility for the Chicago Cubs in Mesa, Ariz. will provide space for 15,000 fans. Image courtesy City of Mesa The stadium design features shaded seating. Arizona State University is in
The United States Department of Labor has begun to interpret the Davis-Bacon Act to require an employer to reimburse employees’ lodging expenses while away from home on prevailing wage jobs. This can create a substantial unanticipated assessment to an employer unaware of this interpretation. Photo courtesy Jennings, Haug & Cunningham Lough specializes in construction litigation matters, including construction industry employment issues. Contractors and subcontractors performing work on federally funded projects are subject to the prevailing wage requirements of the Davis-Bacon and Davis-Bacon Related Acts. When those projects are in a remote location or small rural community, a contractor may find
ENR’s annual Best Projects award program is dedicated to honoring the best construction projects and the companies that designed and built them in all 50 states plus Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico. Photo by Patrick Coulie 2011 Cultural Regional Winner: V. Sue Cleveland High School Orchestra Hall Projects compete in 18 specialized categories, ranging from transportation to higher education. Independent juries of industry leaders in design and construction from each of ENR’s 10 regional editions will judge the projects using five criteria, including safety, innovation and teamwork. The winners will be honored at awards ceremonies held in each region in
Nevada state engineer Jason King cleared the Southern Nevada Water Authority to draw 83,988 acre-ft of water annually from four valleys in rural White Pine and Lincoln counties in northeast Nevada, advancing toward the adoption of a proposed groundwater pipeline network that is designed to slake Las Vegas' growing thirst. Image Courtesy of SWNA SWNA's proposal calls for a 300-mile buried pipeline to supply Las Vegas with water. "This is another step in a permitting process that will help provide a greater degree of certainty for our long-term water supply," says John Entsminger, SNWA's senior deputy general manager, in a
The team behind several successful adaptive reuse projects will partner once again to create a new restaurant in an iconic piece of Phoenix architecture history. Located along North Central Avenue in downtown Phoenix, the former First Federal Savings & Loan Bank, designed by the regional mid-century modernist architect Alfred Newman Beadle, will be converted from offices to dining space by Phoenix-based developer Upward Projects, with the Phoenix office of Shepley Bulfinch as the design firm. The building has remained relatively intact over the years, and the design team plans on keeping it that way. "The bones of the structure are in excellent condition," says Ryan
A new retail property under way near Phoenix acquired an anchor tenant. Phoenix Premium Outlets, which broke ground two weeks ago in Chandler, Ariz., will be home to a Saks Fifth Avenue OFF 5TH store and approximately 90 other high-end retail shops. Image courtesy Architects Orange The 90-store Phoenix Premium Outlets will feature nine primarily tilt-up concrete structures housing approximately 360,000 sq ft of leasable space. Phoenix-based contractor Kitchell is building the 360,000-sq-ft project for Simon Property Group, an Indianapolis-based real estate developer with 57 similar outlet malls in the U.S. and 70 worldwide. Located on 50 acres of land
A new office tower is in the works at Hayden Ferry Lakeside in Tempe, Ariz. Phoenix-based Ryan Cos. US Inc. will develop and build the 10-story office tower located at Mill Avenue and Rio Salado Parkway. Related Links: Read this October 2006 article from the ENR Southwest archives on a previous office tower built at Hayden Ferry Lakeside Sunbelt Holdings, Scottsdale, Ariz., acquired the plot of land at Hayden Ferry Lakeside as part of a larger portfolio from original developer SunCor in 2010. The new tower will be the third office tower at the development along the shores of man-made
A major interchange is undergoing a role reversal in Arizona's second-largest metropolitan area. Designed to solve traffic headaches and a dire safety problem, the Interstate-10, Prince to Ruthrauff roads project in Tucson is "flipping" the grade of Prince Road so that it will pass over, instead of under, I-10. Related Links: View a video on the I-10 Prince to Ruthrauff project The revamp is part of a $76.4-million effort to widen I-10 along a two-mile stretch to eight lanes from six. Crews have to contend with six lanes of traffic at all times, a major railroad route and multiple utilities—all
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