When rebuilding the observation tower, existing brick was taken down to a constant course, which allowed new brick to blend at the match line. |
For 38 years, the Pere Marquette Depot sat boarded up, broken down, and fire damaged. The Prairie-style building, with its distinctive orange iron-brick walls, was once the elegant Bay City, Mich., train station. The facility, which opened in 1904, served the Flint and Pere Marquette Railroad Company when the area was the epicenter of lumber processing for the shipbuilding and kit homebuilding industries.
In 1953, the 9,300-sf depot underwent an atomic-age modernization to convert it into a Greyhound bus terminal. Classical features like the 66-foot-high observation tower, wraparound canopy, ornamental metal brackets, and porte-cochere were demolished. After the bus station closed in 1969, the property sat vacant for more than three decades.
It took the depot's owner, Great Lakes Center Foundation, from 2002 to 2005 to patch together $3.85 million from local, state, and national sources to begin an extensive but frugal renovation that would bring the building back to life as a community center run by the local Convention and Visitor's Bureau and as offices for the Bay Area Community Foundation.
The Building Team, headed by Quinn Evans | Architects of Ann Arbor, Mich., with local firms Gregory Construction as GC and MacMillan Associates Inc. as engineer, had a mess on its hands. The masonry walls were in decent shape, but the foundation was undermined and the interior was devastated by toxic pigeon guano and fire and water damage, which destroyed most of the ornamental plaster walls and ceilings. The mechanical equipment, boiler, piping, plumbing fixtures, light fixtures, and most of the wiring had been stripped.
The Building Team salvaged the wainscoting and most of the windows and doors, replaced missing tiled canopies, the Spanish clay tile roof, and the observation tower, and repositioned the depot for use as a twenty-first-century community and office building. Although the project did not seek LEED certification, recycled content, low-VOC materials, low-flow plumbing fixtures, radiant heating, and light-sensor controls were used.
“They've done a wonderful job with both the interior and exterior work,” said Reconstruction Awards judge David Callan, SVP Environmental Systems Design, Chicago. Fellow judge Ken Osmun, group president of construction at Wight & Co., Darien, Ill., marveled at the project's bang for the buck. “The budget was so low and they had to make the depot the focal point of the community. I can't imagine the challenges they had to overcome.” —Jay W. Schneider, Senior Editor
Related Stories
| Jul 17, 2014
A new, vibrant waterfront for the capital
Plans to improve Washington D.C.'s Potomac River waterfront by Maine Ave. have been discussed for years. Finally, The Wharf has started its first phase of construction.
| Jul 17, 2014
A harmful trade-off many U.S. green buildings make
The Urban Green Council addresses a concern that many "green" buildings in the U.S. have: poor insulation.
| Jul 8, 2014
Frank Lloyd Wright's posthumous gas station opens in Buffalo
Eighty-seven years after Frank Lloyd Wright designed an ornamental gas station for the city of Buffalo, the structure has been built and opened to the public—inside an auto museum.
| Jul 8, 2014
Lost in the Museum: Bjarke Ingels' maze will make you look up and around
The maze, located in the National Building Museum, is a precursor to an exhibit showcasing some of BIG's projects. To navigate the maze, people must look up.
| Jul 7, 2014
7 emerging design trends in brick buildings
From wild architectural shapes to unique color blends and pattern arrangements, these projects demonstrate the design possibilities of brick.
| Jul 7, 2014
'Solar orchid' pods will serve as floating restaurants, retail shops in Singapore's harbor [slideshow]
In an attempt to reunite the nation of Singapore with its harbor, SPARK Architects has designed the "solar orchid"—self-contained, solar-powered pods that mimic traditional hawkers.
| Jul 7, 2014
A climate-controlled city is Dubai's newest colossal project
To add to Dubai's already impressive portfolio of world's tallest tower and world's largest natural flower garden, Dubai Holding has plans to build the world's largest climate-controlled city.
| Jul 3, 2014
Gehry edits Canadian skyscraper plan to be 'more Toronto'
After being criticized for the original tower complex, architect Frank Gehry unveils a new design that is more subtle, and "more Toronto."
| Jul 2, 2014
Emerging trends in commercial flooring
Rectangular tiles, digital graphic applications, the resurgence of terrazzo, and product transparency headline today’s commercial flooring trends.
| Jul 1, 2014
Peter Zumthor's LA art museum plan modified with bridge-like section across main thoroughfare
After his design drew concerns about potential damage to LA's La Brea Tar Pits, Peter Zumthor has dramatically revised his concept for the Los Angeles Museum of Art.