Lane County Courthouse Studio by jareddukes

Innovation in Mass Timber

Lane County Courthouse

University of Oregon Mass Timber Studio Fall 2017 Professors: Judith Sheine & Mark Donofrio

Introduction This studio was sponsored by Lane County, Oregon, to explore the design of their new County Courthouse showcasing local materials in a very sustainable building. The County and State have had a long history with the timber industry and the recent development of new advanced timber products in the United States promises the potential for significant economic growth, particularly in rural areas. In order to encourage more use of timber products, the County would like the new civic building, the Courthouse, which is on a prominent downtown site in Eugene, the County’s largest city, to be a showcase for mass timber and to act as a demonstration project for future public and private projects. The County engaged in an in-depth process with the community and professional experts to determine the size and scope for their new civic building, the best site for it, and the values they wanted it to embody. The downtown site was chosen to reinforce the city’s urban design plan to extend the existing civic core from Willamette Street in the center of downtown to the Willamette River several blocks away, reinforcing and connecting pedestrian and bike paths through the city; the courthouse will form a critical next step in achieving this plan. Sustainability was one of the major values that the community wanted the building to express and the County thought that, in particular, showcasing mass timber structural systems could be a key part of that goal. Contemporary mass timber or solid timber does not require cutting down large diameter trees. Solid elements are manufactured by laminating or gluing together small pieces or layers of wood from small diameter logs to make larger structural members. While some mass timber products have been in use for a long time – glued laminated timber (GLT), oriented strand board (OSB) and laminated veneer lumber (LVL), for example – new advanced wood products have been developed recently. Cross laminated timber (CLT), which consists of layers of 2” x 6” fir glued together perpendicular to each other, was developed in Europe more than 20 years ago, and the first structural CLT panels were produced in the United States in 2015 by DR Johnson in Riddle, Oregon. Freres Lumber in Lyons, Oregon, is producing a brand new advanced wood product, mass plywood panels (MPP). Both CLT and MPP come in large panels and have advantages over steel and concrete in a number of ways. Wood sequesters carbon and is substantially lighter than steel or concrete, which allows buildings to be lighter, reducing structural loads and foundations. New lateral force resisting systems make mass timber very resilient and it is also fire resistant, with fire charring the exterior while protecting the interior of members.

In this studio, students were asked to consider all the major factors that influence the design of a significant civic building in an urban context, to analyze a complex program with very detailed requirements, and to synthesize advanced technical information on structure, energy use, ventilation and daylighting. The studio worked in close collaboration with Lane County administrators Brian Craner, Capital Projects Manager; Elizabeth Rambo, Lane County Trial Courts Administrator; Sarah Means, Economic Development Manager and Alex Cuyler, Intergovernmental Relations Manager, as well as with staff representatives from all the county divisions represented in the new building. Because the 250,000 square foot building program included the courthouse, along with the Sheriffâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Department, offices for the District Attorney, the State, and Probation and Parole services, and due to the studio focus on an integrated design process, the students worked in teams in which they were expected to collaborate productively, to resolve complex issues efficiently and to present them effectively. Generous funding from the County provided for external consultants to assist the students in this integrated design studio. Consultants included architects representing four firms with extensive courthouse expertise: Dennis McFadden, FAIA; Kent Duffy, Bjorn Clouten and Steve Simpson of SRG Partnership; Alan Osborne of Hennebery Eddy Architects; Tim Ganey, Kent Larson, Bill Valdez and Carla Weinheimer of DLR Group; and building code experts from Codes Unlimited, architect Samir Mokashi and engineer Franklin Callfas. Cal Poly Pomona Civil Engineering Professor Mikhail Gershfeld provided his specialized knowledge of timber structural systems, and Department of Architecture faculty members Kevin Van Den Wymelenberg and Jeffrey Kline from the departmentâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Energy Studies in Building Laboratory consulted on issues pertaining to energy use, ventilation, daylighting and other topics relating to sustainable buildings. Multiple reviews with these consultants and with County administrators and staff provided feedback for the students to integrate consideration of the many issues into their designs. The five student teams produced a broad range of approaches to the design project, giving the County much to think about and inspire them in the development of their new courthouse.

THE TOWER Jared Dukes | Jessica Glaeser | Braydon Kennedy | Shawn Robinson As an important civic building, the new Lane County Courthouse will be a symbol of justice. It will also demonstrate in a high-rise structure the potential for mass timber technology to benefit future economic growth within the region. The tower sits on a base which frames a courtyard. This contributes to the City of Eugene’s “Willamette to Willamette” urban design plan along 8th Avenue by greeting the user at a human scale, then drawing them into the courtyard from the street, and up through the tower where there are views to the surrounding city.

LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE

THE TOWER

99 LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE Park Street

Willamette Street

Park Street

High Street

Pearl Street

Oak Street

7th Ave

8th Ave

SITE: left AERIAL VIEW OF SITE: bottom

THE TOWER

100

WALK-THROUGH Mechanical Event Floor

Access to the complex is located on the south side off 8th Avenue, where there is an entrance to the courtyard. On either side of the entry are nonsecure window service spaces for the main sheriff’s office to the west and for the court administration services to the east. At the end of the courtyard is the entrance to the building. Visitors and staff enter through security and into a triple height main lobby. From here there are three directions to travel.

Courtrooms

State Offices

Tower

District Attorney

One direction is to the left through a public atrium in the three-story base. Here the public can access more services of the sheriff’s office as well as the district attorney’s office. The first and second floors of the west wings are comprised entirely of the main sheriff’s office. The departments include the fiscal section, the investigation and patrol units, and police records on the first level with the administrative division occupying all of the second level. The third floor houses the criminal division and victim services department of the district attorney.

District Attorney

Floor 3 Court Admin. Public

Floor 2

Jury Assembly Sheriff Roof Terrace

Court Admin. Public

Floor 1

Sheriff

Sallyport/Holding

Basement

101

Parking

LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE

A second direction to travel from the main lobby is to the right into the east wing that holds the court administration offices. Here the family administration and public services sections can be found on the first floor. Visitors can ascend an open staircase to a generous corridor that leads to the jury assembly room on the second level. This corridor holds self-serve kiosks that allow the public to access public records information. If more assistance is needed the court administration offices are located nearby. A rooftop terrace is on the southern section of the building that overlooks the courtyard and 8th Avenue. The third direction from the lobby is up into the tower. The first level of the tower (the fourth level of the building) comprises the family services department. Next, there are three levels of state office space with nine floors of courtrooms above. The top of the tower features a rentable event space and two mechanical floors. There are three distinct circulation routes through the tower that are all required to be separate from each other. These paths are for the public, incustody holding, and judges/staff, respectively. The public accesses the tower from the main lobby and ascends to smaller lobbies located on the southwest corner of each floor and that overlook the courtyard. The in-custody holding is located in the core of the tower and is accessed from the central holding area in the basement under the tower where the sally port and secure parking are also located. The judges and court administration staff can access their chambers on the northeast corner of each floor of the tower either from the secure parking or the main lobby that lead to a private elevator and stair.

PODIUM PLANS

TOWER PLANS

Conference Room

Office

UP DN

Office

Lounge

Office

Storage

Office

Storage

Client Meeting Room

Conference Room

Meeting Room

DN UP

Police Lounge

Office

16TH FLOOR UP DN

Office

Client Meeting Room

Office

Custodian Security Monitoring & Dispatch Room

Office

DN UP

Office

Conference Room

Office Office

Court Admin. Office

Office

Armory

Kitchen

Office

Conference Room Office

Office Chief Deputy Office UP

Jury Assembly Sheriff's Office

UP DN

15TH FLOOR

Sheriff non-secure window services

Court Admin. non-secure windows

Level 1 Main Entrance 1/16" = 1'-0"

2ND FLOOR

1ST FLOOR

17 16

Conference Room

Women's Locker Room

Central Victims

Attorney Office

Men's Lock Room

7TH - 14TH FLOORS

Reception Office

Storage

Records Storage

Attorney Office

Office

UP DN

2 Control Center

3 4

Attorney Office

12 11

Att. Office

Attorney Office

8 Gun Locker

Att. Office Conference Room

UP DN

10 6

Level 2 Sherif/Court Admin 1/16" = 1'-0"

Att. Office

Victims Services Reception

Level 3 DA 1 1/16" = 1'-0"

BELOW GROUND 1

Basement Parking/Holding 1/16" = 1'-0"

3RD FLOOR 4TH - 6TH FLOORS

THE TOWER

102

COURTYARD ENTRANCE

103

LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE

THE TOWER

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SECTIONS

105

LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE

THE TOWER

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107

LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE

LOBBY: left COURTROOM: bottom There are four types of courtrooms that consist of the arraignment court, standard courts, non-jury courts, and a few larger courtrooms with one for a grand jury. There are two courtrooms per floor with the exception of the grand jury court which is located on its own floor. The courts are offset from each other and take up the northwest and southeast corners of each level of the tower.

THE TOWER

108

ENVELOPE AXON: bottom CONNECTION DETAIL: right

109

LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE

CLT + Concrete Core

Post + Beam

STRUCTURAL SYSTEMS The foundation and first three floors of the building are constructed with poured in place concrete. The next three levels, the 4th through 6th floors, have a steel structure that serves as a transition zone between the lower concrete levels and those above. The courthouse levels, 7th through 16th floors, are comprised of mass timber construction. They feature CLT floors and large glulam members for support with a CLT core.

CLT + Concrete Floors

Glazed Facade Enclosure

THE TOWER

110

DAYLIGHTING: bottom

Direct Daylighting Diagram Noon, Dec. 21

111

LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE

Direct Daylighting DiagramNoon, Jun. 21

ENVIRONMENTAL CONTROLS The building features several environmental characteristics to help lower energy costs. The tower and lower wings are shaped to allow the maximum amount of daylight to enter the spaces. Throughout the program overall room widths are also kept down to allow more natural light to enter. The courtrooms are placed along the edges for direct clerestory light and to borrow daylight from adjacent corridors. The building also features various ventilation systems throughout the scheme. The open floor plans of the lower base (floors 1 - 3) allow traditional cross ventilation to cool the spaces, bring in fresh air, and remove stale air. In the tower the system is slightly different; the floors are grouped together in sets of three. Fresh air enters at the bottom floor of the set and rises through the other two floors and exits at the top. This creates the same effect as more traditional cross ventilation.

THE TOWER

112

Cross-Ventilation Diagram

113

LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE

Tower Ventilation Diagram (Intake)

Tower Ventilation Diagram (Outtake)

THE TOWER

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115

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MODEL PHOTOS

THE TOWER

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117

LANE COUNTY COURTHOUSE

THE TOWER

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