2021 Directory

25 PHOTOS COURTESY OF UNIVERSITY OF WYOMING The SI building features a concrete foundation and structural steel frame with drilled piers and a com- posite concrete floor system. The concrete cores were placed after the steel framing was erected, says Garth Scholl, principal with Martin/Martin Wyoming, the project’s structural engineer. “This construction ar- rangement helped shorten the critical path of the proj- ect, saving time on the schedule. Concrete core walls can be challenging in the winter months in Laramie, and the shotcrete cores are far less impacted by inclem- ent weather as well,” he says. The university’s strict design and construction guidelines require that campus buildings feature sand- stone sourced from a quarry in Utah. The sandstone was incorporated into an intricate masonry design fea- turing extensive limestone on the base, vertical mullion projections and corbelling. The facade is composed of large curtains of glass flanked by masonry pilasters clad with stone veneer. The weight of thematerial required extensivemiscella- neous structural steel to be erected around the perim- eter for support. Stately stone arches over the entries and on the corners of the north elevation are supported by rolled hollow structural section (HSS) tubes that span to pilasters on each side, which in turn provide anchor locations for the stone soffits, Scholl says. Vibration management is a significant issue for lab buildings. Any transmission could impact clarity and functionality of the electron microscopes in the SI building. GSG performed below-grade and low-grade vibration analysis of the site before construction and discovered that train tracks on the west side of town could potentially affect soils under the stone. To ad- dress this, special floating floors were designed in the cyber areas where scanning and imaging are done to control even the smallest amount of vibration. “Tominimize ground-borne and structural vibration transmission to the imaging spaces, 12-in. reinforced- concrete slabs were cut at the demising walls and pe- rimeter isolation material was incorporated to prevent any rigid connection between the slabs,” Schenk says. “The demising partitions are double-stud partitions without any rigid tie-backs so each imaging suite is iso- lated from the adjacent spaces.” The design of the facility is expected to help the Science Initiative achieve top-tier status among uni- versity science programs nationwide in both learning and research. In addition to good vibration control, the design provides totally dark spaces and a special magnetic shielding around areas with computerized scanning devices and microscopes. To entice interaction, collaboration and visibility, the building’s atriumwill have a generous communication stair and plenty of meeting and gathering spaces but will also contain opportunities for displaying the work that is happening within the building. “This was a driving factor of the design: to make as much of the building as visually available to students, researchers and even potential students,” Schenk says. “The work is not closed up behind solid walls; it’s very transparent, and this will be a marketing tool for re- cruiting students.” ACTIVE LEARNING A boon for the Wyoming economy, the facility will en- able science majors of all disciplines—including fu- ture science teachers and 72% of students university- wide—to participate in highly interactive laboratory and classroom environments. “The importance of this facility, more specifically the research and education that this facility will host, will positively impact future generations in the state of Wyoming and around the globe,” says UW project manager SamFarstad. A 200-seat active learning classroom (ALC), the largest in the Rocky Mountain West, will engage stu- TEAMWORK UW construction and design veterans GE Johnson, GSG Architecture and Perkins+Will teamed up on the $103-million SI building. TIME SAVER Concrete cores were placed after the steel framing was erected to shorten the critical path. ON THE WEB For information on other projects in the Mountain States, visit enr.com/ mountainstates. DIGGING DEEPER n HIGHER EDUCATION “This was a driving factor of the design: to make as much of the building as visually available to students, researchers and even potential students.” —Tim Schenk, Senior Project Architect, GSG Architecture MS26 ENRMountainStates m February 15/22, 2021 enr.com/mountainstates MS025_ENR0215_MS_DIGG Wyoming.indd 26 2/8/21 10:59 AM Reprinted courtesy of Engineering Record, copyright BNP Media, February 15/22, 2021, all rights reserved.