Federal Stimulus Funds Pave Way for Valley View Bridge Project

UDOT officials, Wadsworth Bros. Construction, break ground on $6.2 million Valley View Bridge that was washed out during 2005 floods in Southern Utah. Project is one of 88 ARRA projects in the state, 64 of which are being managed by UDOT worth $158 million. UDOT was expected to have all ARRA projects ready for advertising by the end of May, making Utah one of the first states to meet this key criteria milestone.

Federal stimulus funds have revived a statewide effort to rebuild the Valley View Bridge in Southern Utah’s Washington County, which was washed away along with 20 homes during the catastrophic floods of 2005. Utah congressman Jim Matheson, state Rep. Don Ipson, and UDOT executive director John Njord, joined St. George mayor Daniel McArthur and local community members for a celebratory ground breaking and naming of the contractor May 1.

The $6.2 million bridge replacement – put on hold several times over the past four years due to budget constraints – is one of 88 state and local transportation projects in Utah funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). Without the federal funds, construction on the Valley View Bridge would have been delayed again.

UDOT, through its portion of federal stimulus funds, is contributing $3.8 million toward the Valley View Bridge project. The City of St. George and the Dixie Metropolitan Planning Organization are providing $1.2 million each. Wadsworth Brothers Construction of Draper, Utah, was awarded the contract and plans to begin work by June 1, 2009. Construction is expected to end next spring.

Following the 2005 flood, six box culverts were temporarily installed to provide local access to area residents. The new bridge will alleviate a bottleneck on the five-lane road caused by the two-lane structure which allows cars to cross the river bed. Additionally, the new bridge will include a pedestrian sidewalk and trail and bike lane. Decorative street lights will also be installed.

Of the state’s 88 ARRA projects, UDOT is managing 64 state projects worth $158 million. Although UDOT has currently advertised 58 percent of its stimulus projects to the contractor community, it will have all ARRA projects ready for advertising by the end of May, making Utah one of the first states to meet this critical milestone.

Reckitt Benckiser to Build Logistics Center in Tooele County

Reckitt Benckiser, a leading global manufacturer of household, health and personal care items headquartered in the United Kingdom, held a groundbreaking ceremony May 6 for its new $35 million Logistics and Custom Manufacturing Center in Tooele County, Utah. Construction will take place over the course of 2009, with the site expected to begin operation in the first quarter of 2010.

“We are excited to become a part of the Tooele County community,” says Brad Newman, director of North America Supply Services for Reckitt Benckiser. “An extensive study of our supply chain determined that distribution from the Salt Lake City area will improve our financial results and also enhance service for the growing concentration of customers in the Pacific Northwest and in Western Canada.” 

“The $35 million capital investment by Reckitt Benckiser and the construction of this 600,000-sq-ft facility in Utah is a great statement of confidence in the State of Utah and its people,” says Jason Perry, executive director of the Governor’s Office of Economic Development. “The fact that Utah continues to attract strong, profitable and growing companies will help our job base and our economic viability for decades to come.”

The new Logistics Center, the first building in the Miller Motorsports Business Park, is being developed through a collaborative effort between USAA and Greenfield Builders of Indianapolis, Ind. The building will be owned by USAA and will be leased to Reckitt Benckiser on a long-term basis.

The project will include a 574,106-sq-ft building that will consist of 16,000-sq-ft of office and 510,000-sq-ft of warehouse and custom packaging operations. The design allows for an additional 220,000-sq-ft of future expansion. Reckitt Benckiser expects to ultimately create over 100 jobs at the site.

Products made by Reckitt Benckiser include Finish, Lysol, Dettol, Vanish, Woolite, Calgon, and Airwick, among others. The company employs 23,000 people worldwide, with operations in 60 countries and sales in 180 countries.

RLW Construction Begins SR-201 ‘Lane Gain’ Project

Ralph L. Wadsworth Construction of Draper, Utah was awarded a $14 million contract in May to construct an extra lane on SR-201 in West Valley City, Utah.

The ‘lane gain’ project will cause lane restrictions on SR-201 between Bangerter Highway and 5600 West. In mid-May, traffic was switched to the north side of the roadway and reversible lanes were implemented to provide a two eastbound/one westbound lane configuration for the morning commute, and a two westbound/one eastbound lane configuration for the evening commute. Construction is anticipated to last through 2009.

GSBS, Boyer, ESI to Team Up on INL Lab Project

A team from Salt Lake City has been selected to design and build the Research and Education Laboratory in Idaho Falls. In a May announcement by the Idaho National Laboratory (INL), GSBS Architects and developer The Boyer Company, both located in Salt Lake, were selected along with contractor Engineered Structures Inc. of Boise, for the design-build-lease project which will be constructed near the Engineering Research Office Building at INL’s Science and Technology Campus in Idaho Falls.

Planned as a 131,000-sq-ft, $48 million facility, research in the state-of-the-art building will include Radiological Science, Chemistry, and Engineering Science labs, and office, meeting and collaboration support for approximately 400 researchers. The new structure is expected to be completed in late 2011 and is planned as a LEED Gold project.

According to principal architect D. Scott Henriksen of GSBS, the new project comes on the heels of a recently completed project the firm designed for INL, the Center for Advanced Energy Studies (CAES). This 55,000-square-foot, $17 million energy research laboratory on the banks of the Snake River in Idaho Falls was dedicated in April and is expected to earn a LEED Gold rating.

Wilson Sahara Motorsports to Design Korean Race Facility

Details of a new motor sports complex in South Korea were released recently by Wilson Sahara Motorsports, the company responsible for its design. Wilson Sahara Motorsport, LLC is a company formed by Salt Lake-based Wilson Motorsport Inc., and Sahara Inc., a major construction management firm in Bountiful, Utah.

Alan Wilson, principal of Salt Lake-based Wilson Sahara Motorsports, revealed early details of the new theme auto park Injae race facility, to be built at Injae, east of Seoul in South Korea.

“We have been working on this project for several months, and now that the concept for the facility has been agreed with the developers (Korea Racing Festival), we have begun the detail design phase that will see the complex open in 2011,” says Wilson, who helped design Miller Motorsports Park in Tooele County, Utah, which was built by Sahara, Inc. in 2006.

The site is set in an impressive mountain area in the northern part of the South Korean peninsula, and has been designed with specific attention to its impact on the environment and the natural beauty of the surrounding area.

“The 4.0 kilometer twin layout track has significant elevation changes which will make it both challenging and very spectacular,” says Wilson, whose 28 constructed race facility designs include the stunning Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, Ala., often referred to as the ‘Augusta of race tracks’ for its spectacular use of terrain and its park-like presentation.

The Injae facility will feature Formula One quality garages and spectator facilities, a hotel and a condominium building, as well as an international standard kart track. It will be designed to meet FIA Grade 2 standards and has the potential to host series such as Asia GP2, AIGP, Asian Le Mans Series and the Japanese Touring Car and GT championships.

“This new complex will become a catalyst for the growth and development of quality motor sport in Korea,” adds Wilson.

Park City Museum Wins Utah Heritage Award

The Park City Museum Historical Renovation and Expansion project has received a 2009 Heritage Award in the category of Adaptive Use Projects from the Utah Heritage Foundation.

Interior Construction Specialists, a division of Sandy, Utah-based The Layton Cos., was the general contractor for the project, which was completed in December 2008, with San Francisco-based Mark Cavagnero Associates as the project architect and Oakland-based West Office Exhibition Design in charge of designing more than 5,000 sq ft of permanent exhibition space.

The Heritage Awards celebrate projects and people that are committed to making preservation happen – each award recipient offers a model for meeting the challenges of preservation that others can draw from and exemplifies the highest standards within the preservation movement.

The overarching goal of the Park City Museum project was to meet the Secretary of Interior’s standards for historic preservation, while also updating the facility and providing more space for museum exhibits. The design for the renovation and expansion project included an addition to the existing museum as well as the adaptive re-use of three historic buildings right in the heart of Park City’s historic Main Street: the City Hall and Territorial Jail (built in 1885), the Library (built in 1900) and the Fire Department Whistle Tower (built in 1901).

The expansion added more than 5,400 sq ft to the museum, allowing for the exhibition of more than 90% of Park City Historical Society and Museum’s collection. The addition’s two-story interior space allows for the display of large objects such as a giant double cage (17-foot tall mine elevator car) and 1930s Egyptian Theatre backdrop (9.75-feet tall by 17.25-feet wide). Neither artifact had previously been exhibited due to height and space limitations in the old facility. The expanded museum is also now ADA-accessible.

Northern Utah State Veterans Nursing Home in Full Swing

Construction of the $17 million Northern Utah State Veterans Nursing Home in Salt Lake City is in full swing, with a slated completion prior to Veteran’s Day in November 2009. Owned by the State of Utah, the project was designed by Architectural Nexus of Salt Lake City and is being constructed by Salt Lake-based Big-D Construction.

The nursing home, which is all single-level buildings, is a new way of thinking for retirement community projects. Designers strived to make sure this 82,000-sq-ft project has more of a ‘home’ feel than that of a hospital environment.

The exterior is a wood frame structure and finished in stucco and heavy timber. The interior will have carpet and artificial wooden floors, along with more residential looking interior designing, with items like overstuffed chairs, patriotic artwork and drapes instead of blinds.

The facility consists of four pods, each with a beautiful view of the mountains. Some elements in the building are being built to exceed energy codes. The fifth building connects all the pods with a walking path and will consist of a chapel, administration and therapy rooms, along with a barber shop/salon, mail room, library and kitchen.

“The biggest challenge, and also our biggest success, is being able to take a 120-bed facility and create a feeling of home,” says Craig Wyatt of Architectural Nexus.

Parkway Health Center Nears Completion

Westland Construction, Inc. of Orem, Utah is the general contractor on the $5.6 million Parkway Health Center, a skilled nursing facility in Payson, Utah. The project, which started a year ago, was slated to wrap up by May 15.

Designed by Salt Lake-based Carpenter Stringham Architects, the single-story building is 34,000 sq ft and has a total of 46 rooms with a capability to accommodate up to 72 residents. The exterior features stucco, stone and timbers, while interior finishes have a soothing two-tone paint scheme and nice wood trim.

Hughes Breaks Ground on YWCA Facility

Ground was broken April 8 by Hughes General Contractors of North Salt Lake on a new $21 million YWCA Shelter in Salt Lake City.

Designed by Salt Lake-based ajc architects, the new facility will include two buildings, one three stories with an underground parking garage totaling 28,500 sq ft, the other a three-story, 24,500-sq-ft building.

The wooden-framed structures will feature an exterior highlighted by brick, siding and stucco. Sustainability is being designed into every facet possible, including material selection, mechanical systems, water usage and quality of space. The new buildings will include a family center and housing with 150 beds, which is significant compared to the current 87-bed facility. New rooms will be double the size of the existing 120-sq-ft rooms.

“Designing spaces for women and children who are victims of domestic violence and abuse is an extremely sensitive process,” says Derek Wilson of ajc architects. “Consequently, the programming and design resulted in a long, rewarding process that involved residents, case workers, administrators and architects. To this unique client, spending donor money is always a thoughtful consideration.”

The project is scheduled to be completed in August 2010.

R&O Completes Expansion in Evanston for SGL Carbon Fiber

R&O Construction of Ogden, Utah has completed a new 120,000-sq-ft building expansion for SGL Carbon Fiber in Evanston, Wyo. The expansion includes a new carbon fiber manufacturing line with four new ovens or one ‘fiber path’ that now allows SGL Carbon Fiber to double its manufacturing output.

R&O erected huge concrete tilt-up panels (48-ft tall, weighing up to 228,000 lbs) where the carbon fiber ovens were installed. In order to meeting the tight construction schedule, and to ready the project for the necessary equipment installation, R&O poured a 12-in concrete slab floor beginning at 2:30 am. R&O also provided complete construction and installation of all electrical, plumbing and HVAC equipment.

R&O Construction worked with design firm Case Lowe and Hart Inc. of Ogden on the project.

Layton Lands $100 M Portneuf Med Center Project

Layton Construction Co. of Sandy, Utah, was awarded a $100 million construction contract in early May to construct the new 300,000-sq-ft-plus Portneuf Medical Center in Pocatello, Idaho for Legacy Hospital Partners.

The new hospital will bring the highest levels of healthcare to the Pocatello region, which currently services more than 115,000 people. The project will include 187 acute health care beds, a 25-bed emergency department, and 16 newborn ICU beds. Other healthcare services will include cardiovascular, oncology, pediatrics, orthopedics, MRT, CT and nuclear medicine.

The project, which was designed by Ascension Architects of Arlington, Texas, will break ground in June, with an estimated completion in summer 2011.

Ogden City, DEQ Receive $600K in ARRA Funds for Environmental Cleanup

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced May 8 the availability of $600,000 in grants bolstered by funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 to help communities in Utah clean up sites known as "brownfields" which may be contaminated by hazardous chemicals or pollutants. The grants, which include $200,000 from the Recovery Act of and $400,000 from the EPA Brownfields general program funding, help revitalize former industrial and commercial sites, turning them from problem properties to productive community use.

"Today’s announcement will help Utah communities reclaim underused and abandoned properties," said Carol Rushin, acting regional administrator for EPA Region 8. "By removing uncertainty about environmental contamination, these brownfields assessments will pave the way for public and private investments that reinvigorate blighted areas."

EPA has selected the Utah Department of Environmental Quality for a brownfields grant to identify and complete environmental assessments at petroleum sites throughout the state. Abandoned or underused properties that are potentially contaminated with petroleum include gas stations, above-ground storage tank properties and bulk plants that can have a significant blighting influence on communities.

EPA also selected Ogden City for two brownfields assessment grants that will fund more than 90 site assessments for hazardous substances and petroleum contamination in a targeted corridor along 21st, 24th and 30th Streets. This area is burdened by deteriorating or vacant buildings and distressed neighborhoods.