![]() |
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
| Jun 7, 2013
First look: Austin breaks ground on 'light-filled' Central Library
The design scheme by Lake|Flato and Shepley Bulfinch incorporates reading "porches" and a light-filled, six-story atrium.
| Jun 5, 2013
USGBC: Free LEED certification for projects in new markets
In an effort to accelerate sustainable development around the world, the U.S. Green Building Council is offering free LEED certification to the first projects to certify in the 112 countries where LEED has yet to take root.
| Jun 3, 2013
Construction spending inches upward in April
The U.S. Census Bureau of the Department of Commerce announced today that construction spending during April 2013 was estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $860.8 billion, 0.4 percent above the revised March estimate of $857.7 billion.
| May 29, 2013
6 award-winning library projects
The Anacostia Neighborhood Library in Washington, D.C., and the renovation of Cass Gilbert’s grand Beaux-Arts library in St. Louis are among six projects to be named 2013 AIA/ALA Library Building Award winners.
| May 24, 2013
James Turrell's art installation turns Guggenheim Museum into 'skyspace'
James Turrell, an artist whose projects are more properly defined as "light sculptures," will have a major installation at the Guggenheim Museum this summer, turning Frank Lloyd Wright's famed serpentine atrium into a show of shifting colors and textures. The site-specific project, Aten Reign, will run from June 21 to September 25.
| May 17, 2013
First look: HKS' multipurpose stadium for Minnesota Vikings
The Minnesota Sports Facilities Authority (MSFA), the Minnesota Vikings and HKS Sports & Entertainment Group have unveiled the design of the State’s new multi? purpose stadium in Minneapolis, a major milestone in getting the $975 million stadium built on time and on budget.
| May 16, 2013
Chicago unveils $1.1 billion plan for DePaul arena, Navy Pier upgrades
Hoping to send a loud message that Chicago is serious about luring tourism and entertainment spending, Mayor Rahm Emanuel has released details of two initiatives that have been developing for more than a year and that it says will mean $1.1 billion in investment in the McCormick Place and Navy Pier areas.
| May 7, 2013
Renovated bridge building will anchor Nashville riverfront master plan
Renovations to the former Nashville Bridge Company building were recently completed, including a newly-built modern wing. The facility has been re-dubbed The Bridge Building and now offers spaces for meetings, parties, weddings, and other events.
| Apr 30, 2013
Tips for designing with fire rated glass - AIA/CES course
Kate Steel of Steel Consulting Services offers tips and advice for choosing the correct code-compliant glazing product for every fire-rated application. This BD+C University class is worth 1.0 AIA LU/HSW.
| Apr 26, 2013
BIG tapped to design Europa City in suburban Paris
Danish architecture firm, BIG - led by Bjarke Ingels – has been announced as the winner of an international invited competition for the design of Europa City, a 800,000 square meter cultural, recreational and retail development in Triangle de Gonesse, France.