February 1, 2006

REBANKS PEPPER LITTLEWOOD/SHOALTS AND ZABACK

The city of Kingston’s new police headquarters building has been designed to be open and inviting to the public while providing a safe and secure environment for its occupants.

Searching For Gold

Kingston police HQ goes for LEED

Jail cells, gun range, comm centre all included in design

PATRICIA WILLIAMS

staff writer

Ground is expected to be broken later this month on the $26.6 million Kingston Police Headquarters, the municipality’s inaugural Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)-certified project.

Designed by a joint venture of Rebanks Pepper Littlewood Architects Inc. and Shoalts and Zaback Architects Ltd., the environmentally responsible facility could garner as high as gold status under the green building rating system.

“Depending on how many points we finally get, we could be on the cusp of gold or silver,” said Toronto architect and senior police facility consultant John Pepper. The facility, which will be built by M. Sullivan and Son Ltd., will be located at the city’s Division Street civic centre campus. Pepper said a 15-month to 18-month construction schedule is anticipated.

Other members of the project team include electrical/mechanical engineers MCW Consultants, site/civil engineers Josselyn Engineering Inc., structural engineers Roney Engineering Ltd., landscape architects Scott Wentworth Group Ltd., and LEED consultant Enermodal Engineering Ltd.

Pepper, whose firm has designed facilities for police services in both Canada and the United States, said the key LEED items being taken into consideration on the Kingston project are energy efficiency, water use and indoor air quality.

“We had always taken the stance that we wanted this to be an energy-efficient building,” he said, noting that the City of Kingston’s environment division was keenly interested in pursuing LEED certification.

“We had a number of workshop sessions. We looked at ways in which we could achieve LEED status as part of a strategy for a sustainable, energy-efficient building that could be used as an example for other buildings.” City council now requires that a LEED assessment be undertaken on all large municipal buildings and retrofit projects before the project design is finalized.

The three-level, 121,000-square-foot building has been designed to meet the needs of the Kingston Police Services Board for the next 25 years. The structure has been designed to accommodate future expansion.

“They are building this for the future,” Pepper said. “They are making a significant investment in future facilities. They are not just building this for today, for the least number of dollars possible.”

The facility is being constructed on a former brownfield site.

It will house administrative space, detention facilities, a firing range and firearms training centre and communications centre in addition to a multi-purpose room that can be converted quickly into a secondary, emergency operations centre for the city.

This multi-purpose room also can be reserved by community groups.

Pepper said the building has been designed to make a “positive” architectural contribution to the community and be open and inviting to the public while meeting the police department’s security requirements.

“We have provided a lot of glass in the front lobby area,” he said. “This area is designed to be open and attractive and airy. The exterior of the building is designed with security in mind.”He said a state-of-the-art security system has been incorporated into the project.

The police department’s existing headquarters building on Queen Street was designed to accommodate approximately 100 employees, half the current complement and less than one-third of what is expected in the next 25 years.

Print | Comment