Keith Bailey, a principal with HDR Architects in Alexandria, Va., has been involved in the design of eight salt-water-related projects encompassing more than 400,000 gsf over the past decade. In this two-part series, Tradeline presents, first, an armchair tour of these facilities, an assortment of "edutainment," teaching, and research spaces; and, second, an exploration of the particular issues, challenges, costs, and solutions associated with building for the long-term under the extremely taxing shoreline conditions.

Museum of Science and Industry

Completed in 1980, Phase I of the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI) is a 60,000-gsf building located in Tampa, Fl. With 20-foot-high ceilings sheltering hurricane and seawater exhibits along with aquariums dedicated to ornamental fish, the pavilion-style building is known for its openness. Organized around a central spine, the structure takes advantage of Florida’s sub-tropical climate through a precise east-west orientation that maximizes air circulation and natural light. (In fact, the project is showcased in the National American Institute of Architects Energy Handbook as a way of using prevailing breezes for natural cooling.) Public functions such as meeting spaces are located on the first floor, adjacent to the general parking area. Ramps and stairs, rather than elevators, provide access between floors.

The MOSI design team accomplished a significant cost saving by selecting roof-top packaged HVAC units with HVAC ducts that were dropped down into allotted spaces from the roof as needed during the development of new exhibits. A standing-seam metal roof tilts over a Unistruct™ modular frame, creating shaded spaces below. To withstand hurricane-force winds, hold-down devices on five-foot centers provide the ability to bolt anything to the floor below.  The facility is also a demonstration project, employing color-coding to illustrate the various building systems, which have been left exposed to promote teaching opportunities.

Orlando Science Center

The sprawling 207,000-gsf Orlando Science Center weighs in as the largest such facility in the southeast. At its hub is a five-story exhibit that recreates a Florida swamp, including a giant cypress tree with alligators, turtles, and snakes living at its base; and water features using seawater manufactured in an equipment room screened by exhibits. This special environment, along with a seawater shark tank and a coral reef exhibit, has allowed the Center to earn its place as a major destination point.

Other public spaces in the building range from a 250-seat performing theater and a planetarium to a 30-foot observatory with the largest refractory telescope in the region. Two different building levels offer a total of 60,000 sf of 20-foot high clear exhibit space. A wide, organizing staircase spirals around five levels, ending at the top with the observatory and an adjacent 50-seat classroom.

University of North Carolina Wilmington

Tucked into a linear 50-acre plot stretching from the sea, the Center for Marine Science at Myrtle Grove at the University of North Carolina Wilmington was hit by two hurricanes during construction, causing successive repair phases that delayed completion for more than a year. The two-story facility, about 106,000 sf, faces the ocean to the east. The project elevation was intentionally kept low to blend into the heavily wooded, brand-new waterfront campus.

Several hundred feet of dock extend out into the water, providing access for ocean-going vessels arriving along the intracoastal waterway. The dock also carries piping, left exposed for easier maintenance, that transports seawater through the pine forest to the research labs. The use of unfiltered seawater demanded a scheme of multiple, redundant pipes to back up those that would regularly undergo a temporary shut down for service.

An assortment of teaching and research laboratories, stretching along the perimeter of the racetrack corridor, house both graduate and undergraduate studies in marine science. The typical laboratory module is approximately 10 feet wide and 30 feet deep, with several double modules assigned on the research side. Aquariums are built into the walls of the labs, and trench drains in the floors catch the overflow water. Faculty offices overlook the coast, while all teaching facilities, auditoriums, classrooms, and administrative areas have landside views.

Florida International University

The recently opened Florida International University houses a new teaching and research facility, the Marine Biology Laboratory Building, on a dramatic site at its Key Biscayne campus on the North Miami waterfront. Comprising a three-story lab block attached to a cylindrical-shaped tower of the same height, the facility had to meet stringent code requirements established in the wake of Hurricane Andrew.

Windows feature laminated glass that will not lose integrity when hit by a 2x4 traveling at 200 mph, in order to withstand 140 mile-an-hour winds and coastal flood surges—at a cost three times more than standard product. Conversely, window openings are smaller than normal because large expanses of the heavy-duty glass have not yet been put to the test under gale conditions. Borrowing from a classic design used on waterfronts and castles in Europe, the rounded tower also affords storm protection, Bailey points out.

"The cylinder presents a very strong shape to the water while giving faculty and graduate teaching assistants a very flexible teaching auditorium with an outside plaza and immediate access to the water itself," he comments.

The first level of the complex includes four 35-seat classrooms, a large 50-seat teaching wet seawater laboratory, an aquarium room with portholes to the corridor, a library with water views, and an entry lobby flanked by a flexible seating/seminar room with oceanfront access across the plaza. Research and teaching labs, many with a "wet wall" of aquariums, occupy the upper floors. Framed by enviable ocean views, wedge-shaped faculty offices are arrayed along the perimeter of the cylinder. Offices for graduate teaching assistants are in the level below, in a more compact configuration but with similar views. Future plans call for a second lab block, carefully sited not to encroach on existing sightlines, and a new dock to supplement the one already in place.

Eckerd College

Eckerd College, just above Tampa Bay in St. Petersburg, boasts the Galbraith Marine Science Laboratory, the first undergraduate marine teaching facility in Florida. A hurricane in the area in the early 1990s, the year before the project started, put the site under three feet of water, so construction entailed raising the first floor 12 feet above existing grade. The unusual, L-shaped building, set 45 degrees to the coastline, consists of a large right angle on the outside joined to a smaller right angle, rotated 180 degrees, on the inside. The ells create an open interior courtyard, shaded by an extremely durable Teflon fabric canopy rated to screen out 70 percent of the light transmission.

Serving multiple branches of marine biology and geology, the Galbraith building houses a diverse array of specialty labs, from botany and ichthyology to sedimentation and chemical oceanography. Several high-tech microscopes are installed in the geology lab. Waterfront access allows the facility to pump unfiltered seawater directly into the labs to duplicate natural environments. Tiered sea tables in the labs catch the overflow from tanks above in order to recycle the natural seawater. Because of the high corrosion level, redundant piping systems alternate between operation and maintenance every two weeks.

By elevating the building, planners were able to create a convenient, shaded space for the tank farm, while other ground-level areas can be used for instruction. All illumination, interior and exterior, focuses back inside the building as a protective measure to keep from encouraging the neighboring sea turtles to migrate toward the light.

New College of Florida

Funded by the family of the same name, the Pritzker Marine Biology Research Center is a 9,400-gsf facility on the campus of Sarasota's New College of Florida (formerly known as the University of South Florida). The complex was originally the home of the Ringling family, with the waterfront Charles Ringling mansion recently restored at the cost of $14 million.

The Pritzker Center has been set back from the coast just enough to miss the 140 mile-an-hour wind zone. The building's raised elevation planted it above the waterline to avoid not only the 100-year flood plain but potential annual flooding. A tank farm is located under the building, while all emergency power and HVAC equipment are located above grade—and above the 100-year flood plain. Two means of egress, stairs and a ramp (elevators are inoperable in storm conditions), make sure occupants can leave the premises even with several feet of water under the building.

On the first floor, a flexible teaching area overlooking the bay is lined with aquariums. The water features, including a 12,000-gallon tank aquarium and a 9-foot-deep swimming pool-size holding tank, create a significant weight load. An earthen berm against that side of the building provides extra support.

Seawater taken from the bay is distributed to several teaching and research labs, conditioned at the bench by overhead chilled water piping for temperature control in the tanks. A seawater retention pond and salt hollow have been constructed to avoid the need for permitting to discharge spent seawater back to the bay.

Florida Southern College

Renovation of the two-story Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Polk County Science Building on the Florida Southern College campus in Lakeland, Fl., presented planners with the challenge of installing new building systems without altering the historic exterior. Inside, some parts of the new systems are mounted overhead, while other components are concealed in an underground area that had to be excavated. The 61,000-gsf facility now houses completely new teaching laboratories in a wide array of scientific disciplines, including a marine lab.

Smithsonian Institute Ft. Pierce Marine Station

As part of the National Museum of Natural History, the Smithsonian Institution has operated a marine station (SMS) in Florida for almost 30 years. During most of that time the SMS, which focuses primarily on oceanography (and serves as a port for the Caribbean-bound mini-subs filming for the Discovery Channel), was headquartered on a barge. The new, permanent campus, on the waterfront in Fort Pierce, comprises two structures. One, a donated, architect-designed home moved down the river, is now a residence for visiting professors. The second, newly constructed 9,300-gsf building houses the labs for post-graduate research. Every single opening, including HVAC vents, has to be shuttered in this facility because of its location, surrounded by water. Telescoping antennas used for ship-to-store communications can be taken down in 15-foot sections when storms hit. The complex did a good job withstanding a recent hurricane, Bailey reports.

While the lab building is organized around the typical racetrack corridor, some of the shared functions in the middle are quite unusual, including AV production and a diving and shower clean-up area. Mechanical equipment is all concealed overhead to keep it above the 100-year flood plain. A tank farm has been erected immediately outside the building. The master plan shows several more buildings to be constructed on the site.

By Nicole Zaro Stahl

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