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Best of 2006 Awards
Fair Lawn Community Center
AWARD OF MERIT: Small Projects
Town officials in Fair Lawn, N.J., unveiled the spacious, modern Fair Lawn Community Center in April, gladly replacing indoor recreational facilities in the borough that had been split between two small buildings across town from each other.
The prior accommodations, 14,000 sq. ft. in all, offered a substandard gymnasium, cramped activity rooms and other inadequate facilities.
But the new 42,000-sq.-ft., three-story building – encased in colored concrete masonry with horizontal bands of glass and topped with white Alucobond for a light, contemporary feel – now houses a 170-seat theater, modern gym, game rooms, exercise room, teen lounge with TV and pool table, art studios, and more. “It’s a nice-looking building for public money and a low bidder,” said one Best of 2006 judge.
The new space also features offices for Fair Lawn recreation employees and a back-up generator that will allow the building to double as an emergency shelter.
The small but ambitious project struggled initially to get off the ground in 2003, as the town battled with the local board of education to secure land for the new building and, later, had to establish a special nonprofit entity to manage the funding, which was largely provided by Bergen County. Town officials signed a $9.75 million guaranteed maximum price contract for the construction, which began in September 2004. “They did it at a time when construction costs were going up,” another judge said. “And during the construction they had re-engineering to stay in that price.”
One of the re-engineering efforts met what another judge called “unusual hurdles,” such as the need to shift the building’s layout by 90 degrees from the original plan in order to move it away from high-voltage lines. The change removed a handful of parking spaces and required a redrawing of the main entrance.
Designers also had to plan around nearby rail lines serving commuter trains, which called for extra soundproofing in the theater. The team installed sand-filled masonry blocks around the room, along with a 9-in. layer of lightweight concrete for the theater roof.
The added weight of the soundproofing measures required a more robust structural steel framework but also strengthened the building, bolstering its alter ego as an emergency shelter.
Key Players
Owner: Borough of Fair Lawn; Fair Lawn Community Center 501(c)3 Inc.
General Contractor: March Associates
Architect: Studio 5 Partnership
Structural Engineer: Dewberry
Mechanical Engineer: Lehr Associates Consulting Engineers
Site-Civil Engineer: AFR Group
Acoustical Engineer: Abel Consulting
Geotechnical Engineer: Richard Kessler
Structural Steel: Summit Steel
Masonry-Concrete: B.F. & Son Masonry
Electric: Modern Electric
HVAC: DeSesa Engineering
Plumbing: Countryside Plumbing and Heating
Carpentry: Interstate Drywall |
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