Wisconsin Builder | Top 20 Projects of 2001

Double Vision

Design/build team successfully juggled two projects

By Chris Thompson
Editor at large

The lobby of GE Medical Systems' CT/PET/Detector Business Center represents an elegant, streamlined design that complements the other structures on the company's Waukesha campus.

Project Name: Waukesha Technology Expansion Building and CT/PET/Detector Business Center

Location: Waukesha

Owner: GE Medical Systems, Waukesha

Architect: Eppstein Uhen Architects, Milwaukee

Engineer: Pierce Engineers, Madison (structural); Arnold & O'Sheridan Inc., Madison (electrical and civil); Harwood Engineering Consultants, Milwaukee (clean-room mechanical); Klein Howard Lighting, Milwaukee (lighting); Ring & DuChateau Inc., Milwaukee (mechanical and plumbing for office building)

General Contractor/Construction Manager: M.A. Mortenson Company, Waukesha

Project Cost: $35 million for the CT/PET/Detector Business Center and $10.5 million for the Waukesha Technology Expansion Building

Start Date: Both projects started in December 2000

Completion Date: CT/PET/Detector Business Center completed December 2001 and Waukesha Technology Expansion Building completed September 2001

Description: The design/build team ushered two projects to completion simultaneously for the owner. Both the $35 million, 215,000-square-foot CT/PET/Detector Business Center and the $10.5 million, 70,000-square-foot Waukesha Technology Expansion Building were finished within budget and about a month ahead of schedule.

It had all the characteristics of a tough job: high-tech engineering, a guaranteed-maximum price and an owner that wanted to get in as soon as possible.

But in order to get the job done right, M.A. Mortenson Company and Eppstein Uhen Architects had to multiply each of those challenges by two. That's because the owner wanted both a 215,000-square-foot CT/PET/Detector Business Center and a $10.5 million, 70,000-square-foot Waukesha Technology Expansion Building on its Waukesha campus.

"We were able to turn one over a month ahead of the contract schedule, and both projects were under budget," said Greg Morelli, project manager for Mortenson. "It was a tremendous team effort."

The Waukesha contractor and Milwaukee architectural firm formed a design/build team to handle the work. The team was one of four that competed for the project, and Morelli said it won the job in June of 2000.

From that moment on, the project was a blur of activity as the contractor and architect juggled work on the two projects, which were located about a quarter mile apart on the GE campus.

"We went through a design process from July to October for both buildings simultaneously," Morelli said.

Peter Kucha, project manager for Eppstein Uhen, said that right from the beginning, time and scheduling were the biggest challenges.

"It was a really ambitious schedule because the owner wanted to be in the smaller building by the summer of 2001 and in the larger building in November of 2001," he said. "And that's what actually happened."

Balancing act

Mortenson broke ground on both projects in December 2000, and kept both running at about the same pace into January 2001.

The company completed the steel erection for the smaller building in March, enclosed it by May and turned it over to GE in August.

At the same time, the CT/PET/Detector Business Center structural steel was done in April, it was enclosed by July and turned over in November.

"Another challenge was keeping both projects on their individual schedules simultaneously," Morelli said. "But that became an advantage because we had the same team on both buildings."

The design/build team approach, Kucha said, helped the two firms meet each challenge the projects presented. That result actually runs contrary to common arguments that design/build runs into trouble when confronted with intricate projects, he said.

Both buildings offered complex problems. The CT/PET/Detector Business Center features a clean-room component that added a lot of engineering work, and there are atriums in both projects that set them apart from regular buildings.

"It shows the merit of the design/build process because we were working on something that wasn't just a box, and it enabled us to get it done," Kucha said. "Without design/build, it would have definitely added several months to the process. The timeframe really drove the whole process in terms of the design/build team working together and issuing multiple packages."

Design/build advantage

Design/build helped the project team maintain control over a job that could easily have run amok, Morelli said. But it never would have worked without the owner, architect and contractor knowing what it took to keep the project together.

"It was really a three-headed monster that worked in concert really well together -- with the ability to mesh design with early procurement, and the ability to get in the ground while they were still designing it," he said. "It's almost like on some jobs, the team approach falls apart in the chaos, but this owner gave us the ability to meet its expectations."

Kucha said a great team created two great projects.

"It was a triangle between the architect, general contractor and owner," he said. "It was just a good dynamic. It really comes down to the team. Design/build sets the table for good communication, but it doesn't always work that way. It worked here."