The American Museum of Natural History will soon have a home in the Heartland. For the first time in its 143-yr history, the New York-based museum is partnering with another institution to house both temporary and permanent exhibits. Located near a busy intersection in Overland Park, Kan., the Museum of Prairie Fire is a key element of a new large-scale $60 million development currently underway. Walk on to the large job site, and you’ll find many buildings under construction simultaneously.
For example, workers are not only hard at work inside the Museum of Prairie Fire, but they’re also erecting several restaurants and finishing out a high-end movie theater called Cinetopia. The theater building features three large theaters with 50-plus-ft screens and one-third steeper seating areas than other theaters. The building also contains four parlor rooms and 10 “living rooms.” On this project, electricians will install wiring for 200 televisions and gaming consoles where visitors can pit their skills against one another.
“Cinetopia is a high-end movie theater that offers a Digital Super High Definition screen with a high-definition, premier sound system,” says Arlen Kleinsorge, senior project manager for McCownGordon Construction. “It is a very unique experience. This is only the fourth one that has ever been built.”
In addition to the movie theater, the construction team is working on a 950-space parking garage that will be illuminated with LED-based luminaires. On the western end of the site, the team recently wrapped up construction on the new Fresh Market grocery store and REI outdoor gear and clothing store.
McCownGordon Construction, general contractor, is working alongside several electrical contractors on the project. ProCircuit, Kansas City, Mo., is providing the site electrical; RF Fisher Electric Co., Kansas City, Kan., is handling the tenant finish on Cinetopia; and Electrical Associates LLC, Lenexa, Kan., is working on a temporary space for the museum exhibits, the shell of the garage, and the shell of the movie theater. Oliver Electric is wiring three buildings, which will house retail and restaurant spaces, and Faith Technologies, Lenexa, Kan., is responsible for the shell of REI and Fresh Market as well as the shell and tenant finish for the future museum. Just east of the museum site, another construction company is building new luxury residences.
Confronting challenges
The first phase of the Prairie Fire development, which is slated for completion by the end of April, broke ground on January 1. The adverse Midwestern weather threw some curveballs at the project participants in the beginning, and the crews were challenged with keeping the equipment and dirt moving so the frost wouldn’t settle into the ground.
“Right out of the shoot, the biggest challenge was probably the weather,” says Kleinsorge. “In Kansas City, we even received snow in May.”
Another obstacle was breaking through all of the limestone and other rock on the greenfield site. To accomplish this feat, the construction team used a large back hoe with a breaker on it. When installing underground plumbing in the garage, the workers used a rock trencher with diamond-studded teeth to cut their paths. Using this machine, they were able to trench out an area measuring 22 in. wide and 8 ft deep out of solid rock.
The need for the rock excavation impacted the installation of the foundations as well as the utility work on site. ProCircuit, which is installing the local electric utility infrastructure for Kansas City Power & Light as well as the site lighting, was also challenged by the rocky subterrain.
“Rock is a big challenge because it requires a lot more time, effort, and energy to install the conduit underground,” says Cody Murphy, an electrical foreman for ProCircuit who was on the site to supervise installation of the utility infrastructure.
Another significant challenge for the construction crews is working on a congested job site with two and sometimes three cranes in operation at the same time, different trades working side by side, and multiple buildings going up at once.
“Whenever you do a job at this pace, it requires a lot of coordination,” says Murphy, whose number of on-site electricians ranges from two to 10, depending on the workload for that day. “A lot could go wrong, but if everyone does their job correctly, then it can flow pretty smoothly.”
With all of the activity on the job site, McCownGordon works hard to ensure that everyone stays safe. The general contractor has a full-time safety engineer on-site who handles the orientation for new employees, and all of the workers are required to wear personal protective equipment. In addition, the superintendents do a safety walk every morning and perform inspections. As of early October, the project had no recordable incidents, Kleinsorge says.
Saving time
While working on the Prairie Fire development, the team members are focusing not only on safety, but also on efficiency. For example, Faith Technologies is using a 3D BIM model on the project.
“It makes it easier for us because we can see what the building will look like before it’s built,” says Sergio Chavez, superintendent for Faith Technologies. “It also helps us with the coordination of other trades.”
Additionally, the contractor is using laser-based equipment to lay out underground conduits and floor boxes. This method is much faster and more accurate than the traditional way of using string lines to save time on the job site, according to Chavez.
To enhance the productivity of its field workforce, Faith electricians are prefabricating 4-in.-diameter sections of communications conduit. By prefabbing the communications conduit before it was installed in the ceiling, Faith Technologies saved a significant amount of time in the field, Chavez says.
“We are using every opportunity to prefab materials in our shop,” says Chavez, whose crew started in July 2013 and plans to finish by March 2014. “When the materials are already ready to install, it makes it so much easier in the field and saves a lot of time.”
In some cases, however, Faith Technologies had to figure out a new way to install the conduit. Architecturally, the museum has a dichroic glass wall, an angled deck, and wavy stone exterior that fades from red to yellow to simulate a prairie fire. As part of this design, the ceiling and deck are different shapes. As such, the electricians couldn’t run conduit the traditional way. Instead, they needed to install the majority of the conduit under the slab and then do as many rough-ins as possible overhead. After the electricians installed the underground conduit and roughed it in, they installed the power, relay, and dimming system panels. In the final stage of the project, electricians will trim out the devices and install luminaires.
LED-based luminaires will illuminate the interior of the museum as well as the exterior of the structure. These low-energy-use luminaires will help contribute to the pursuit for LEED certification on this building.
The electrical contractor, which will peak at eight electricians on-site, is responsible for the power, lighting, and fire alarm systems on the project. In addition, Faith Technologies electricians are running conduits and working on the rough-in for the security, phone, and data systems.
Through careful coordination with the different trades and a focus on safety and productivity, the team is on track to wrap up completion on the museum next spring.
Fischbach is a freelance writer and editor based in Overland Park, Kan. She can be reached at [email protected].
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