Special Report: New Jersey

Museum Expansion

Science Center to Get Bigger, Better, and Smarter

by Katherine S. Robertson

The Liberty Science Center in Jersey City will go dark for 22 months, but plenty is going on behind the scenes. The 11-year-old facility is slated for a $60 million facelift that will increase the total square footage by 44 percent.

The project isn't just an expansion, however. It's a redefinition, said Walter Crimm, vice president of the cultural practice at EwingCole, a Philadelphia-based architect.

"We're taking a building that is now an object in an industrial landscape and creating an addition where, from the moment you enter from parking or the light rail, it's programmatically preparing you for all the learning opportunities," Crimm said.

The project entails building a 100,000-sq.-ft. addition and making substantial renovations to the existing 196,000 sq. ft. It also involves physical plant improvements and alterations to the parking lot.

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The project team is completing bid documents and aiming to start site work in the middle of 2005. That's when the 22-month job schedule will commence, said John Dolan, project director for the construction manager, Skanska USA Building Inc. of Parsippany, N.J. In the interim, the museum is taking its programs on the road under plans in development for more than a year. Popular exhibits at the museum have moved to the renovated CNJ railroad terminal in Jersey City, Verizon's headquarters in Newark, and to hospital auditoriums in Morristown and Summit, N.J. The center has 350 permanent exhibits including a 100-ft. touch tunnel and a live animal exhibit, and it drew 650,000 visitors in 2003.

While the exhibits are touring, their home will take a big leap away from standard museum fare. Instead of hanging event banners and signage on the museum's tightly wrapped tomb-like structure, EwingCole focused on making the center itself a highly visible, dynamic herald of its existence and purpose. The southwest exterior facing the New Jersey Turnpike will get a glass skin. Huge backlit 30-ft. by 30-ft. panels showing images of museum features will provide a stained-glass effect, directing the observer's eyes into the facility.

In the interior, theater scrim will carry these images. In other places, the light will pour through, projecting the images onto the floor and walls. "It will be a very dramatic area," Crimm said. "It needs to wow visitors in an architectural way."

The planned Grand Foyer, a 24,000-sq.-ft. light- and image-infused space, will serve as a centerpiece, directing visitors toward the grand staircase, which in turn takes them into the museum itself. A long-underutilized tower will take on a new role anchoring the building's central circulatory system, connecting visitors to the different exhibits. The glassed windows will also provide sweeping views of the harbor and New York skyline.

The phased project starts with renovation on the existing building, Dolan said. When the rehab work wraps up, the curators can tackle exhibit fit-up while construction crews start on the new addition. That newer space's primary function will be to house administrative offices and the Grand Foyer. In that way, the entire facility will be ready when the 22-month construction schedule ends. The only part of the center sitting out the renovation work is the existing IMAX Theater.

The project's two phases involve different construction materials and techniques, Dolan added. In the existing space, the contractors will create a hybrid superstructure by infilling the structure, currently steel and double-T pre-cast, with poured concrete on steel decking. The addition's exterior will be precast panel, glass, and aluminum.

Reflecting the spirit of a science museum, Dolan said plans are underway to share the construction program with the public. Skanska and the museum are developing a temporary interactive exhibit, planned to open in the parking lot around the time of the groundbreaking next spring. The exhibit will offer visitors an eye on the completed museum design, as well as showcase the equipment, materials, and technology that will make it happen.