Louisville Flex

Summarize the project's program, features and achievements?

The Colorado Tech Center in Louisville, Colorado, is a coveted location for tech and aerospace technology companies. The majority of the land has been developed, and only a few very small, difficult lots are left to develop. This project took a small site between two existing buildings and maximized its potential. Providing a new unique building that can facilitate a drive-up dock, office space, and warehouse all on a site that shouldn't have room for dock capacity at all. To make this work, the design team used a "U" shaped footprint to create the required drive aisle clearances. Site detention was also a problem. This was solved by building a detention area on the front of the building that used the building itself as one wall of the detention pond. Extensive retaining wall foundations were designed to create the pond, and the tilt-up walls were set on top of these retaining foundations. The overall building footprint was under 17,000 square feet, making this a great example of how tilt-up can still be a cost-effective option for smaller structures.

What obstacles were overcome related to the schedule, budget, program, specification, site, etc. on this project?

The building was built on an extremely small site sandwiched between two developed lots. Crane access was very limited with buildings to the north and south, road to the east, and train tracks to the west. Proper site drainage required a detention pod built using the building as one side of the pond.

Please communicate any engineering complexities or unique features of the panel design for this project?

The limited slab footprint made panel layout and design a challenge. The need for a detention pond integrated with the building foundation was also a challenge from an engineering standpoint.