Page 18 - College Planning & Management, June 2018

PHOTOS COURTESY OF DLR GROUP
RECYCLED FACILITIES
BENEDICTINE UNIVERSITY COAL BEN
surprisingly diverse, with Beloit’s Daniel J. Schooff, chief of staff and Powerhouse project manager, describing it as a facility with “spaces for students and community to interact, a fitness floor, training track, gym, competition swimming pool, health and wellness center, signature lecture hall, batting cages, conference room, lots of interaction with the Rock River,” and food.
This is an adaptive reuse project of considerable scope and complexity, inherently challenging. Schooff says, “Turning a decommissioned power plant into
a world-class student union, recreation, and athletic center has been challenging, but well worth it.” As Schooff sees it, “there were times we could have brushed our hands and said, ‘well, we tried,’ but...
we leaned on partners, communicated over and over again, and found a way” to forge ahead.
According to Studio Gang, the project not only adaptively reuses, but also creates new energy efficien- cies that include using river water to heat and cool the building and solar heating for the aforementioned swimming pool. The architect indicates the project is targeting LEED Gold, and in another environmentally related step, work will include remediating abutting areas of the riverfront.
The key to making this large project happen, Schooff points out, has been cooperation with a large group of private and public partners and donors. In his view, the Powerhouse provides a characteristic response to a campus need, and one “that matches the quality of our educational experience” and “amplifies our mission.”
“COAL”ESCING INTO NEW FUNCTIONALITY
Another sweeping change in use came about suc- cessfully some years ago when Benedictine University in Lisle, IL, transformed a large coal bin into a gather- ing place called the Coal Ben (“Ben” for Benedictine).
Marco Masini, Benedictine’s vice president for Student Life, provides the back story: “Our student government was requesting a space on campus for students to hang out and socialize. This was brought up to then-President William Carroll, who walked the campus searching for a location. As he opened the doors of the coal bin, he envisioned ‘a gathering space’ for the campus community.”
The idea launched what was a new journey for the university. Benedictine had previously converted a science center into classrooms and a library into an enrollment center, Masini explains, but nothing on the scale of the Coal Ben. That journey was intricate and extensive.
Architect Kate Yurko, principal, DLR Group, explains what unfolded at the coal bin, including a painstaking investigation of how to deal with old materials “not necessarily meant to withstand the test of time,” as well as asbestos abatement. Accessibility issues drove another major step. As Yurko reports, “To make the floor levels work for operations and meet accessibility, we added a ground-floor level inside the existing building envelope, but this floor could not bear on the existing perimeter walls, so another structure was inserted within the building envelope to support the new floor.”
The process also included reusing interior redwood
PHOTOS COURTESY OF BENEDICTINE UNIVERSITY
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COLLEGE PLANNING & MANAGEMENT / JUNE 2018
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