A pre-engineered metal building fits the bill for new recycling center
Every year, the Long Beach Conservation Corp hires more than 200 at-risk youth each year to work on projects for local cities, county agencies and other non-profit agencies in the greater Long Beach, Calif., area. The non-profit’s mission is to raise selfesteem, develop basic work skills, work ethics and education, and promote teamwork for through a combination of work, education and conservation.
A major component of the program is the collection and processing of recycled products from different areas in the region. But the group outgrew its headquarters where the recycling had been done, so they looked to expand into a new space, buying a 1/2-acre lot with an existing metal A-frame building on it. Originally looking to retrofit, or expand, the existing building, they determined that the best option was to demolish the building, recycle the material, and then design and construct a new building.
Alan Pullman, AIA, senior principal at Long Beach-based Studio One Eleven says that since cost was a huge factor, they originally thought that constructing a concrete block building with a wood roof would be the cheapest way to build the building. “We actually designed it with that in mind, and in talking to several contractors about cost, and getting some feedback, several of them said that really the quickest and most cost-effective way of doing this project would be a pre-engineered metal building,” explains Pullman, a CCLB board member.
After familiarizing themselves with metal building systems, Pullman says, “we discovered that we could create a pretty much standardized metal building, but clad the front of it along the street in cedar panels and create custom windows and do something that really made a more architectural statement on the street-which the city required-and still have all of the cost savings and time savings of a pre-engineered metal building.”
Completed in 2010, the 9,000-square-foot Environmental Education Center features a preengineered metal building with clear span rigid steel frames, 26-gauge prefinished Galvalume panel rib walls and 24-gauge SSR KXL Kynar finish roof panels in Cool Regal White, all from Memphis, Tenn.-based Varco Pruden. The roof has a 1:12 slope. The center provides offices for support staff and work areas for the sorting, bailing and processing of recyclables.
To respond to the city’s request for a civic street presence, the metal building was modified with wood cladding and custom storefront windows and trellises. Inside the building, a 1,850-square-foot mezzanine overlooks the naturally ventilated processing area that is illuminated by skylights and glazed sectional doors. Varco Pruden also provided the skylights and ridge vents for the project, while the storefront windows and doors came from Arcadia Inc., Vernon, Calif.
The biggest challenge came from the site itself, says Peter Chang, AIA, LEED AP, project manager at Studio One Eleven. Considered a Brownfield development, the site was contaminated and the existing building had lead paint and asbestos. The site also had an existing oil well and buried containers from previous users, which made it all that more challenging to get the most use out of it as possible.
The Education Center includes a number of sustainable features, such as water efficient fixtures, drought tolerant landscaping, composite wood fencing and recycled tire mulch. “Within the site, the building and kind of throughout, we tried to maintain a continuity of sustainability,” says Chang.
The building, not including site work, cost approximately $115 per square foot.
“I think the cost savings, the environmental factors, the flexibility of a metal building make them a really interesting building type that we’d like to explore more,” Pullman continues. “We are talking to several of our clients about how to use that technology and that kind of building system to create more economical buildings for them.”
Developer: Conservation Corp of Long Beach
Architect/landscape design: Studio One Eleven, Long Beach, Calif.
General contractor: Bremco Construction, Long Beach
Metal building erector: Knight Building Systems, Santa Clarita, Calif.
Metal building, wall and roof panels, skylights and ridge vents: Varco Pruden Buildings, Memphis, Tenn., www.vp.com
Storefront windows/doors: Arcadia Inc., Vernon, Calif., www.arcadiainc.com
