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  #1261  
Old Posted Jul 20, 2018, 8:34 PM
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It will be interesting to see how the design of the new landside terminal flows into the existing airside X. I'm hoping they do some heavy lifting on the X as well, and don't just put down new paint / carpet (again).
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  #1262  
Old Posted Jul 20, 2018, 11:05 PM
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It's also exciting that Gensler (locally designed The Tower at PNC Plaza, the Fairmont Pittsburgh, etc) is onboard. They helped design the brand new Terminal 2 at Incheon International Airport.

https://www.hyundaimotorgroup.com/Me...80205.hub#none



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  #1263  
Old Posted Jul 21, 2018, 4:37 AM
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Speaking of the Tower at PNC Plaza, it's a complete failure form an energy efficiency perspective. The result of architects pursuing bullshit LEED credentialing with zero understanding of the basic concepts of stack effect, thermal mass and bridging, much less understanding the use of EUIs for benchmarking.

They don't even utilize the active glazing hopper and popper window system anymore because the building engineer got sick of wasting so much energy. Gensler should bury its head over this one.
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  #1264  
Old Posted Jul 21, 2018, 2:08 PM
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Originally Posted by pj3000 View Post
Speaking of the Tower at PNC Plaza, it's a complete failure form an energy efficiency perspective. The result of architects pursuing bullshit LEED credentialing with zero understanding of the basic concepts of stack effect, thermal mass and bridging, much less understanding the use of EUIs for benchmarking.

They don't even utilize the active glazing hopper and popper window system anymore because the building engineer got sick of wasting so much energy. Gensler should bury its head over this one.
Interesting...I had no idea (of the failures). How did you hear about it?

If it is a case of the facilities team not using the technology as designed, maybe there was poor communication / training when the building was commissioned and handed over to the owner? I've heard about that on other projects. Basically, the Architect / Engineer over-designs, or else designs an unfamiliar system, and instead of adapting to it, the folks managing it just revert to their familiar old ways. Technology only works if people understand how to use it!
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  #1265  
Old Posted Jul 21, 2018, 3:09 PM
MarkMyWords MarkMyWords is offline
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Yep, that is definitely a student theater, not a major new venue as they wanted people to think.
I'd be interested in knowing why you think this to be "not a major new venue". If you mean huge theatres (seating capacity 1000 or more), those just aren't being built anymore for legitimate regional theatre. If you're thinking of auditoria that can handle travelling Broadway blockbusters, those aren't economically feasible to build from scratch anymore. (The Dolby theater in LA, site of the Oscars, being an exception. But that's a special case.)

In addition to having pretty much state-of-the-art equipment, it looks to have quite a few things that most professional companies would die for.

Over all, I think this could be a major addition to the Pittsburgh theatre scene. It all depends on how the PPU program grows over the next few years, to see how it integrates with other professional companies.

And, no, I'm not making any comment on how disappointing the exterior design of the buildings themselves are.
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  #1266  
Old Posted Jul 21, 2018, 3:50 PM
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Originally Posted by deja vu View Post
Interesting...I had no idea (of the failures). How did you hear about it?

If it is a case of the facilities team not using the technology as designed, maybe there was poor communication / training when the building was commissioned and handed over to the owner? I've heard about that on other projects. Basically, the Architect / Engineer over-designs, or else designs an unfamiliar system, and instead of adapting to it, the folks managing it just revert to their familiar old ways. Technology only works if people understand how to use it!
I'm in the medical/environmental health field, and I've been involved in more and more work in the buildings sector, particularly with indoor air quality... which has required me to learn a great deal about design/construction for energy efficiency, as the two often go hand in hand. I'm not going to name sources on here , but let's just say that I now work in the industry involving these issues.

It's not a case of the facilities team at all... they are top-notch. The problem is in the design itself... namely an architecture firm designing to a bullshit marketing standard with a lot of bells and whistles to put a plaque on the wall and tout how hi-tech it is, rather than getting the basic physics right. They basically shot their wad on the all the fancy active components, but failed to first address the primary passive design on the structure. It's a real shame.
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  #1267  
Old Posted Jul 21, 2018, 3:54 PM
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Originally Posted by MarkMyWords View Post
I'd be interested in knowing why you think this to be "not a major new venue". If you mean huge theatres (seating capacity 1000 or more), those just aren't being built anymore for legitimate regional theatre. If you're thinking of auditoria that can handle travelling Broadway blockbusters, those aren't economically feasible to build from scratch anymore. (The Dolby theater in LA, site of the Oscars, being an exception. But that's a special case.)

In addition to having pretty much state-of-the-art equipment, it looks to have quite a few things that most professional companies would die for.

Over all, I think this could be a major addition to the Pittsburgh theatre scene. It all depends on how the PPU program grows over the next few years, to see how it integrates with other professional companies.

And, no, I'm not making any comment on how disappointing the exterior design of the buildings themselves are.
Yeah, from this pic, it looks like it will be a pretty cool venue... especially as an option for smaller productions downtown. I like the windows at the back... don't feel like I see that too often in a theater. It would be nice to see a good concert there. Obviously the exterior blows.
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  #1268  
Old Posted Jul 21, 2018, 6:46 PM
BrianTH BrianTH is offline
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Originally Posted by MarkMyWords View Post
I'd be interested in knowing why you think this to be "not a major new venue".
When facing pushback on their planned removal of the historic buildings and the small scale of the project given the Downtown location (both changes for the worse since its original proposal), PPU and its allies argued that despite the limited scale of the overall project, this theater would provide a large boost to the area by attracting theater-goers. It is the same sort of argument people make on behalf of other entertainment venues like stadiums and such.

This picture graphically demonstrates why that was always a fantasy. The number of non-student people it serves over a given year is going to be small compared to what, say, just a modest restaurant would achieve.

You might be right it is not viable to actually build a major new performing arts venue from scratch, but there were other alternatives. For example, this student theater could have been just a part of a much large complex (as originally proposed, in fact).

In any event, my point is simply that to deflect criticism, PPU and its allies dramatically oversold this theater's value as a public amenity.
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  #1269  
Old Posted Jul 22, 2018, 3:58 PM
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Originally Posted by BrianTH View Post
When facing pushback on their planned removal of the historic buildings and the small scale of the project given the Downtown location (both changes for the worse since its original proposal), PPU and its allies argued that despite the limited scale of the overall project, this theater would provide a large boost to the area by attracting theater-goers. It is the same sort of argument people make on behalf of other entertainment venues like stadiums and such.

This picture graphically demonstrates why that was always a fantasy. The number of non-student people it serves over a given year is going to be small compared to what, say, just a modest restaurant would achieve.

You might be right it is not viable to actually build a major new performing arts venue from scratch, but there were other alternatives. For example, this student theater could have been just a part of a much large complex (as originally proposed, in fact).

In any event, my point is simply that to deflect criticism, PPU and its allies dramatically oversold this theater's value as a public amenity.
I think this goes back to my comment that the final impact will be very dependent on how well this theatre (as a facility) integrates into the overall downtown factilities. If it winds up being strictly a venue for PPU productions, even if they are rather good, it's not going to have the same draw for theatre patrons if the theatres can't also be used by other companies, especially during times when PPU is not in session.

And that, I am presuming, boils down to questions of economics - can other companies afford the rent and costs for technical support? How much control does PPU want to retain over the facilities? And so on.

Just using the Riffe Center theatres here in Columbus as an example - they built a similarly sized 3 theatre complex inside a state office building in 1998. The two smaller black box theatres are used extensively; the larger auditorium hardly at all. But there is no resident theatre company capable of using the large 900 seat auditorium (which has absolutely horrible acoustics by the way). The largest Playhouse auditorium will have just slightly fewer seats than the O'Reilly (500 vs. 650). So I think it can be an excellent supplement to the theatre scene downtown.
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  #1270  
Old Posted Jul 22, 2018, 7:51 PM
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So the current Pittsburgh Playhouse self-reports that it serves about 30,000 patrons per year, which is about 80 people per night on average. I am not sure how many of those are non-students.

A typical moderate-sized downtown restaurant is going to average 200+ covers per day, possibly quite a few more if it is successful enough.

We'll have to see, but I am highly skeptical this venue will serve three times as many patrons as the current Playhouse, particularly not if you take out students.

Anyway, it is water under the bridge--the City rolled over and the project got done.
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  #1271  
Old Posted Jul 23, 2018, 2:05 PM
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August HRC is up. Only six items on the list this time, and a couple are retreads of last month or minor house renovations in Manchester. Items of note.

1. Some work is finally being done on the former Iron City Brewery site. This appears to be mostly replacing the missing top portion of the smokestack visible from the Bloomfield Bridge.

2. Not covered in the presentation, but on the agenda, is the nomination of Holy Family Church in Lawrenceville as a historic landmark. The presentation will come later, in a planning commission presentation. Still, as we learned from Albright Methodist Church, this means nothing unless the City Council takes action.
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  #1272  
Old Posted Jul 23, 2018, 2:10 PM
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Originally Posted by BrianTH View Post
So the current Pittsburgh Playhouse self-reports that it serves about 30,000 patrons per year, which is about 80 people per night on average. I am not sure how many of those are non-students.

A typical moderate-sized downtown restaurant is going to average 200+ covers per day, possibly quite a few more if it is successful enough.

We'll have to see, but I am highly skeptical this venue will serve three times as many patrons as the current Playhouse, particularly not if you take out students.

Anyway, it is water under the bridge--the City rolled over and the project got done.
I can't remember, what is PPU planning on doing with the current Pittsburgh Playhouse site in Oakland? It's in an interesting spot in the "Oakland Portal" area. Though I'm guessing the most likely result is PPU sells to UPMC, which makes it part of Magee's campus, meaning no net increase to tax rolls at all.
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  #1273  
Old Posted Jul 23, 2018, 6:40 PM
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Some people are questioning the price the City is planning to pay for the former Art Institute building:

http://www.post-gazette.com/business...s/201807200064

It does sound high to me and I worry about no-bid situations like this.

However, this is just silly:

Quote:
Ms. Harris, the councilwoman who is a critic of Mayor Bill Peduto . . . also believes that the current Robin Building is a better location because of its proximity to the City-County Building on Grant Street.
Here is the setup:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Jo...!4d-79.9966894

That's the City-County Building on the mid-right. The Robins building is on the top-right behind the Grant Building. The Art Institute building is on the top left behind the Oxford Centre.

So it is maybe one block further away.

In fact that's at least one good reason to pay a little premium--precisely because it is so close.
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  #1274  
Old Posted Jul 23, 2018, 9:04 PM
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  #1275  
Old Posted Jul 23, 2018, 9:38 PM
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Originally Posted by pj3000 View Post
I'm in the medical/environmental health field, and I've been involved in more and more work in the buildings sector, particularly with indoor air quality... which has required me to learn a great deal about design/construction for energy efficiency, as the two often go hand in hand. I'm not going to name sources on here , but let's just say that I now work in the industry involving these issues.

It's not a case of the facilities team at all... they are top-notch. The problem is in the design itself... namely an architecture firm designing to a bullshit marketing standard with a lot of bells and whistles to put a plaque on the wall and tout how hi-tech it is, rather than getting the basic physics right. They basically shot their wad on the all the fancy active components, but failed to first address the primary passive design on the structure. It's a real shame.
All LEED buildings have to go through an HVAC commissioning process where they run the building and see if it meets expectations. If not, they are supposed to rework or calibrate the system to where it will achieve what was designed. I wonder if they are finding it difficult to meet the goals "without knowing the basic physics".

Since I am in the masonry industry, I wish people would quit using all these fancy active systems that may or may not work and use more passive means for energy efficiency like thermal mass that don't require more energy to function...
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  #1276  
Old Posted Jul 23, 2018, 10:45 PM
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All LEED buildings have to go through an HVAC commissioning process where they run the building and see if it meets expectations. If not, they are supposed to rework or calibrate the system to where it will achieve what was designed. I wonder if they are finding it difficult to meet the goals "without knowing the basic physics".

Since I am in the masonry industry, I wish people would quit using all these fancy active systems that may or may not work and use more passive means for energy efficiency like thermal mass that don't require more energy to function...
Absolutely... passive first, then take a look a the potential for active, and then look at generation. It seems so many projects (new construction or retrofit) do it in reverse...

I was told that the HVAC system isn’t flawed, it’s just that it cannot operate how it was intended to operate because of the incompatibility and shortcomings of the building envelope.
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  #1277  
Old Posted Jul 24, 2018, 1:52 PM
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Cool. I like this angle:


Absolute unit.
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  #1278  
Old Posted Jul 24, 2018, 2:35 PM
eschaton eschaton is offline
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Yeah, I presume the construction schedule for the building (when did they rename it?) was purposefully set to end around now, considering it's student-focused rentals and they need to have units ready for move-in in August or the whole year will be shot in terms of revenue.

Man though, the final color scheme is boring as shit. Given it's so prominent (particularly coming down Centre) I really wish they put some sort of bright accent color on it. It's marginally less bland than Coda on Centre, but that's not saying much.

Last edited by eschaton; Jul 24, 2018 at 5:45 PM.
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  #1279  
Old Posted Jul 24, 2018, 5:22 PM
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The Centre building height would have been nice to see in the Strip. Its not that tall, but certainly more useful than the height level that we are seeing...
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  #1280  
Old Posted Jul 24, 2018, 5:31 PM
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The Centre building height would have been nice to see in the Strip. Its not that tall, but certainly more useful than the height level that we are seeing...
Then you'll be disappointed to learn that the new riverfront zoning has a maximum height of 85 feet. That means anything new in the Strip will be limited to 5-6 story buildings.
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