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Past Projects
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HARBORVIEW PARKING GARAGE Baltimore, Maryland
Description of the Project The Harborview Parking Garage and its accompanying 30 story highrise condominium tower is one of the largest and most challenging projects constructed in Baltimore in the past 25 years. The entire project is valued at $65 Million with the parking structure valued at $16 Million. The project proceeded under a phased construction format with Phase I consisting of the garage and phase II consisting of the condominium tower. MCE was retained for both phases; however, the remainder of this commentary will specifically address phase one, or the parking garage portion of the project. The $16 Million four story underground facility constitutes one of the most sophisticated, state-of-the-art garages ever constructed in the United States. Specifically, the 500 vehicle facility was constructed below sea level in an abandoned engraving dock immediately adjacent to Baltimore Harbor. The below sea level parking structure is separated from the Harbor by a specially reinforced sea wall. Meyer Consulting Engineers was retained to function as the structural systems consultant and structural systems engineer for the parking garage. The project proceeded under a contractor led design/build format. Initial plans developed for the garage by others utilized a traditional cast-in-place concrete framing solution. Meyer Consulting Engineers was then retained to provide a value engineering analysis of those plans and ultimately to develop an alternate, more cost-effective structural framing plan. Under our direction, a specialized precast concrete framing system was developed for garage framing components that also supported the thirty story condominium tower above. The MCE plans were then incorporated into construction documents. The state-of-the art MCE precast garage structure is credited with saving over $3 Million in construction costs when compared to the more traditional framing systems which were analyzed in the bid process. Specifically, the MCE structural system utilizes field placed concrete connections eliminating the traditional hinged welds which are both prone to premature deterioration and result in height, seismic, and loading restrictions. Other state-of-the-art advantages afforded by the MCE design included less dead load resulting in significant foundation cost savings, greater spans resulting in fewer columns (and foundations), and increased user visibility and enhanced security due to greater column free open areas. In addition, the precast "T"s were constructed parallel to the primary direction of vehicular travel. This feature both enhances driver comfort as it eliminates the "bumpity-bump" traditionally associated with precast construction and reduces long term maintenance costs as the waterproofing between "T"s is subject to less deterioration from traffic. The services provided by MCE for the Harborview Garage encompassed all phases of construction development including schematics, design development, construction documents, shop drawing and structural submittal reviews, precast plant inspection, and construction administration site and quality control visits. In addition, the design and design review tasks were very complex as the project had three architectural consultants and two structural design consultants. |
Meyer Consulting Engineers Corporation
451 Hungerford Drive, Suite 600
Rockville, MD 20850
Phone: (301) 738-5690
Fax: (301) 738-5695
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