The owners of the new Star Wash car wash in South Jordan, Utah, had two major requests of its Building Team:
1. Design an economical facility that fits its setting at the base of the Wasatch Range, a 160-mile-long stretch of mountains slicing through central Utah.
2. Make the car wash eco-friendly.
Nichols-Naylor Architects, Salt Lake City, gave the 11,600-sf facility (with an additional 3,400 sf of covered canopies) an organic shape with two distinctive arched roofs and open-web bowstring trusses and steel joists that mimic the mountain’s peaks and valleys—and grab the attention of passing motorists on one of the area’s busiest thoroughfares.
Open-web bowstring trusses and steel joists were also used on the interior roof to match the arched profile of the exterior canopies. “Anytime you have different arched chords or use bowstring trusses, the coordination of the job is more difficult,” says Brad Hardy, operations manager with Steel Encounters, the project’s steel detailer.
Of course, it would have been easier for Hardy’s team had the architects and BHB Consulting Engineers, South Salt Lake, designed and engineered one large arched roof spanning the entire structure, but their design instead incorporated two roof structures coming off the building at different angles and at different elevations—one roof is eight feet higher than the other. The Steel Encounters team wound up designing 9,700 sf of arched chord trusses and joists to match the exact profiles the architect wanted. “It was definitely more of a challenge doing it this way,” says Hardy. “Each joist is different, each has to be specifically designed and engineered. You can’t pull one off a shelf and put up the building.”
Fortunately, these design complications didn’t add to construction or erection costs. The open-web steel trusses, in addition to serving an aesthetic purpose, were actually an economical alternative to more costly steel tube trusses. They also helped contribute to the owner’s request for an eco-friendly facility because they incorporated more than 99% recycled material and were fabricated by Legacy Steel, Salt Lake City, and manufactured by Vulcraft, Brigham City, Utah, two firms located within 100 miles of the job site. Steel erection was performed by C&C Steel Erectors, Springville, Utah.
The recycled steel was just one of several green elements used in the $1.2 million project. Eighty-five percent of the wash water used in the two interior wash bays is recycled, 60 photovoltaic panels supply 15% of the building’s electricity, and the facility’s heating comes from burning waste oil from an oil-change facility on the property.
The Star Wash car wash was recently named a 2010 Design Award Winner by the Steel Joist Institute (http://steeljoist.org), which ranked the project tops in its “Unique Application” category.
Related Stories
| Dec 13, 2013
GRW acquires West Virginia design firm Chapman Technical Group
GRW is expanding its capabilities through the recent acquisition of Chapman Technical Group, a 36-person West Virginia-based firm.
| Dec 13, 2013
AIA, MIT issue joint report on impact of design on public health
The research looks at the health of eight U.S. cities and lays out a path for translating the research into meaningful findings for policy makers and urban planners.
| Dec 11, 2013
Wyndham unveils hotel prototype for its Hawthorn Suites chain
The extended-stay hotel prototype reduces development costs by 46% for franchisees and enhances the overall guest experience.
| Dec 10, 2013
16 great solutions for architects, engineers, and contractors
From a crowd-funded smart shovel to a why-didn’t-someone-do-this-sooner scheme for managing traffic in public restrooms, these ideas are noteworthy for creative problem-solving. Here are some of the most intriguing innovations the BD+C community has brought to our attention this year.
| Dec 9, 2013
Tips for designing higher education's newest building type: the learning commons
In this era of scaled-down budgets, maximized efficiencies, new learning methods and social media’s domination of face time, college and university campuses are gravitating toward a new space type: the learning commons.
| Dec 9, 2013
Does technology help or hinder innovation?
Whether digital technology will help or hinder workplace insights remains a topic of ongoing debate. FastCo.Design features insights from business scholars on both sides of the issue.
| Dec 6, 2013
French concert hall includes integrated musical elements [VIDEO]
La Métaphone, a concert hall in Ognies, France, is a 1,980-sm facility with the unique characteristic of being a structural musical instrument. The solar-powered building incorporates musical elements in its walls, which can be played by musicians inside or outside the facility.
| Dec 6, 2013
Goettsch Partners selected 2013 AIA Chicago Firm of the Year
Architecture firm Goettsch Partners (GP) has been named the 2013 Firm of the Year, as conferred by the Chicago chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA Chicago). The award is the highest honor a firm can receive from the chapter.
| Dec 5, 2013
Maximizing the impact of online marketing
Because most professional services firms exist to help their clients reduce risk and navigate an uncertain future, they tend to approach the world of online or digital marketing with some caution. Here are four tips for maximizing the impact of online marketing.
| Dec 5, 2013
Translating design intent from across the globe
I recently attended the Bentley User Conference in Vejle, Denmark. I attended the event primarily to get a sense for the challenges our Danish counterparts are experiencing in project delivery and digital communication. One story I heard was from a BIM manager with Henning Larsen Architects in Denmark, who told me about a project she’d recently completed overseas in the Middle East. She outlined two distinct challenges and offered some interesting solutions to those challenges.