March 8, 2007
Major renovation of G & H wings to begin
At the end of April, a major renovation project for the G wing and the older section of the H wing will begin in the Health Sciences Building. The project will last approximately two years and will renovate three floors of laboratories and seismically stabilize both buildings.
“This renovation cannot occur within the Health Sciences Building without the cooperation of every occupant in the entire facility,” said Jill Morelli, director of facilities for the School of Medicine. In addition to displacing units in those wings under construction, the project will have an impact on pathways through the building. For offices and laboratories near the work site, noise, vibration and power outages may also be problems.
A complete renovation, including new walls, wiring, plumbing, heat and air conditioning will be done for floors 3 through 5, Morelli said. Those areas have been occupied primarily by the departments of Biological Structure, Microbiology, and Physiology & Biophysics. Microbiology has moved to their new long-term location in the K wing, recently vacated by the Department of Genome Sciences. Biological Structure and Physiology & Biophysics will return to the G and H wings and their new labs and support spaces after the renovation work is complete.
Seismic stiffening, or structural work that will make the building better able to withstand a major earthquake, will be done during the renovation throughout the entire building. Morelli said that this includes adding structural supports at key junctures on all levels and then tieing the structural system together so the stresses are transferred to the foundation itself. This work will have considerable effects on floors 1 and 2; however, these improvements will be structural, not cosmetic.
“We are decanting the whole building except the 6th floor,” Morelli said, moving offices and laboratories to other areas until the work is finished. She noted that the William H. Foege Building, opened last spring for the departments of Genome Sciences and Bioengineering, has helped to create the opportunity for this option, since areas once occupied by those departments are now available. “Without the Foege Building, I’m not sure we ever would have found a way to do this project,” she said.
The project is part of the UW’s “Restore the Core” effort, which is renovating a series of older campus buildings. The School of Medicine is also contributing funding, and grant funds from the National Institutes of Health are being used for the new laboratories. The G and H wings were part of the original Health Sciences Building, completed in 1949. No full-scale renovation has been done, although some sections and laboratories have been improved since then.
For faculty, staff and students outside the immediate renovation area, pathways through and around the G and H wings may be the most important issue. Morelli said a throughway will be preserved in the main east-west corridor on the fourth floor. Necessary seismic work made it impossible to keep the third-floor corridor open.
The north-south corridor of the H wing on floors 1-5, and also the south corridor of F wing on floor 5 will have restricted access for the duration of the project. While the H-wing addition, which contains the School of Pharmacy and some public health units, will be open as usual, access through the older section of the H wing will be shut off.
The contactor will be using much of the grassy courtyard between Pacific Street and the I wing as a staging and materials area. A pedestrian path will remain open from the Rotunda Café in the I wing to Pacific Street. Another staging area will be set up just north of the Ocean Sciences Building.
“In my 30 years of construction management, this is probably the most complex project I’ve been involved with,” Morelli said. “We have had to work through four “dominoes” of moves just to get the building cleared for the contactor. And then the contractor access issues are very difficult, since these wings are in the middle of a complex and have very little space around them.
“The contractor and the UW Capital Projects Office will do their best to keep people informed and give adequate warnings about things such as planned power outages,” she said. “But there are always surprises in an old building.
“We want to do this work as quickly and efficiently as possible, with reasonable accommodation for people working nearby. Part of my job is to work through these problems while keeping my eye on the end-game,” Morelli said. “We need to get this done so that we can have the benefits of the improved space for many years to come.”
A series of “neighborhood” meetings are being held with interested stakeholders in the project. These meetings focus on project overviews, identifying issues, and notifying delivery and service providers before the work begins, Morelli said. The next meeting, open to everyone, will be at 1 p.m., Friday, March 9, in room K-069. For notification of other meetings, contact Irene Moy at 206-685-9430 or immoy@u.washington.edu.
