Court Upholds Verdict Ordering $108M Payout By ConAgra to Jacobs – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC – Engineer Recruiter

The final significant legal chapter played out this month in the decade-long aftermath of a terrible gas explosion that killed four people and injured more than 60 others at a factory in Garner, N.C.

Judges in a courtroom 1,271 miles away in Lincoln, Neb. ruled that ConAgra, the owner of the plant where Slim Jims were made, owed Jacobs, the engineering powerhouse, more than $100 million that Jacobs and its insurers had paid to settle lawsuits from the explosion. The appeals court decisions upheld a jury verdict reached in March, 2016, following a long trial. The jury assigned all the blame to ConAgra and another contractor.

What is unusual is that Jacobs and its insurers made the payouts in lawsuit settlements despite Jacobs having little if anything to do with the disaster.

Jacobs was one of the defendants in the numerous lawsuits over the accident. But the case is unusual in that Jacobs and, presumably, its insurers made the payouts despite Jacobs having little if anything to do with the disaster.

ConAgra was updating the plant’s water heating system. After rejecting Jacobs proposal for the project as too costly, it hired the engineer to play a limited support role on the work. In the work agreement, ConAgra and Jacobs indemnified each other for damages caused by each parties’ own negligence.

ConAgra hired Energy Systems Analysts (ESA), a high-efficiency water heater contractor, to design and install a 5-million btu gas-fired water heater. And Jacobs designated an employee, Donald Pottner, as onsite project manager for its work. But two ConAgra employees—engineering manager Timothy Yost, and John Puff, the plant’s utilities manager—were supervising the work.

When the time came to commission the new water heating system, Pottner was ill and could not be present so ConAgra agreed to supervise that part of the work itself.

What happened next is a textbook example of why not to purge gas lines into the interior of a building, according to a report by the federal Chemical Safety Board.

Puff was responsible for determining the procedure to connect the new equipment to the plant’s gas supply, according to the account by the appeals court judges. On June 4, 2009, Puff instructed the crew to purge the line to the boiler with a hose leading outside, but he failed to provide the instruction to purge the line to the hot water tank. Puff stated that “[w]e just didn’t get to it.” Yost admitted the line to the hot water tank should have been purged before startup to prevent an explosive mixture.

At Yost’s direction on the next day, a ConAgra senior safety specialist inspected the pump room where the new water heater was located and reported “[e]xposed wires” as possible ignition source hazards. On June 9 an ESA employee, Curt Poppe, came to the plant to commission the water heater, but Puff did not provide the connection procedure to Poppe, the judges wrote, and no safety plan was created.

A ConAgra employee worked with him and unrated temporary lighting was brought into the room. Poppe had difficulty lighting the water heater, making 32 failed attempts. Over the next 3.5 hours he repeatedly cracked the valve on the pilot line and placed a gas meter in front as he released small streams of gas into the pump room to “bleed” the pipe.

Gas Odors Triggered Worry

Danger signs triggered mental alarms but not enough action. Employees smelled gas and worried whether the gas meter Poppe was using was functioning properly. Puff admitted he did not tell Poppe that the line had not been purged, even after Puff realized Poppe was struggling to light the heater.

The fateful moment approached.

According to the appeals judges, Puff interrupted the commission process so that he and Poppe could walk outside to allow Poppe to calibrate the gas meter in fresh air. Puff then left the plant to pick up supplies for another project. Puff left Poppe with another ConAgra employee even though Puff testified that he did not believe that person was qualified to supervise clearing air from a gas line. The employee thought something was wrong and went to the roof to try to locate an alternate purge point. Poppe returned to the pump room and released gas by opening the cap on the 2-in. gas pipe.

The room flooded with gas in less than 60 seconds. Puff admitted he “should have stayed around a lot longer” and had given the contractor “more credit’” than he should have. When asked about Poppe’s opening the cap on the gas pipe, Puff testified that if he had stayed, he “wouldn’t have allowed that.”

With the explosion, walls collapsed and the roof section fell. Altogether, four people died and 67 were injured.

Payouts Made in Lawsuits

Facing numerous lawsuits, Jacobs agreed at Conagra’s request to pay out settlements expecting to be reimbursed. But Conagra then said the indemnification didn’t apply, triggering Jacobs lawsuit against ConAgra in state court in 2014. Following a weeks-long trial in March 2016 with hundreds of exhibits and depositions, a jury awarded the contractor $108.9 million, the full amount of the settlements.

ConAgra continued to resist paying. Attorneys for each side recently faced off in Lincoln, Neb. in front the appeals court judges.

ConAgra’s attorney, Christopher Landau, argued that the district court erred because ConAgra’s liability should be limited to what it would owe under the state’s workers’ compensation laws. “It’s an end-run around the workers compensation system,” he said.

Jacobs failed to prove that its losses resulted from ConAgra’s negligence, he said, or others “under its control.”

Finally, Jacobs didn’t qualify as a real party in interest with standing to seek indemnification by documenting exactly what it paid in settlements or insurance payout. “I can’t see how you can affirm without knowing that they paid a penny,” Landau claimed.

Attorney Stephen B. Kinnaird, representing Jacobs, noted that the contract between the two companies plainly stated that ConAgra had a duty to indemnify for all claims caused by ConAgra’s negligence and by those under its control and that “Jacobs was only liable to extent of their negligence.”

Prior rulings in the various lawsuits over the explosion had shown that, while the insurance settlements had been redacted from the public record, the insurance policies in the record required Jacobs had a 10% copay or deductible of $35 million. In addition, Jacobs had an insurance tower—additional coverage that kicked in when lower levels were exhausted.

“The trial court found that more probably than not Jacobs paid part of the $108 million,” Kinnaird argued.

The North Carolina Dept. of Labor also found no negligence by Jacobs.

In its investigation of the disaster, the state wrote that Jacobs performed no work that could have contributed to the accident, had no knowledge of the hazardous condition and that its work scope deprived it of knowledge of the hazardous condition. The appeals court judges noted that ConAgra “accepted what the authorities determined” and did not conduct a separate investigation.

Two years after the explosion, ConAgra shut the plant and moved its operations to Ohio.

 

Landscape Architect News – 2018 TRENDS IN GARDEN DESIGN – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC – Landscape Architect Recruiter

Each year we highlight topics of growing importance in the gardening realm. For 2018, our trends emphasize the concept of providing pleasure to people in their gardens—whether it’s growing new foods, providing a refuge for wildlife, or creating a relaxing place to share a meal with loved ones. Enjoy!

1. EMBRACING THE SMALL GARDEN

These days, space is at a premium—but, designers are determined to make even the smallest of gardens useful and attractive. While small gardens are by no means new, we’ve noticed great progress in the way they are designed. In this case, less really can be more.

Here are two popular ways to make the most of a small garden:

Multipurpose Features: “Everything in a small garden needs to have multiple uses,” says Seattle-based designer Scot Eckley. “This concrete fire feature is a perfect example: It creates a bold element that runs through the space. It’s also a curb edge for the deck. It’s a planter. It collects water from downspouts on the house. It’s a seat wall. And, of course, at the end of the day it turns into a fire feature.”

This fire feature saves space by serving a variety of purposes. Design by: Scot Eckley. Photo by: Alex Crook.

Container Combinations: One of the best ways to appreciate and explore combinations is in a container. A plant may be exquisite on its own, but its assets can be magnified when placed in a context—with plants that complement its color, structure, or textures.

Click here to read the full article in Garden Design Magazine.

 

Interior Design News – B&B Italia Resurrects 71-Year-Old Italian Furnishings Brand Azucena – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC

Select pieces from B&B Italia’s inaugural Luigi Caccia Dominioni collection, from left: ABCD armchair, Base Ghisa lamp, Catlinia chair, Cilindro ottomans, Imbuto floor lamp. Photography courtesy of B&B Italia.

B&B Italia has inked a licensing agreement to acquire the trade rights to Italian furnishings manufacturer Azucena, with the first reissues available this month through B&B Italia’s namesake stores and select retailers.

Submit your best products and projects to the 2018 Best of Year awards today!

The Toro upholstered lounge chair from 1973 is among the Azucena reissues debuting in B&B Italia’s Luigi Caccia Dominioni collection. Photography courtesy of B&B Italia.

Founded in 1947 by Italian architects Luigi Caccia Dominioni, Ignazio Gardella and Corrado Corradi-Dell’Acqua, and named for a character in Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Il Trovatore, the line was an outgrowth of the custom furniture designed by the trio for their private clients.

Luigi Caccia Dominioni’s Nonaro outdoor ensemble from 1962 spawns a sofa in the late architect’s namesake collection at B&B Italia. Photography courtesy of B&B Italia.

The manufacturing and distribution alliance debuts with the Luigi Caccia Dominioni collection, consisting of “re-editions” of the first 20 products designed by Dominioni in postwar Italy. Dominioni died just weeks before his 103^rd birthday in 2016.

Seating highlights include circular Catlinia chair in powder-coated steel from 1950, overstuffed Toro lounger (1973), spunky Cilindro ottomans (1963), and Nonaro outdoor ensemble (1962). Metallics rule the lighting assortment, such as the Base Ghisa (1953) and Imbuto floor lamps (1954).

B&B Italia is also launching a dedicated website for the collection later this month at azucena.it.

 

HVAC Mechanical Engineering – Customized for Comfort – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC

Buildings use about half the energy in the United States, and close to half of that powers heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems.

Next time you’re at work, stroll around and you’ll see why. The spacious lobby, high-ceilinged rooms, empty office spaces—they’re all typically heated to about 70 °F or cooled to about 73 °F. That’s incredibly wasteful, says Edward Arens, director of the Center for the Built Environment, an industry-university research consortium based at the University of California, Berkeley.

“Buildings are way overdesigned and overconditioned for what people actually need,” he said. Arens aims to change that. In March, at the ARPA-E Energy Innovation Summit in National Harbor, MD, he and his colleagues presented a “personalized comfort system”— a set of devices that warm or cool parts of the body that are especially sensitive to heat or cold. They’re designed to let workers maintain the temperature they prefer, no matter how warm or cool the office is, and they cut building energy costs dramatically.

A workstation equipped with a personal comfort system. Image: University of California, Berkeley

The system’s components include an under-desk foot warmer that uses an average of 20 W, a 5 W wrist warmer and a heated mouse that keep hands warm, 2 W heated insoles, and a 1 W desk fan that blows a light breeze across the worker’s face from as much as six feet away.

Arens’s team also hacked a commercial ergonomic office chair to heat or cool the body for an office worker’s comfort, using heating coils in the seat and the back, an air plenum inside the chair, and a wicking, non-insulating fabric.

The combined wattage of the entire system is less than one-fiftieth of the 500-1000 W a typical building HVAC systemconsumes to heat or cool a single person.

The chair also contains sensors that detect occupancy, temperature, and humidity, and relays that data via WiFi to the building management system. This lets the building operator turn down the heat or reduce the AC in part or all of the building to save energy.

To see how much energy the office chair saved, the researchers had 25 U.C. Berkeley office workers work in the customized chairs for 16 months and report twice daily whether they
felt warm or cool, and if they were comfortable. Most workers preferred office temperatures between 74 °F and 77 °F in ordinary chairs, but four of five people in the customized chairs were fine with office temperatures as low as 68 °F and as high as 80 °F. This saved an astonishing 60 percent on building energy costs.

An earlier six-month test of the foot warmers alone saved 48 percent of the total heating costs over a cool northern California winter. The Berkeley project is unique in tailoring their localized heating and cooling technologies to individuals, said Jennifer Gerbi, program director for ARPA-E’s DELTA program, which funded the work. “People feel comfort in different ways,” Gerbi said, “And I think they’re really amazing in looking at that.”

Learn about the latest trends in energy solutions at ASME’s Power & Energy Conference and Exhibition.

 

Civil Engineering News – Zeroning In – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC

Across the United States, primary and secondary school buildings are leading the way in the so-called zero-energy movement, in which structures are designed to generate at least as much energy as they use. They tend to be owner-occupied, are located on roomy sites with plenty of roof space for solar panels, and have predictable energy usage patterns, making them the perfect candidates.

Discovery Elementary School in Arlington, Virginia, opened in 2015. It is a zero-energy school that was created without a budget increase through careful management of all aspects of the design and construction process. © ALAN KARCHMER / OTTO

THE IDEA OF DESIGNING buildings that generate as much energy as they use goes by many names. “Whether people are talking about net zero, zero net, or zero energy, it’s basically all the same thing,” says Paul Torcellini, Ph.D., P.E., a principal engineer for the Commercial Buildings Research Group at the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, Colorado. The different terminology is largely regional, he says. Those on the West Coast tend to refer to zero-net energy, while those on the East Coast prefer net-zero energy, but policy makers and federal groups have opted for the more streamlined zero energy. Regardless of what it is called, however, “the nice thing about the whole zero-energy discussion is that it is a goal that can be measured operationally about a building,” Torcellini says. “At the end of the day, you want to look at the meter and say, Have I bought as much energy as I have sold?’ And it’s kind of as simple as that—conceptually.”

It may sound simple, but the end result remains challenging. To attain zero-energy status, a building or site must, over the course of a year, generate as much energy on-site as it consumes, or export as much energy from its own on-site generation as it purchases from the grid. Typically, most zero-energy buildings generate that energy from renewable sources.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE At the Ameican Society Of Civil Engineering.

 

Pet Rooms Join Au Pair/In-Law Suites As Increasingly Popular Home Features – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC

As an Executive Search Conultant in the Architecture and Engineering industries for the past 13 years, I have seen many new design trends come and go.  I am not surprise (with Americans love for their pets) that this design trend has come to light.

Results from The American Institute of Architects (AIA) second quarter Home Design Trends Survey shows homeowners are becoming increasingly interested in reconfiguring spaces for their pets as well as for their in-laws and au pairs.

The latest survey results—focusing on home features—show architecture firms receiving a major bump in interest from clients in reconfiguring both interior kennels and au pair/in-law suites as home spaces that can function as separate living quarters.

“Outdoor living areas and home offices remain popular special function rooms in a booming market,” notes AIA Chief Economist Kermit Baker, PhD. Hon. AIA. “But an increasing number of homeowners are also focusing on their pets and incorporating them into their housing designs.”

Among the second quarter survey’s findings:

• Architecture firms reported client interest in pet rooms/interior kennels increased to 30 percent from 20 percent a year ago.
• The popularity of au pair/in-law suites also grew in this quarter’s survey with 41 percent of respondents reporting interest, which is up from 36 percent last year.
• Outdoor living areas topped the list of home features growing in popularity, with almost 58 percent of respondents reporting to firms an increased interest.
• Client interest in adding a home office increased to 39 percent from 33 percent a year ago.

Overall, the home design market remains robust with custom luxury homes showing the strongest improvement among new construction sectors. Aggregate second quarter findings, include:

• Client interest in custom/luxury homes increased to 24 percent from 18 percent on net in the second quarter.
• First floor master bedrooms remained a top request among clients, with half of firms reporting increasing inquiries.
• Residential architects report continued strong interest in accommodations for multiple generations in homes they design.
• Increasing popularity for in indoor ramps and elevators.

Second quarter survey results can be reviewed online. The AIA Home Design Trend Survey is conducted quarterly with a panel of more than 500 architecture firms that concentrate their practice in the residential sector.

 

Reducing Embodied Carbon And Operational Emissions In Buildings – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC

Last week, at the Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco, Microsoft announced it is the first large corporate user of a new tool to track the carbon emissions of raw building materials. Microsoft is piloting the tool, called the Embodied Carbon Calculator for Construction, or EC3, in the remodel of its 72-acre Seattle campus.

The open-source EC3, which is running on Microsoft Azure, was developed by Skanska with the University of Washington Carbon Leadership Forum, Interface and C-Change Labs. Skanska is purposely carving out embodied carbon in materials in construction—from the cradle to the grave—because it is manageable, said Stacy Smedley, director of sustainability for Skanska USA Building Inc., at the Carbon Smart Building Day, held on Sept. 11 in advance of the summit and attended by more than 300 people in the buildings sector.

“Benchmarking and understanding data is important” but existing calculators have different baseline data, which is not necessarily open source, so using them results in different numbers, added Smedley. EC3 is not only open source, it is free for all to use.

Operational Carbon Emissions

In addition, at the Sept. 12-14 summit, the World Green Building Council (WorldGBC) launched its Net Zero Carbon Buildings Commitment. The 38 initial signatories include 12 businesses, 22 cities and four states and regions. The member businesses, which represent nearly $23 billion in revenue in building and construction supply chain, are pledging to eliminate operational carbon emissions from their business portfolios of more than 10.7 million square meters by 2030. WorldGBC expects this to trigger a wider market transformation to enable net-zero carbon buildings by 2050, said Victoria Kate Burrows, head of advancing net zero for the WorldGBC.

The commitment also represents a pledge by the leaders of member municipalities to enact regulations and/or planning policies that would require all new buildings within their jurisdictions to operate at net-zero carbon by 2050. Some public-sector signatories have made a commitment to get to net-zero carbon operations of buildings they own, operate and develop by 2030.

Ed Mazria, founder of Architecture 2030, introduced the Carbon Smart Materials Palette, which contains an attribute-based approach to embodied carbon reductions in the built environment. The palette identifies key attributes that contribute to a material’s embodied carbon impact, and offers guidelines and options for emissions reductions.

Annually, embodied carbon is responsible for 11% of global GHG emissions and 28% of global building sector emissions, said Mazria. “As we trend toward zero operational emissions, the impact of embodied emissions becomes increasingly significant,” he added.

On the building operations side, regarding carbon emissions, Architecture 2030 has set a goal of a decarbonized buildings sector by 2050. Toward that goal, policymakers must embrace a standard for all buildings: new and existing, large and small, and appropriate for any location including dense urban areas where most of the U.S. and global construction will take place over the next two decades, said Mazria. A Zero Net Carbon (ZNC) building is defined as a highly energy-efficient building that produces on-site, or procures, enough carbon-free renewable energy to meet building operations energy consumption annually.

Zero Net Carbon Energy Standard

Toward that end, Architecture 2030 launched a ZNC energy standard several weeks ago. The ZERO Code is a national and international building energy standard for new building construction that integrates cost-effective energy efficiency standards with on-site and/or off-site renewable energy resulting in zero-net-carbon buildings.

The standard includes prescriptive and performance paths for building energy efficiency compliance based on current standards that are widely used by municipalities and building professionals worldwide, according to Architecture 2030. These include the latest ASHRAE Standard 90.1-2016 requirements for minimum building efficiency, the International Green Construction Code (IgCC), ASHRAE Standard 189.1-2017 and any building energy efficiency standard that exceeds ASHRAE Standard 90.1-2016.

The ZERO Code for California, a building energy standard for new nonresidential, high-rise residential and hotel/motel buildings, incorporates the 2019 California Building Energy Efficiency Standards and also includes prescriptive and performance paths for building energy efficiency compliance.

The standard offers a flexible approach for incorporating renewable energy, both through on-site generation and/or off-site procurement, says Architecture 2030. By establishing a flexible approach, the ZERO Code is applicable to all new commercial and institutional buildings, even those in dense urban environments with limited on-site renewable energy generating capacity.

“We are running out of time,” said Mazria. “We have to act really fast and globally. Every effort must be scaleable.”

For the ZERO Code, a technical support document is available that describes several potential options for off-site procurement of renewable energy within the context of codes, and presents a process for evaluating and assigning a weight to each procurement method.

The ZERO Code is supported by Architecture 2030 Energy Calculators intended to ease the implementation process and reduce errors when applying the prescriptive compliance path. An Application Program Interface (API) for the national and international ZERO Code versions of the software has been developed, enabling the software to be implemented on a website or within an application for smart phones and tablets.

“We need to move faster and try out things that are not exactly right,” said Kate Simonen, director of the Carbon Leadership Forum, which organized the Sept. 11 event and published a 33-page primer, called Life-Cycle Assessment of Buildings: A Practice Guide, in June.

LCA for construction is a method used to quantify carbon dioxide emitted during the extraction, manufacture, transport and construction of building materials, together with end-of-life emissions.

One attendee of the Carbon Smart Building Day injected a dose of reality: “There are amazing things happening to bring embodied carbon down in buildings, but declaring net zero on embodied carbon lacks credibility because we don’t even know what that means yet,” said Don Davies, president of structural engineer Magnusson Klemencic Associates.

 

August Architecture Firm Billings Rebound As Building Investment Spurt Continues – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC

Southern region, multi-family residential sector lead growth.

Architecture firm billings rebounded solidly in August, posting their eleventh consecutive month of growth, according to a report released today from The American Institute of Architects (AIA).

AIA’s Architecture Billings Index (ABI) score for August was 54.2 compared to 50.7 in July (any score over 50 represents billings growth). Most of the growth continues to come from the South and the multi-family residential sector.

“Billings at architecture firms in the South continue to lead the healthy increase in design activity that we’ve seen across the profession in recent months,” said AIA Chief Economist Kermit Baker, Hon. AIA, PhD. “Nationally, growth across all building sectors remains solidly positive.”

Key ABI highlights for August include:

• Regional averages: West (54.2), Midwest (52.5), South (57.0), Northeast (46.9)
• Sector index breakdown: multi-family residential (55.6), institutional (52.3), commercial/industrial (53.6), mixed practice (51.7)
• Project inquiries index: 58.0
• Design contracts index: 49.6

Regional and sector categories above are calculated as a three-month moving average, whereas the national index, design contracts, and inquiries are monthly numbers.

More information on AIA’s ABI is available online.

About AIA

Founded in 1857, AIA consistently works to create more valuable, healthy, secure, and sustainable buildings, neighborhoods, and communities. Through more than 200 international, state and local chapters, AIA advocates for public policies that promote economic vitality and public wellbeing.

AIA provides members with tools and resources to assist them in their careers and business as well as engaging civic and government leaders and the public to find solutions to pressing issues facing our communities, institutions, nation, and world. Members adhere to a code of ethics and conduct to ensure the highest professional standards.

 

Berkley – Landscape Architecture And Environmental Planning – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC

View programs, people and coarses at Berkley Landscape Architecture.

 

Civil And Structural Engineering – Wood Use In Schools Expected To Increase – A/E Executive Search – GCA International, LLC – Frank J Rivelli Executive Search Consultant GCA International, LLC

Experts project U.S. schools will need to accommodate an additional 2.8 million students by 2024. Meanwhile, the average age of education facilities at every level has increased, and rapidly evolving student needs and technologies are making repairs, renovations and expansions critical for schools striving to remain relevant. As U.S. designers seek to satisfy the needs of a growing student population, Think Wood anticipates an increase in wood schools over the next decade.

Tight timelines, limited budgets, stringent safety requirements and high standards for sustainability are also creating unique challenges for architects and developers. With spending on education building construction predicted to grow by 4.8 percent year-over-year in 2018, designing and building with wood provides solutions for the growing challenges while simultaneously helping architects and developers capture their share of this expanding market.

For these reasons, the new Stadium Drive Residence Halls at University of Arkansas will be the first U.S. student housing development to use cross-laminated timber (CLT) and the first multi-story mass timber development in the state of Arkansas.

“At Stadium Drive Housing project, we were able to take advantage of digital pre-fabrication of mass timber structural elements such as CLT floor and roof panels, along with glued laminated timber (glulam) columns and beams for economy and expressive design potential,” explained Tom Chung, Principal with Leers Weinzapfel Associates. “By carefully configuring the modular housing units with the overall length, width and shape of the buildings we were able to maximize the efficiency of CLT panels, which minimized production waste while also allowing for special moments of expressive structure such as the CLT-glulam roof and truss in the building’s main space. Pre-fabricating all of these elements meant a reduction in installation time onsite compared to conventional means.”

Student housing solutions like Stadium Drive are in high demand, with a growing number of students attending colleges and universities.  Institutions are looking for creative and cost-effective ways to expand their housing offerings so more students can live on or near campus. Wood construction offers rapid, modular assembly, enabling developers to get student housing facilities online in time for the new school year. These facilities can also help attract and retain students by meeting the same quality and environmental objectives as other campus buildings.

For Trinity Western University in British Columbia, accommodating a fast-growing student population was a nice problem to have but an important one to solve. When the school needed to quickly expand its student housing for the upcoming school year, modular wood construction enabled a nine-month turnaround that would have been impossible to achieve using other construction methods.

Trinity Western University, British Columbia Canada Modular wood construction enabled a nine-month turnaround for a 5-story 55,378 sq ft student residence using 90 modules. Image: Metric Modular. Additional photos available on request. Additional information: https://metricmodular.com/trinity.

“Using a modular design ticked off all the boxes on our list of needs and then some,” said Bob Nice, senior vice president of business administration and chief financial officer at Trinity Western University. “With a modular design we were able to meet an extremely tight deadline, reduce the construction site footprint on campus, stay within our budget constraints and give our students a safe, beautiful building with well thought-out layouts and features.”

There is a strong case to be made for using wood in school construction to accommodate a growing number of students with structures that are cost effective, while also creating high-performance buildings that are safe, resilient and eye-catching.

To learn more about the possibilities and benefits of using wood in education buildings, visit www.ThinkWood.com.