© Maxwell MacKenzie 2009

Patriots Plaza II and III, located in the heart of Southwest Washington, DC, have been awarded LEED Core & Shell Gold Certification, making them part of the largest speculative office project in the District to receive a LEED Gold rating. Haynes Whaley’s engineers collaborated with the project team, including Trammell Crow Company, Gensler, B&A Consulting Engineers, and Helix Constructors, to design a facility that meets new government security standards, is marketable to private sector tenants, minimizes the impact to the environment and is energy efficient. Patriots Plaza II and III perform 14% better than ASHRAE 9.1, utilized over 20% of recyclable and regional building materials, and recycled more than 80% of the construction waste.

Patriots Plaza is a three-phase, 1 million sf office complex that is more than 80% leased by the General Services Administration for multiple U.S. Government agencies, including the FBI, FEMA, Health and Human Services, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Our engineers provided structural design services for the entire complex, which was the first market-driven urban complex designed to meet post 9/11 security standards for a Level IV facility. Patriots Plaza’s high security features include progressive collapse avoidance, a hardened structure to resist blast loading, special column designs in the below-grade parking garage, and intricate detailing of reinforcement to increase the ability of the structure to confine damage and withstand attack.

Haynes Whaley’s latest Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) laboratory project was recently featured in the Spring 2009 edition of Gilbane Construction’s “Bulletin”.  Our firm provided the structural engineering services for the National Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures Center (NBACC) at Fort Detrick, Maryland.  This recently completed project was the first new facility built for the Department of Homeland Security.  Along with Gilbane Construction, we worked with Perkins + Will (Atlanta and Houston), Affiliated Engineers, Inc., ccrd partners, and other national firms on this critical project.  The mission of this facility is to serve as the lead lab with the FBI and other law enforcement agencies in the event of a bioterrorist attack on this country.

This was Haynes Whaley’s third BSL-4 project.  Our previous experience with the unique construction requirements for high-containment lab areas was a great benefit to this effort.  As an example, we were able to reduce the concrete curing requirements for the concrete containment walls based upon our experience with the two previous projects.  NBACC presented many other unique structural design challenges, including the ability to resist progressive collapse and the use of a micropile foundation system.

Haynes Whaley was the engineer of record for the project which also included Developer: Trammell Crow Company; Architect: SmithGroup; and Contractor: Clark Construction.