Lincoln Square
PCS Business Unit: Major Projects Division
PCS Customer: Skanska
Location: Bellevue, WA
PCS Project Superintendent: Dave Morehouse & Les Hanford
PCS's Performance Date: 2004 - 2007
Project Highlights
This project was a long time coming. Lincoln Square has been a vision in its Owner (Kemper Freeman’s) mind since before the new millennium. Pacific Construction Systems, Inc. (PCS) has had a long history of its own attempting to secure the project, which was passed around between several General Contractors until it was finally secured, for the last time, by Skanska USA. After years of work in the bidding stage, this project – unique to Bellevue, WA and the Seattle area for that matter, would finally be underway.
Consisting of a Hotel Tower, Condo Units, Parking Garage, and a Retail area the size of several football fields, Lincoln Square has been touted as the second largest mixed-use project under construction in the United States. Lincoln Square’s size contains approximately 1.4 million square feet with an overall project value of $500 million. The Hotel / Condo Tower reaches 42 stories high, the Parking Garage contains 1,700 spaces over five levels, and the retail space of 310,000 square feet features a 16 screen cinema. The 444 foot tall Hotel / Condo Tower was the tallest structure in Bellevue at the time it was built. PCS understood upfront that there would be many obstacles along the road to completing this project; its inherently multi-faceted nature proved to be challenging for both management and construction.
The foremost challenge for project management was the organization, maintenance, and reconciliation of four separate contracts (Hotel, Condo, Retail, and Parking). PCS’s experience managing multi-phase projects and combination-package projects proved up to the task, but not without trial and error and the need to continually improve during the course of the project. Even as construction came to its conclusion, the project had strong management needs in order to facilitate its closeout.
As challenging as the management of Lincoln Square had been, it was minute in comparison to the amount of effort that was required in the field, both to build the innovative structures themselves and to keep in-line with the project’s aggressive schedule.
On the Hotel / Condo portion of the project, the most consistent challenges were with scheduling and crew size, as well as some difficult details. Work in the Hotel tower was fast paced, with wall and ceiling framing happening at about six or seven days per floor (this fast pace continued on through the gypsum wallboard and taping phases as well). The Hotel base was loaded with tricky ceilings and soffits to build, including a lot of round and domed ceilings with critical dimensions required in order to match the acoustic ceilings and other finishes. The Condo Tower had challenges of its own. Work proceeded through the colder months of the year, and one of the biggest challenges as a result was keeping the temperature high enough so the taping mud would dry. Crew sizes reached their peak during the bulk of the Condo work (exceeding ninety personnel for a time). The schedule was fast paced in the Condo as well, with an emphasis on quality since PCS knew these units would be under the critical review of the multitude of owners. Additionally, many of the owners made revisions to their units, and with every change a new set of drawings was issued. This challenged field personnel with keeping a voluminous set of drawings current and organized in order not to miss the myriad of changes made – some of them creating double units or making major interior changes with gypsum wallboard ceilings, soffits, and high-end finishes like upgraded carpet, hardwood or tile floors, and cabinets and appliances. Overall the Condos proved to be PCS’s testament to quality and fortitude.
In regards to the Retail space, one of the most prevalent challenges was in the exterior framing phase, where areas of the work were extremely difficult to access. Several unique obstacles were presented via Retail areas like the drive aisle, atrium, future office tower, and theatres, all of which required creativity and an abundance of resources in order to complete; resources utilized included spider stages, eighty foot boom lifts, a wealth of scaffolding, some daring souls, good luck, and a vast array of safety precautions. The exterior framing in the Hotel was just as difficult, including radius soffits that were extremely difficult to construct.
The Retail interior also had its challenges with forty or more stair enclosures that were not installed until the last few months of the project when the metal stairs finally arrived on site. The late arrival of the stairs required PCS to work around the clock with an enormous crew (up to 75 personnel on the Retail alone) in order to complete all of the gypsum wallboard and life safety requirements for the TCO date. Successfully finishing the Retail portion in the face of that adversity, before its opening to the public in November 2005, prompted both a collective sigh of relief and swell of pride that PCS will remember for years to come.
Lincoln Square has virtually changed the face of Bellevue. In its wake one can see a fledgling skyline that promises to one day rival Seattle. Now PCS can be proud with not only helping to shape the Seattle Skyline since 1966, but to be an integral part of completing such a landmark project as Lincoln Square for the city of Bellevue.
