Reinvented Landmark

Jersey City Development Reconstructs a Fortress

by Tom Stabile

A former hospital complex that was a marvel of its time is being reshaped into a new $350 million, 2-million-sq.-ft. condominium complex in Jersey City, N.J.

Metrovest Equities of New York is transforming the former Jersey City Medical Center, which is listed as both a state and national historic landmark, into the Beacon, a complex where each building - all to be named after historic movie theaters - will be fully restored on the exterior and rebuilt on the interior.

"The conversion involves a gut rehab of all the buildings," said George Filopoulos, president of Metrovest. "It is the largest historic restoration in the state of New Jersey."

The medical campus was a monumental architectural accomplishment of its time, built during the heart of the Great Depression under the direction of Frank Hague, the city's legendary mayor and political boss. Hague, through a friendship with President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, managed to get the funding and resources to erect the fortress-like, 10-building, Art Deco complex, which has eight structures designed by John Rowland and two by Christian Ziegler, according to Ulana Zakalak, principal of Zakalak Associates of Red Bank, N.J., the project's historic preservation consultant.

The complex, which took 13 years to build, included the Margaret Hague Maternity Hospital, which was once among the nation's leaders in number of children born. The buildings contain numerous architectural treasures, said Phil Fierro, executive vice president of Metrovest.

"The façade has great architectural features - friezes and steel work on the parapets - and the inside has wall-to-wall terrazzo, marble walls, and great detail in the ceilings," he added. "We're really trying to keep the Art Deco features of that era."

Metrovest purchased the complex in January 2005 and broke ground shortly thereafter to restore the buildings, some of which had been vacant for 30 years.

That $120 million initial phase of work entails interior demolition and environmental abatement of the 22-story Rialto and the 21-story Capitol, in tandem with restoration of the exterior façades. Both are slated to open next March.

The phase also involves the renovation of a 25,000-sq.-ft. pavilion area that links the Rialto and Capitol. The space will house lobbies and resident amenities serving four buildings on the complex.

As of May, Metrovest had sold 75 percent of the 315 units in the two buildings. The units are priced at $300,000 to $700,000, which Filopoulos said is less than other condominiums along Jersey City's bustling riverfront sector, where studios go for the same cost as a one-bedroom unit at the Beacon.

The Beacon's studio, one-bedroom, and two-bedroom units - many with views of the Manhattan skyline because of the complex's perch on a high bluff about 2 mi. from the Hudson River - range from 600 sq. ft. to 3,200 sq. ft. in size.

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Both Restoration and Reconstruction

Project crews have their work cut out for them in the dual effort to preserve the historic features of the complex while reconstructing the interiors to create the high-end condominium homes.

The design plan required various approvals from landmarks authorities and input from the community in what ended up being a three-year process prior to Metrovest acquiring the buildings, Filopoulos said. A thorough analysis of the exterior followed in spring 2005.

"We had our engineers up on scaffolding for months inspecting every brick," he added.

The team's various demolition, masonry, general construction, interiors, and steel contractors have been busy over the last several months replacing exterior bricks, windows, and various interior structural elements, while also repointing and power-washing the façade. The team also has restored or reproduced custom versions of Art Deco-style bricks, terra cotta panels, granite, wrought iron, steel, marble, and friezes around the two towers.

The team is coordinating many of the tasks under State Historic Preservation Office guidelines, a requirement that was part of Metrovest's development approvals, Zakalak said.

As with any major restoration, surprises abound. In this case, the buildings held many secret corners, because they served not only as a hospital but as the place where Mayor Hague held court for years, Filopoulos said.

"We stumbled across hidden offices," he added.

Subcontractors on the job are uncovering many of the surprises, said John Miranda, project manager for Global Ironworks, a structural and miscellaneous steel contractor based in the Bronx that is fabricating and installing replacement steel for the first two buildings.

"As they're gutting this building out, we're finding medical files, letters," he added. "You'll find all kinds of crazy things in an old hospital."

With early demolition and façade work nearing completion, the focus in recent months has been the reconstruction of the interiors, with New York-based Turner Construction, working from its Somerset, N.J., office, leading the interior project team on the Rialto and Capitol.

"They did a lot of the demo over the last year, and our work started in February," said Ed Jenkinson, project executive for Turner. "It's being stripped down to the superstructure, and the only thing remaining on the floors are the elevators and exit stairways. We're doing all of the windows, elevators, masonry, drywall, and M-E-P work."

The structural rehabilitation work is extensive. Many floors need patches for uneven portions of the slab where crews had knocked down masonry interior walls and found troughs beneath them, Jenkinson said. Other spots had holes where there had been chutes for mechanical systems, and the roof required major patches of 30-ft. holes in several sections where crews had removed old water towers.

Many of the patches involve adding steel, corrugated decking, and concrete pours, said Miranda, whose contract is about $1 million. His work includes reinforcement to add new HVAC units on the roof as well as steel for the amenities space.

The structural work also comes with surprises, such as crews expecting to find steel beams based on the drawings but instead finding concrete ones, Miranda added. In some places, the steel has deteriorated badly because the building had long been out of use, requiring major reinforcement of floors with new steel. In other spots, the crews are finding that the original contractors had inserted hollow walls where full masonry walls were on the original drawings - requiring the new team to fix those decades-old issues.

Overall, the two buildings will use 150 tons of steel, Miranda said. Most of that will enter the buildings by hand and rise in the complex's oversized elevators because crews cannot erect an exterior hoist - due to the masonry restoration effort - and cannot use a standard site crane because it would be too heavy for the grade-level surface, which stands above a network of tunnels that linked buildings in the hospital complex.

Having to bring in steel by hand has created complicated scheduling logistics for delivering materials to the floors and also requires crews to splice together smaller steel sections, Miranda said.

"It's not your normal structural rehab," he added. "This is a unique project."

A Fully Outfitted Living Community

While the restoration and reconstruction effort is the main focus, the first phase of the complex set for completion next spring will also feature the Aqua, a lifestyle and fitness center that will link to a joint lobby and amenities space for the Rialto and Capitol.

The center will have a gym, yoga studio, children's playroom, screening room, indoor pool, hot tubs, saunas, lounge, and locker rooms. The amenities area will also feature various spaces built with Art Deco finishes, including a gathering hall, a catering kitchen, poker room, reading gallery, and billiards hall. Fierro said some of the rooms will occupy grand 30-ft.-high halls while others will be more intimate.

"The pool room is Frank Hague's old office, and will have terrazzo floors and wood paneling," he added.

The complex will also have a rooftop restaurant, 6,000-sq.-ft terrace, retail shops, and licensed day-care facility, while the condominium units will have high-end finishes, including marble in the bathrooms and Pietra Cardosa stone in the kitchen.

The next phase of work is an $80 million effort to add 214 units in buildings dubbed the Mercury and the Orpheum, Metrovest's Filopoulos said. Those and the remaining six buildings onsite, which range in height from 10 to 23 stories, all need exterior restoration. Engineering design work has begun on the 18-story Mercury and the 20-story Orpheum, he added.

Meanwhile, on the Rialto and Capitol, interior work continued in late spring, including sheet metal and sprinkler installation on lower floors. The effort is ramping up, and by October there will be about 300 construction workers on the site, Turner's Jenkinson said.

The large crew will have a strong safety focus, Global's Miranda added, citing an emphasis on reducing work violations.

"They have very strict rules," he said. "Every piece of steel has to have a stamp on it. Everything has to be rated."

Key Players

Developer: Metrovest Equities, New York

Construction Manager: Turner Construction, New York

Architect: Ismael Leyva Architects, New York

Structural, Miscellaneous Steel: Global Ironworks, Bronx

Demolition Contractor: Bedrock Contracting, Fair Lawn, N.J.

Masonry Contractor: Commodore Construction, New York

Historic Restoration Consultant: Zakalak Associates, Red Bank, N.J.

Structural Engineer: Goldstein Associates, New York

M-E-P Contractor: S.A. Comunale, Barberton, Ohio

Environmental: Slavco Construction, Clifton, N.J.