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Bish Bosch: Ambisymphonic premieres

Thu, 23 May 2013 16:58:00 GMT

May 24 marks the premiere of Bish Bosch: Ambisymphonic, an immersive sonic re-imagining of musician Scott Walker's 2012 album Bish Bosch.

The project is a collaboration between Walker and his longtime co-producer Peter Walsh; multimedia artists Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard; and Arup's New York-based team of Raj Patel, Terence Caulkins (acoustics/sound) and Brian Stacy (lighting).

The installation, which will run through June 2 at the Sydney Opera House as part of the Vivid Sydney festival, centers on an ambisonic arrangement of speakers that have been custom programmed to provide a 3D spatial experience of four tracks on the album. Forsyth and Pollard developed the installation concept and worked closely with Caulkins and Walsh to ensure that Walker's original musical vision was preserved in the final result.

Six Arup engineers win '40 Under 40' award

Wed, 15 May 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Six of Arup's engineers were selected as recipients of Consulting-Specifying Engineer magazine's 2013 '40 Under 40' award.

This award is given to 40 building industry professionals age 40 and younger who stand out in all aspects of their lives.

Arup's honourees include:

Hans-Erik Blomgren, Associate and structural engineer in Arup's Seattle office.
Michelle Dionello, senior mechanical engineer in Arup's San Francisco office.
Murat Karakas, Associate and mechanical engineer in Arup's Los Angeles office.
Amit Khanna, senior design engineer and senior sustainability consultant located in Arup's San Francisco office.
Jason Krolicki, Associate and structural engineer situated in Arup's San Francisco office.
Jamey Lyzun, Associate and mechanical engineer in Arup's Los Angeles office.

Candidates were nominated by a professional colleague or mentor and judged based on commitment to excellence in their academic, professional, personal, and community involvement.

"Now in its sixth year, the competition is becoming more intense. Each winner truly deserves this award. Through project management, finding unique engineering solutions, volunteering, mentoring, and much more, these winners are guiding the building and engineering community."

- Amara Rozgus, Editor-in-Chief of Consulting-Specifying Engineer.

The May issue of Consulting-Specifying Engineer magazine profiles each young professional, highlighting traits that lead him/her to continued success, recent professional projects, and personal achievements. To read profiles of the winners, please visit www.csemag.com/40under40.

This is the fifth year that Arup has had winners in this annual awards program.

High-performance structural design delivered on 40-storey tower

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 08:00:00 GMT

The Manhattan office tower for Boston Properties at 250 West 55th Street included New York's first innovative viscous damping system. This reduced steel requirements by 10%, resulting in a cost savings of $5m.

Boston Properties hired architect Skidmore Owings and Merrill LLP (SOM) and Arup to design a 40-storey tower that includes office space, a green roof, two podium levels, and two basement levels. Our design incorporated an innovative viscous damping system into the outrigger and belt truss at the crown of the building, the first of its kind in New York. This damping system reduces the building motion during wind storms, and enabled the steel tonnage to be reduced by 10%, resulting in a cost savings of $5m. The integration of seven small viscous dampers into the mechanical space at the top of the building preserved valuable space within the building that would have otherwise been occupied by a tuned-mass damper, thereby maximising rentable space for the landlord, Boston Properties.

Arup utilised Building Information Modelling (BIM) to deliver a highly coordinated and efficient design. We pushed the technology even further on this project by passing the design model to the fabricator, and then reviewing the detailed fabrication model in 3-D, speeding the review process and dramatically reducing coordination problems. We used the technologies currently available to help reach BIM's full power, developing a more efficient, "first-time-right" approach to design and construction.

"Our experience with Arup as structural engineer for 250 West 55th Street has been nothing but positive. The firm's engineering innovations helped us save $5m and gave us more usable space per floor. The degree of coordination achieved with the Revit and Tekla models was extremely thorough evidenced by the low number of RFI's received for the entire steel fabrication and erection process. Arup showed creativity and a real willingness to help us achieve our goals for the design of 250 West 55th Street."

-Robert Schubert, senior vice president of construction at Boston Properties.

This 1mft² office tower is slated for occupancy in early 2014, having just reached substantial completion of the structure and envelope.

Arup and NBBJ design new corporate building for Samsung

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 08:00:00 GMT

History of design collaboration results in third project for South Korean electronics giant, Samsung.

Arup is collaborating with NBBJ, a global architecture firm, to design the new 1.1m ft² building for Samsung AHQ(DS), located in California's Silicon Valley. The project will be pursuing LEED certification.

Samsung's new campus will consist of a ten floor office tower building with research facilities, a clean room, a data centre, a cafeteria pavilion, and a nine floor parking garage.

Included in the design of the office tower are an eco-friendly collaborative workspace, open garden floors, on-site fitness centre and yoga space, and an extensive courtyard. The façade for the open plan office configuration has been designed to maximise the use of daylight, taking advantage of the courtyard's access to sunlight, while reducing solar gain to create a healthy, productive workplace interior. The structural design enables the ground and the garden floors to remain column free on the east and west sides by integrating cantilever and bridge elements in the office floors between. Additional technical features of the project are anticipated to include low-energy mechanical systems, thermal energy storage, the use of innovative LED lighting technology, and low-flow water fixtures.

Arup is providing structural, mechanical, electrical, plumbing, civil, and façade engineering, as well as acoustics, lighting, vertical transportation, sustainability, fire and life safety, parking, and risk consulting services for the project. Currently in the construction document (CD) stage, ground is expected to be broken in mid-2013, with an estimated project completion date of mid-2015.

Arup has worked extensively with NBBJ on prior projects that have involved light and airy indoor and outdoor spaces similar to Samsung's new building. The firms have partnered on additional Samsung projects, most notably the Electronics R&D Center and the Training and Learning Center, both in Suwon, South Korea. In addition, Arup and NBBJ worked collaboratively to design the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Headquarters in Seattle, Washington.

Kauffman Center wins top engineering award

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 19:41:00 GMT

Arup's structural engineering for the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts has won the Grand Conceptor Award, the top honour bestowed by the American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC).

The award was announced last night during a ceremony at Washington DC's Grand Hyatt. Arup's chairman for the Americas, Mahadev Raman, and Washington DC group leader, Greg Giammalvo, accepted the award.

The Kauffman Center, a 356,000ft² facility designed by Safdie Architects, serves as the focal point of Kansas City's burgeoning arts district. The project's structural engineering highlights include a tensile roof system, a "box-in-box" design that separates the facility into three buildings for acoustical purposes, and a split in materials that provided cost and functionality benefits.

I'm delighted that the Kauffman Center was awarded the ACEC's highest prize. The project was picked out of a national shortlist of eight Grand Award winners and singled out for high praise. The judges had kept the selection a secret until the last minute, so the announcement at the ceremony came as a genuine surprise.

— Mahadev Raman, Arup Americas Chairman

Congratulations are also due to our local engineering partners in Kansas City, Structural Engineering Associates and WL Cassell & Associates, Inc.

The ACEC's Engineering Excellence awards are judged by a panel of approximately 25 individuals drawn from fields ranging from engineering to government and media. Criteria include innovation; future value to the engineering profession; perception by the public; social, economic and sustainable considerations; and successful fulfillment of client and owner needs.

A number of projects have also won awards from regional ACEC chapters in the past two months. During an April 6 New York ACEC chapter event held at the Waldorf-Astoria, two Arup projects received the highest level award, Diamond: +Pool (architect: Family + PlayLab) in the studies, research and consulting category, as well as the Kauffman Center in the structural category. The building systems engineering of the Kauffman Center won the second-highest level, Platinum. Pier 15, East River Waterfront (architect: SHoP) won a Gold award in the special projects category, and Haeundae I'PARK (architect: Studio Daniel Libeskind) earned Silver in the structural category.

At a Massachusetts awards ceremony held on March 20 at Cambridge's Royal Sonesta Hotel, the John W. Olver Transit Center (architect: Charles Rose Architects), the nation's first zero net energy transit facility, won a Gold award in the building systems engineering category.

Influential book about climate change published

Wed, 10 Apr 2013 08:00:00 GMT

"Two Degrees: The Built Environment and Our Changing Climate" explains our current situation and advises practical steps to reduce the extent of global warming.

Authored by Arup's Fiona Cousins, Alisdair McGregor, and Cole Roberts, Two Degrees reviews the outcomes that may occur if the earth's temperature rises at its current rate, and lays out a roadmap for keeping global temperature rise to less than 2 degrees centigrade.

Two Degrees is a practical guide intended for a broad audience that occupies and shapes our built environment. It is about global warming, its impact on the world, and the associated opportunity to create economic development and unnoticed resilience.

In Two Degrees, the authors provide a clear framework for communities, policy makers, planners, designers, developers, builders, and operators to help manage the impacts and capture the opportunities of our changing climate.

Two Degrees is divided into three sections: Fundamentals, Mitigation, and Adaptation, and covers a diverse array of topics ranging from climate-positive communities and low-carbon buildings, to the psychology of choice and the cost of a low-carbon economy. The book covers planning and sustainability; urban design; green construction; environment and business; environment and society; environment and the city; and structure, materials and detailing.

"We have our challenge laid out. Two Degrees provides a well-structured guide in which anyone who designs or builds in the built environment can find lasting value."

—Ed Mazria, founder and CEO of Architecture 2030.

The book's foreword is written by Amory Lovins and includes insight from more than 10 contributing authors with direct experience in the practice of the built environment.

"Two Degrees is a world-class book. There is a waterfall of ideas… Thoughtful. Clear. Two Degrees emerges from some of the best minds in sustainable practice."

—Jim Cramer, Design Futures Council; chairman and principal of the Greenway Group.

Published by Routledge, the book is now available for purchase.

Americas Region strengthens transit operations

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 08:00:00 GMT

Arup announced today it has hired Joseph Edge, P.E., associate principal, and Christopher J. Taylor, P.E., associate principal, to augment its regional transit market offerings. They will be located in Arup's New York office.

"Both Joseph and Christopher bring unprecedented experience to Arup's transit group. Joe's strengths are in project and program management of major highway and transit projects and his immediate impact will be advantageous to Arup's oversight role on the Tappan Zee bridge project. Christopher has extensive capabilities centered on high speed rail, commuter rail, and subway projects that will directly benefit the delivery of a high speed rail project in Texas."

—Gillian Blake, principal and leader of the infrastructure practice team in Arup's New York office.

Joseph Edge, P.E., associate principal, is a senior project and programme manager with more than 27 years of experience in running major domestic and international large-scale projects and programmes for highways and rail infrastructure. Joseph excels at the commercial and contractual aspects of both design-build and more traditional projects. His main responsibility will be to oversee the Tappan Zee bridge project, the first design-build transportation project in New York State. Joseph is a former recipient of a service award from the Iraqi Reconstruction Program. He received a BS in civil engineering from Ohio University and an MBA from Baruch College—the City University of New York.

Christopher J. Taylor, P.E., associate principal, serves as project manager and lead engineer for railroad right-of-way and station projects. His primary responsibility will be to deliver a major high speed rail project in Texas, while growing the rail business in the northeast out of our New York office. He previously served as the deputy director of high speed rail for AECOM and his experience includes engineering leadership of the North East Corridor high speed rail feasibility study for Amtrak, the Trans Hudson Express project for NJ Transit, and design and construction management for various transit projects in the US, Australia, and Europe. Chris was the 2004 recipient of the Young Engineer of the Year award from the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), North Jersey Branch. He received a BS from the New Jersey Institute of Technology and an MS from Cornell University, both in civil engineering.

NCE/ACE honours Terry Hill and Tom Wilcock

Fri, 22 Mar 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Terry Hill was presented with the NCE/ACE Outstanding Achievement Award for his major contribution to engineering over a career spanning four decades.

Arup director and former chairman, Terry Hill, was recognised for being an ambassador for engineering by highlighting the impact that the industry makes to our society, environment and quality of life.

"Hill has been in the industry for almost 40 years, and, throughout that time, has raised the profile of engineering both through projects he has championed, and through his tireless work as a member of industry and government organisations."

— NCE/ACE Judges comments

In addition, Tom Wilcock, a senior engineer based in Arup's New York office, beat over 60 applicants to win Young Consultant of the Year.

"Tom Wilcock embodies a lot of the change taking place across our sector at present. He sees engineering as an opportunity to make a difference to people's lives while reflecting the growing diversity of skills involved in the sector, demonstrating strong economic insight and the ability to manage projects and people alike. All of the shortlisted nominees for this award are remarkable young engineers, and Tom should inspire many others to join a wonderful profession."

— Chief Executive of ACE, Dr Nelson Ogunshakin OBE

NCE editor, Antony Oliver described all four finalists for the Young Consultant of the Year Award as exceptional, saying they were inspirational to young people coming into the industry.

Presented by the BBC presenter and economics expert Evan Davis, the Awards, which consist of four business categories and two prizes for individuals, recognise outstanding contribution and business performance in the UK engineering field. Visit www.nce.co.uk (subscription required) to see details of all winners.

New York office hosts Two Degrees launch party

Fri, 15 Mar 2013 14:38:00 GMT

On March 7, our New York office hosted the local launch of Two Degrees: The Built Environment and Our Changing Climate.

Authored by Arup's Fiona Cousins, Alisdair McGregor, and Cole Roberts and published by Routledge, the book is now available for purchase.

Taking its title from the 2° Celsius (3.6° Fahrenheit) that the scientific community has set as a target cap for global temperature rise, Two Degrees explores practical steps to reduce warming and adapt to a changing climate. It reviews the current science and explains how we can set practical steps to reduce the extent of warming and to adapt to the inevitable changes, all while improving the bottom line, beautifying our communities, and increasing human health. The book is a practical guide intended for a broad audience of those who occupy and shape our built environment. The authors provide a clear framework for communities, policy makers, planners, designers, developers, builders, and operators to help manage the impacts and capture the opportunities of our changing climate.

Two Degrees has been well received since its release. Jeffrey Koseff, the Perry L. McCarty Director of the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment, praised its "truly unique approach to meeting the challenge of solving the complexity of global-scale climate change on a human scale, using practical, profitable, and sustainable approaches to developing buildings."

The New York event included a discussion with Fiona and Cole moderated by Robert Watson, an international leader in the green building movement and founder of the LEED green building rating system.

Arup integrates Artec Consultants Inc into global practice

Mon, 04 Mar 2013 08:00:00 GMT

Thirteen acoustics, audio visual and theatre consultants join Arup.

Arup and Artec are pleased to announce the integration of their practices, effective immediately. This combines two of the world's premier practices specialising in the planning, design, and engineering of venues for performing arts, contemporary entertainment, education, conference, convention, sports and worship venues.

"Our expanded team offers clients around the world unrivaled knowledge, experience, skills, and cutting-edge tools to plan and design innovative venues for the 21st century."

—Raj Patel, Principal, Americas Arts and Culture Business Leader

"Joining forces with Arup, enhances our collective ability to provide highly specialist skills anywhere in the world, through the resources of a large, global organization, serving projects of any scale, with the best international design thinking, delivered to clients locally from start to finish."

—Tateo Nakajima, Principal, former Partner at Artec

Arup has integrated former Artec staff into the New York team led by Raj Patel. With this move, Tateo Nakajima, Ed Arenius, Todd Brooks, Christopher Darland and Tom Clark from Artec join our leadership team and will work closely with our regional leaders.

This enhanced team of acoustics, audio visual and theatre consultants strengthens our ability to provide clients and their projects whole life relationships. From cultural masterplanning, project inception and concept development, through design, construction and post opening. Our holistic service supports the owners, operators and users in delivering performances to their audiences.