Blue and White...and Green

I found a bit of Pegula Center news attempting to inject life into this slow news week, specifically that form field studio (deliberate lower case, e.e. cummings-style) will be assisting architects Crawford and BCJ with their sustainability efforts.

"We are thrilled that our friends over at Crawford Architects have been awarded the new 200,000sf Ice Hockey Arena at Penn State.

"form field studio will be assisting Crawford in their sustainability goals of making this a LEED-rated feature facility. Crawford's team also includes Bohlin Cywinski Jackson out of Wilkes-Barre."

What does it mean to be an LEED-rated feature facility? Glad you asked, I certainly did. Let's head over to the U.S. Green Building Council's website, on a page explaining it.

LEED is an internationally recognized green building certification system,  providing third-party verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies aimed at improving performance across all the metrics that matter most: energy savings, water efficiency, CO₂ emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality, and stewardship of resources and sensitivity to their impacts.

Developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), LEED provides building owners and operators a concise framework for identifying and implementing practical and measurable green building design, construction, operations and maintenance solutions.

LEED is flexible enough to apply to all building types – commercial as well as residential. It works throughout the building lifecycle – design and construction, operations and maintenance, tenant fitout, and significant retrofit. And LEED for Neighborhood Development extends the benefits of LEED beyond the building footprint into the neighborhood it serves.

There's some good info around that website in terms even liberal arts majors can understand, in case you're curious about one of the ways we plan on making good on Joe Battista's claim that the building will last 75 years - and not destroy the planet before that time is up.

Welcome to the team, form field studio!

"The Best in the Country"

As a general rule, I try not to insult the intelligence of the readership with a single-source post - simply sharing a relevant story is Twitter territory in my opinion - and I try to be more thoughtful than bloggers who go "oooh, an article within my area of interest," then basically do a copy/paste with maybe a couple sentences of their own stuff in between paragraphs.

Yeah, that's right, NCAA hockey establishment blogs. Both barrels, until you stop this useless sniping/taking out your frustrations re: Big Ten hockey on us. We have about as much control over it as you do. We're not all pro-Big Ten. We're sorry that Joe Battista didn't abandon his life's work and tell the guy with $88 million to stick it so you could keep playing Michigan Tech and St. Cloud State. Or not. We love Penn State, we love hockey, and for many of us, September 17th was the culmination of a lot of wishing. We're here, we're not going anywhere, deal with it.

What was this post about? Oh right, this article from the Collegian's Tony Barton, which does a tremendous job somehow covering new ground with respect to the Pegula Center, and is therefore worth breaking the rule. If you wondered why there are two architecture firms (Crawford Architects and Bohlin Cywinski Jackson) on the job, this would be the place for the answer. If you thought that Dan Craig was the only ice guru out there, now you know that Penn State has Tim Moore on the design team. Here's the part where I copy/paste the Collegian to tell you that I like the cut of Moore's jib.

“Large sports facilities are very near and dear to my heart,” Moore said. “I’ve been kind of hoping we could be affiliated with this project since it first became public.”

Moore is no stranger to Penn State, as Battista recruited his son, Brian, to play with the university’s club team, the Icers. While his son ended up playing at Division I Bowling Green, the ties to Penn State were made.

The refrigeration technician said his work began with ice arenas 25 years ago, and he and his partner Joel Anderson have worked on more than 200 ice sheets.

As for the championship ice, Moore said its creation is his passion.

“We’ve learned how to do it properly, and we’ve learned what’s important about it,” Moore said. “We know what effects the conditions of the ice and whether it’s fast or slow.”

Moore said the ice system will consist of more than 100 moving parts. He will work to create the most efficient refrigeration units possible that will also be functional year-round.

“We recognize that Penn State wants the best ice in the country,” Moore said. “We think we can bring that.”

There's been some discussion in the Penn State community about how successful our men's hockey team will ultimately be. Some (myself) feel like we're going to have everything in place to be a top program, while others point to the men's basketball program as evidence of Penn State's ability to run a high-profile program that isn't football.

Here's what I feel like I know: Basketball doesn't have a Joe Battista overseeing it, a guy who's been a winner in everything he's done and who has devoted a pretty big chunk of his life to Penn State hockey. He's not doing this to fail. Basketball doesn't have a Terry Pegula, a similarly-wired winner, to keep everyone accountable. Basketball hasn't made a full-on commitment to being the best in the country in every aspect of the program - even the architects and the ice guy, who are less than a week into this, know where the bar is located.

One other note tucked in at the end of the article:

Once a decision is made, the architects, construction team and members from the university will have a kickoff meeting on Nov. 30. It will be the first time the three components come together and begin working on the design.

Sounds like we have a hard date on the construction team's selection, as opposed to the "soon after the architect" line we've heard a couple times.

UPDATE: Barton tweeted to tell me that the construction interviews are next Wednesday.

Battista Likes the Window Seat

Once again, Joe Battista was on with Steve Penstone (43:50 in) during a first intermission of a Friday night game, this time, last night's 5-3 win against West Chester. I didn't think I was going to do another one of these posts, but since some new puzzle pieces came out of the interview, I went ahead with it. After some chatting about the game at hand, Battista got into the day's big news, the selection of a Pegula Center architect.

"Crawford and BCJ from - Crawford is from Kansas City, BCJ is from the Wilkes-Barre area - partnered, and they won the award for the architect's contract. They did the initial study, so they're obviously very familiar, not only with what it is we're trying to do here, but with the site - what needs to be done, what can and can't be done because of where the steam lines are, utility lines - you know, it's always a tricky thing because you look at the building that you know is going to be there for 75 years, and architecturally, you want to do something, but you've got a power line. So you spend a million dollars to relocate that power line. In the short run, you saw "well, we don't want to spend a million dollars to do that." But then when you step back and say "this building's going to be here for 75 years," maybe it's worth it.

"And, you know, that location is such a great place. And if we do the right things, and I'm no architect, but I've been in enough of these meetings to know, if we do it the right way, it's going to have some great views of Mount Nittany, great views of Beaver Stadium, on the back side, it's going to have great views across campus. It really is a unique place, and we're going to be able to build the building partially into a hillside, so it allows us to bring in fans at the concourse level and at the event level, which I think is pretty cool to be able to do that. So we're excited, it's been a tough thing, I can tell you we've read more about architects in the last two months than I've had to do since I was an engineering student in my dreams back as a freshman. But it's been fun, we're excited, they have a terrific team that they've put together, and when we got down to the three finalists, I think most of us would have been happy with any of the three. It was a very tough competition among them, and at the end of the day, we're going to end up with a state-of-the-art world-class facility."

So it sounds like we're going heavy on the windows on the side facing University Drive (which also faces Beaver Stadium and Mount Nittany). Man, I feel smart. We also got a little bit about the points of entry and the hillside construction. By the way, you know what set up that answer? Penstone stating that an architect was selected today. It wasn't even a question! Little-known fact: in journalism heaven, people only have to interview Joe Battista. Penstone next asked a when, what's next question, and Battista presented both an updated timeline, and an unusual challenge that will need to be addressed.

"They're going to have about a year, fast-track it nine months, to design - put everything on paper, well, on computer, it's all 3D modeling these days, which is really amazing stuff, but I think the decision that Penn State - we have to make is do we want to break ground before or after football season next fall? You know, you gain three months if you break ground in August, but now you're taking off line a lot of parking, you know, it's just - I don't know. One way or another, for two years, you're going to have construction going on outside the Bryce Jordan Center, so you've got to do it at some point. Maybe there's a way to get it so that we can do some things without disrupting the football parking and the traffic and that sort of stuff. [Penstone: Much like they've done with that ladies softball stadium.] Absolutely. The difference again is that, if you look at where we're building that, it's going to take off line the ADA parking, some of the bus parking. We'll come up with a solution, but once again, people have to be patient because there's a lot of moving parts to this. But it's all good, it's exciting, in a couple weeks we're going to pick the CM, you know, we want the CM and the architect to work together very closely right from the start, and again, hopefully we're designing a building that'll be great not just for the men's and women's hockey teams, but for the whole community."

I'll gladly park my car in Boalsburg for football games if it helps get this done quicker. Who's with me? Anyone?

Board of Trustees Names Architect

Penn State Live, the university's official news source, has reported that the Board of Trustees gave Crawford Architects, with Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, the job of designing the Pegula Center.

Bohlin Cywinski Jackson worked on the just-under-construction Biobehavioral Health Building at Penn State, and they have a litany of projects on other campuses under their belt - they clearly know the ins and outs of the university environment (red tape included, I'm sure). Their style seems to me to be modern but not overbearingly so, although they clearly know visual impact as well. And while their portfolio is light on sports-related projects, well, that's where Crawford comes in.

Crawford...you remember them, right? They were the ones behind this press release, which leaked in early 2009, then was quickly removed from their site, leading to the strongest "Penn State hockey to NCAA" rumors ever (well, until the "real" ones).

Crawford Awarded Ice Hockey Arena Study for Penn State University
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (November 18, 2008) – Crawford Architects announced today that the firm was selected for the study to design the Ice Hockey Arena for Pennsylvania State University.

Penn State’s new hockey arena will allow Intercollegiate Athletics to develop a Division I men’s and women’s varsity program and continue the recreational skating program.

The program includes new a 6,000-seat venue for Varsity Hockey and other events, as well as an additional sheet of ice. Full services amenities will be included, such as premium seating options and provisions for a wide range of events.

According David Murphy, Principal at Crawford Architects, “The challenge is to design a facility that enhances the surrounding campus, functions smoothly, and meets all the needs of a Division I program.”

Where Bohlin Cywinski Jackson gently treads into modern territory, Crawford marches in with a bazooka, as evidenced by Vector Arena in Auckland, New Zealand or a proposal for Samsan Arena in South Korea. I'm guessing that their mission statement reads as follows: "Be sleek." Just a guess on my part, but those looking for a classic hockey barn might be disappointed.

It doesn't appear that they have any college hockey venues to their credit, although they worked on a proposal to upgrade Notre Dame's Joyce Center Rink (the university ultimately went in a different direction).

While those arenas look great, I'm more interested in a different project. Check out this picture of the outside of the Branson Convention and Exhibition Center (more available at the link):

I don't know about you, but do you know what that looks like to me?

Overthinking it? Maybe, but then again, maybe not. Maybe the answer's staring us right in the face. Can't wait to find out.

UPDATE: The Collegian wrote up a blurb on the architect selection (with more coming Monday), and gave the hardest number we've seen as far as seating capacity: 5,600.