$1.5 Billion Complex to Highlight Renewable Energy

Bridgeport's planned 7-million-sq.-ft. Steel Point mixed-use development calls for tapping renewable energy sources. Also, designs are unveiled for three towers at the World Trade Center in Manhattan.

New WTC Tower Designs

The trio of world-class architects commissioned to design Towers 2, 3, and 4 at the World Trade Center in Manhattan recently released their designs, giving shape to what the new 10-million-sq.-ft. complex may look like in 2012 when the buildings open.

Lord Norman Foster of London-based Foster and Partners, Richard Rogers of Richard Rogers Partnership of London, and Fumihiko Maki of Tokyo-based Maki and Associates were tapped over the last year to design the towers, which will ring around the eastern edge of the site. Silverstein Properties of New York, developer of the three towers, created a studio in its recently completed 7 World Trade Center office building for the design teams to coordinate shared elements such as underground infrastructure.

Foster, a Pritzker Architecture Prize laureate, designed the 78-story Tower 2, which will be known as 200 Greenwich Street and offer 2.3 million sq. ft. of office space. The 1,254-ft.-tall tower will also have 143,000 sq. ft. of retail space, a central cruciform core, and four main blocks containing column-free office floors. Starting at the 59th floor, the glass façade will slant at a sharp westward angle.

The Rogers design for Tower 3 at 175 Greenwich St. will rise 71 stories to 1,155 ft., with 2.1 million sq. ft. of office space, five trading floors, and 133,000 sq. ft. of retail space. Positioned as the middle building, it will use diamond-shaped structural bracing, allowing for column-free spaces at the corners.

Tower 4 at 150 Greenwich St., designed by Maki, also a Pritzker Prize winner, will offer 1.8 million sq. ft. of office space in its 947-ft.-tall, 61-story frame, including five floors of retail space. The sleek-faced tower's façade will change color with the light of day.

WSP Cantor Seinuk of New York is structural engineer for Towers 2 and 3, while Leslie E. Robertson Associates of New York has that role for Tower 4. The rough $4.5 billion budget for the three towers is being developed into precise estimates, a Silverstein spokesman said.

The firm is striving for gold-level Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design ratings for all three towers and will mimic Freedom Tower and 7 World Trade Center in incorporating code-exceeding life-safety features. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owns the entire site, is building a new bathtub that will provide a foundation for the new towers along Church Street.

Connecticut Complex Aims for Sustainable Design

A 7-million-sq.-ft. mixed-use development is expected to break ground in the second quarter next year in Bridgeport, Conn., with an emphasis on using solar, water, and wind power.

The $1.5 billion Steel Point development would reclaim a mostly vacant industrial waterfront property by adding 3,500 residential units, a 400-slip marina, 160,000 sq. ft. of office space, 1.1 million sq. ft. of retail space, and a 2,800-ft.-long public promenade.

"It will be a live-work-shop-play community," said Dan Pfeffer, president of New York-based Midtown Equities, the lead developer.

The complex would generate 5 to 7 MW of power from solar, wind, and hydroelectric resources toward the projected annual 45 to 60 MW of consumption at build out in 2013 or 2014, said Herb Hauser, president of Midtown Technologies, the developer's energy consulting affiliate, which designed the plan.

The solar power would come through 2.5 to 3.5 MW generated by roof and window photovoltaic cells geared to heat hot water, supply heat, and create electricity. The project would generate 1.5 to 2.5 MW from wind-powered microturbines integrated into the design of tall buildings. And another 1 to 1.5 MW would come from hydrokinetic systems tapping the nearby waves and tides with generation from offshore power buoys or water turbines.

The whole complex also aims for energy-efficient design. Hauser said Midtown expects that nearly all of the property would attain a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design platinum rating, the highest on the scale.

"We want to make sure we've done all we can to not waste energy," Hauser said.

The 52-acre site was moving through a three-step municipal process to change its zoning this fall. The city had used its eminent domain powers over the years to vacate most of the property, and had already demolished various structures. Midtown negotiated deals this year to buy out the few tenants left, including an old marina and an oyster company, as well as United Illuminating, a New Haven, Conn., utility that owned 15 acres on the site.

"This was an old industrial property with virtually nothing left," Pfeffer said. "There was a lot of contaminated soil that was cleaned up."

Midtown became a majority partner in the project last year, joining Bridgeport Landing Development, the firm that had won an RFP from the city to develop the site three years ago. He said Midtown expanded the original proposal by adding retail and residential space, with the current design based on a master plan and a circulation and massing outline, both developed by New York-based Perkins Eastman.

The first phase starting next year would erect an 800,000-sq.-ft. retail center along with some residential units on a part of the property not dependent on the extensive marine work required for the overall development. Midtown has not yet hired a construction manager, but has tapped McLaren Engineering of West Nyack, N.Y., as a consulting, civil, and marine engineer. The property juts out into Bridgeport Harbor where the Pequonnock River and the Yellow Mill Channel meet north of the Long Island Sound, giving it an extensive waterfront with "excellent prevailing winds and a significant amount of sunny days for that part of Connecticut," Hauser said.

The decision to focus on renewable energy came from a business standpoint, with an eye toward using a "free source" of energy for the long-term, Hauser said.

It isn't clear yet whether the developer, the buyers of the units in the development, or the city will ultimately control the energy generation equipment, he added.

The development would also have a streetcar loop system connecting it to downtown transit facilities.

Koolhaas to Design Jersey City Tower

A new 1.3-million-sq.-ft. residential development that will offer 710 condominium units in the burgeoning waterfront district of Jersey City, N.J., has signed on a famous designer in Rem Koolhaas of the Netherlands-based Office for Metropolitan Architecture.

The 111 First Street project, valued at $400 million to $450 million, will offer 16,000 sq. ft. of art galleries, 52,000 sq. ft. of retail, and 120 work-live units for artists. Developed by two New York-based firms, BLDG Management and Athena Group, the project will move past a battle waged over the site for several years, after the artist tenants of a former tobacco factory onsite refused to leave to make way for a then-$100 million planned development.

The tenants and developer reached an agreement in early 2005, with the tenants agreeing to leave and the developer waiving back rent.

But a new battle began last year when BLDG and its New Gold Equities affiliate filed a federal lawsuit against Jersey City, alleging that the municipality was hindering the owner's development efforts at both 111 First St. and a property at 110 First St. The conflict over the 111 building involved the developer's contention that it could not preserve the 400,000-sq.-ft. complex because of structural defects in the eight timber and masonry buildings erected in stages starting in 1870.

The developer and city finally settled in July, when the two sides entered into a consent degree. The deal set new zoning rules for the site, while the developers agreed to help the city develop a Power House Arts Residence District that will retain the local artists' community that has sprouted in the area over the past 15 years.

The settlement called for the reconstruction of the 111 First Street façade by utilizing the original bricks "to the extent possible" and listed other design-specific considerations related to space usage. The developers also agreed to construct affordable housing units and the 120 live-work units for artists, as well as to provide a "high quality architectural design."

Koolhaas was the Pritzker Architecture Prize laureate in 2000. According to the July consent filing with the federal district court in Newark, N.J., the developers had also considered hiring David Childs, a prominent architect who works in the New York office of Chicago-based Skidmore, Owings & Merrill.

The agreement also specified future development plans for the 110 First St. site, calling for a 360,000-sq.-ft. structure not exceeding 345 units or 350 ft. in height. It calls for setting aside space for a restaurant, sculpture garden, garage, and a façade allowing the "permanent display of durable public art."

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