For Peter Gisolfi, the new green student center at Manhattanville College, a building designed with multilayered transparency in mind, is both cause for celebration and a sober reminder of the toll the economy is taking on the architecture industry.
As the senior partner at Hastings-on-Hudson-based Peter Gisolfi Associates prepares for gold LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification by the U.S. Green Building Council and an April building tour at the green student center, he discussed the waiting game inevitably facing the business of architecture.
“I think in any downturn, the first thing to go is construction,” he said. “The multiplier effect of construction is extraordinary. We buy all the materials, we employ all the construction workers and then put people in the buildings earning money, so it”™s an important part of the economy and unfortunately, one that is cyclical.”
Gisolfi said the firm steers clear of naming its niche, “but at any one particular moment, about 50 percent of our work is for academic institutions.”
As for the effect of the stimulus package on education, partner Frank Craine of Peter Gisolfi Associates said, “We”™re hoping to get additional projects. Everyone is scrambling to see what it really means and how it will impact schools.”
Russell Davidson, managing partner at KG&D Architects and Engineers P.C. in Mount Kisco and a director of the national association, American Institute of Architects, applied that exact frame of thought in his work in Washington, D.C.
“Through a leadership retreat we call Rebuild and Renew, we all visit our congressmen and senators to push for the stimulus to focus on vertical infrastructure,” Davidson said. “Public schools are the largest publicly funded project in the country. There is one in every neighborhood. As people know, they need work. This downturn has hit the construction industry more than ever.”
Both Gisolfi and Davidson discussed their ongoing educational projects and what exactly is going forward in the Hudson Valley and Westchester County.
Gisolfi said construction is concluding on a new middle school and community recreation center for the Peekskill school district, a project that was “slowed down and delayed because one of the contractors went bankrupt.” Gisolfi said the approximately $48 million construction project should be complete by summer”™s end.
For the Pelham City School District, Craine said a bond issue of more than $24 million was approved last May, the “last one we had approved. Construction on the 180,000-square-foot high school will begin in earnest this summer. We”™re expecting a final completion date of spring 2011.”
Craine said the firm is doing an entire exterior renovation, interior upgrades including: 26 classroom renovations, SMART technology add-ons, energy-efficient lighting, five faculty resource centers, a transformed library media center and full restoration of the auditorium. In addition to other minor renovations, The Colonial Elementary School will be upgraded.
At the Hackley School in Tarrytown, Peter Gisolfi Associates is working on a green project with construction costs in the $10 million to $12 million range.
“It”™s analogous to the one we did at Village Hall in Bronxville, but this is a private school, a historic building being rebuilt, expanded and made green,” Gisolfi said.
Davidson”™s firm is on schedule with a $37 million elementary school project in White Plains, technically an addition, with a completion date in the fall.
In Rockland County, Davidson said a proposal for the Clarkstown School District will be voted on this week.
“I think it takes a degree of courage to continue moving forward with what needs to be done; a few projects here and there can sustain an awful lot of jobs in this economy,” Davidson said. “Our view is that we shouldn”™t spend money in haste. If we”™re going to mortgage our future to do more public building, let”™s have it be something we”™ll be proud of. We prefer the phrase ”˜shovel worthy”™ instead of ”˜shovel ready”™ as architects.
“If we knew we had a new project waiting for us, we”™d be able to hold onto employees; we employ 30 people,” he said. “I think about contractors, of course. I think about the seven percent of lost jobs just in architecture in the last five months. I have a pile of resumes on my desk. It”™s dramatic.”
“In other words, when the federal government does something, how long does it take to get to the people who actually spend the money?” Gisolfi said. “And I don”™t quite understand that yet, but we”™ll wait and see; we”™re hoping ”¦ we”™re hoping.”