When the City of Tacoma set out to design the Center for Urban Waters, officials didn’t want just a “green” building. They wanted the Foss Waterway facility – which will house research facilities for the University of Washington Tacoma, headquarters for the Puget Sound Partnership, and a proposed office of the Environmental Protection Agency – to be a showcase of environmentally friendly design.
They are aiming for a platinum rating from the U.S. Green Building Council for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, or LEED. That highest designation has been achieved by about 100 buildings in the world so far.
Mayor Bill Baarsma has said the building, scheduled to open in 2010, would let the world know that Tacoma is a leader in environmental consciousness.
“It’s well worth it,” he told the council at a meeting late this summer to review the design plans.
But prestige comes at a price: The city has a $40 million budget for the project. The initial sketches, done by Perkins + Will, would likely have exceeded the budget. That determination sparked a “value engineering” process, meaning the firm deleted some of the flashier elements from the design and cut the building size to reduce costs.
Those elements include a large atrium, a concrete frame, a high-tech ventilation system and a water-facing wall that was supposed to be almost entirely made of glass. Such features were either completely deleted – in the case of the atrium – or modified: Instead of a wall of glass, there will now be ample windows on a more traditional wall.
Despite the changes, it will still be plenty comfortable: About 90 percent of the offices will have outdoor views, and 75 percent will be lighted by daylight. Radiant floor heating will keep the building warm, and a rain garden and “green” roof will help reduce runoff.
The cost-cutting measures reduced the size of the building by about 8,000 square feet, and dropped the price per square foot from an estimated $745 to $689, including permitting costs.
But as the city prepares to solicit estimates from builders in the next few weeks, whether the streamlined Urban Waters can be built for $40 million is still up in the air. “Until we see that (estimate), we don’t know what the cost is,” City Manager Eric Anderson said.
If no one promises to build it for under $40 million, the city will either have to go back to the drawing board or decide whether to scrape up more money. The latter will be a tough sell during a biennium when tax revenues are expected to dip and the city will likely need to use some reserve money to patch the budget.
Still, Anderson said the initial price tag isn’t the only factor.
“The consideration needs to be in two directions – differences in initial costs and differences in long-term costs,” he said.
Several council members – including Jake Fey, who was initially concerned about the price tag – have indicated at previous meetings that they would at least consider increasing funding.
“LEED designation means that the building is intentionally designed to be energy-efficient and to minimize the environmental footprint, and we believe that’s important,” Anderson said.
But how much money that energy efficiency will save is also unknown.
“We’re pretty confident that life-cycle costs of that are paid,” said Joe Borden, senior project manager for Lorig Associates, which has worked on the project.
Borden estimated the cost increase for LEED certification on a building like this Urban Waters to be 10 percent to 15 percent, meaning $4 million to $6 million on this project. He added that there haven’t been enough Platinum buildings studied to determine if the initial cost will be recouped by lowered energy costs.
Dan Seng, an architect with Perkins + Will and the project manager for Urban Waters, said the 10 percent to 15 percent figure sounded about right, but that it’s difficult to determine at this point.
“I have a really hard time with pulling out what the costs of each of these things are and whether it’s an added cost over and above what would be Gold” certified, he said.
He said he’s hopeful the building’s efficiency will recoup the initial cost increase over time.
“We have what the estimates say, but we haven’t built it yet,” he said.
Even if the cost increase over a traditional building isn’t recouped entirely, the city has indicated the project will still be a success.
“It’s important as a symbol. And the mayor and the council have taken the position that we need to be leaders in recognizing the need to reduce our carbon footprint and our footprint period on the environment,” Anderson said.
Niki Sullivan: 253-597-8603
blogs.thenewstribune.com/politics
What’s next
The city will put out a request for bids later this month. Officials hope to select a contractor later this year and to break ground as soon as January, according to City Manager Eric Anderson.
If all goes according to schedule, the building would open in spring 2010.
For more information, visit www.cityoftacoma.org/urbanwaters.
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