Overlooking Texas A&M’s marina on its Galveston Bay island campus, the 110,000 square foot Ocean and Coastal Studies Building will house the university’s marine biology and marine sciences programs, including ecology, comparative physiology, and environmental theory and policy. The active marina shelters a fleet of both research and training vessels, and the new building, set upon its bank, should serve as a portal to the exploration and knowledge of marine life.
The university embarked on this project with three goals for this building: it should reinforce the school’s position as a leading marine education and research institution; it should promote interdisciplinary teaching and research; and it should earn no less than LEED® Silver designation.
The cross shaped building aligns and unifies two existing campus grids, improving circulation and giving landmark status to these strategically sited grounds. Oriented to mirror the dual campus axes, the building’s wings are separated by 104.5 degrees, coincidentally the molecular bonding angle of a water molecule, the agent common to all the facility’s research.
In response to the university’s desire for discrete research laboratory and office/teaching functions, the three-story building is designed with separate wings for each. Entries at both the north and south ends of the office/teaching wing are linked by a circulation spine that runs through the entire building, traversed by a second double entry pathway that parallels the lab wing. A large lobby occurs at the intersection of the two wings, accessed by the corridors and yet a fifth building entry. These multiple entries and pathways allow easy entry to both wings without overlap of undergraduate and graduate students.
The lobby serves as meeting point, connector, exhibit space and navigational hub. Its centerpiece is an open grand stair that vertically connects all three floors. With views to the campus marina, the lobby’s interior also provides a visual connection to its waterside setting. A series of large mosaic murals by noted artist Dixie Friend Gay will embellish the walls with color and texture, informing through environmental responsibility. Constructed of recycled glass, the murals depict regional marine life relating to the studies occurring here.
On the first floor office/teaching wing are a large 120-person lecture theater, a 90-person classroom, teaching lab and faculty offices. The second floor houses another teaching lab and faculty offices. Break out rooms, meeting rooms and kitchen areas ring the second and third floor lobby spaces. The Galveston campus CEO office suite is on the third floor with large conference room, VP offices and an outdoor terrace facing the boat basin and open-air gathering plaza below.
The research labs lie on all three floors of the east/west wing. Flexible, modular lab layouts occur on a 10’6” w x 22’ grid with two-module and four-module labs, totaling approximately 30 individual labs. Support space is concentrated in the center of each floor, common to all labs. To promote interdisciplinary relations, the research labs overlap by field of study, and the central lobby break out areas foster interaction among researchers, faculty, CEO and officers.
The lab wing is constructed of precast concrete, reflecting existing campus architecture and the technical nature of research. The office/teaching wing is distinguished from its lab counterpart through the use of brick masonry, evoking historic Galveston waterfront architecture and the personalized aspect of teaching occurring within.
Adjacent to the first floor labs is a 5,000 square foot sea life center with running seawater supply and drainage. A networked system of filters, pumps and large storage tanks enables the university to maintain local species for research. Variable seawater temperatures allow replication of different oceanic conditions to study their effects on sea life. Sea life facilities here range from phytoplankton culture chambers to marine mammal holding tanks and aquaria.
Consideration for attaining the university’s goal of LEED Silver certification was evident in all phases of the project. As the result of a concentrated effort by WHR with cooperation from both the Owner and Construction Manager, the building has earned a superior LEED Gold rating due to its many conservation strategies, such as:
- Environmentally sensitive building materials. Precast concrete and locally produced brick were used for exterior cladding. The concrete contains a high percentage of fly ash, a post-industrial product, replacing sand. Also, most of the building’s steel maintains a proportion of recycled content.
- Underground water storage tanks collect condensate from the HVAC system, which will be used for irrigation, limiting off site discharge.
- Construction waste management will involve separation and recycling.
- Since the site is on an island 50 minutes from Houston, a carpool plan for subcontractors was implemented.
- Interior finishes are low volatile organic compound (VOC)-emitting.
- Lab casework is Forest Stewardship Council (FSE) certified and meets standards for reforesting. All casework contains recycled steel or wheat board substrate, which is a recycled, low VOC product made with clear maple wood veneer without formaldehyde.
- Cork, a natural, renewable material, is used on lobby accent walls on all three floors for its acoustical sound absorption properties and to evoke the image of sediment in sand.
- In addition to the recycled glass used in the mosaic murals, it is also used as an aggregate in the terrazzo on the main lobby stair.
- Native coastal plants were selected to demand less irrigation, while forming an indigenous seaside landscape.
Revit software was used for Building Information Management (BIM) throughout the design and construction phases. BIM has allowed the entire team to view the building in 3D format to increase levels of understanding of design elements and effects on the entire structure. Improved coordination occurred among architects, mechanical/electrical/plumbing engineers and contractor, greatly reducing conflicts in the field. BIM helped reduce change orders and realize significant savings in construction.
BIM allows increased understanding of site conditions, as well. The use of BIM facilitated 3D modeling of foundations and critical site utilities to accurately locate piers and avoid potentially serious sub-grade conflicts, resulting in successful drilling of piers.
The result is a highly successful, fully coordinated effort involving owner, researchers, faculty, architect, engineers and contractor, setting the stage for advancing the university in marine science exploration.
