\tOn November 19th, members of the Regional Development Committee recently visited City Center DC, a joint venture of Hines and Archstone on a tour lead by members of the Clark\/Smoot JV construction team. <\/p>\n
\tThe site visit kicked off with a presentation of the project scope with includes two office buildings, two apartment buildings and two condominium building, along with a future hotel, all of which are placed over a below grade, 1500 space, 1.0 million SF, multi-level parking garage and loading dock for back of house operations for the buildings . The completed project will include 185,000 SF of retail in the base levels of the buildings, 515,000 SF of office space and 674 residential units. The 10-acre site is designed to be pedestrian friendly with a park in the Northwest corner and a centrally located plaza with landscaping and fountains which will play host to concerts and other community activities.<\/p>\n
\tThe tour provided access to the entire site located on the grounds of the former DC Convention Center between 9th and 11th streets, New York Avenue and H Street, including the garage area which covers the majority of the site. The six buildings are each at different stages of construction, from top out to nearly completed facades too framing and rough-in of the residential interiors. We viewed the structural systems for the soon to be in place sky bridges, that will connect the office buildings on the odd numbered floors, the ceramic architectural terra cotta veneer facade panels and the enormous steel box beams required for the large clear span in the underground loading dock.<\/p>\n
\tThe $420 million project, a series of four contracts, commenced in 2011 with completion scheduled for 2014. Construction activities occur around the clock with over 1200 tradesmen on site daily and 138 subcontracts in place. The developer is committed providing opportunities to small businesses through the CBE program along with providing job opportunities to District residents with the First Source Employment agreement.<\/p>\n
\tThe committee would like to thank Barbara Smith of Barbara J. Architectural Sales for arranging the tour and Jared Oldroyd, Sarah Diesze and Mike O’Neil from Clark Construction Group for leading the tour.<\/p>\n