10.28.2022 — Rainier Square earned ASCE’s OCEA Award this week during the organization’s OPAL Awards Gala in Anaheim, California. The OCEA honor, presented annually since 1960, is billed as civil engineering’s “Academy Award.” It recognizes the project that best illustrates superior civil engineering skills and represents a significant contribution to civil engineering progress and society.

Completed in November 2020, Rainier Square rises 58 stories and 850 feet above downtown Seattle, offering 1.4-million square feet of office, apartment, and retail space. It also represents the first high-rise ever built with SpeedCore—a non-proprietary, first-of-its-kind structural system that uses modular, prefabricated core elements with assembly-line-like efficiency to erect high-rise towers faster, safer, and more economically.

“Rainier Square and the incorporation of the SpeedCore structural system represents 16 years of research and development, including contributions from research universities, colleagues, building officials, fabricators, erectors, and competitors from all aspects of our industry,” said Ron Klemencic, Chairman and CEO of MKA, Rainier Square’s structural engineer. “This is a testament to what can be done with collaboration.”

You can learn more about the award and this week’s event here.

» Rainier Square Earns ASCE’s Top Outstanding Civil Engineering Achievement Award

05.24.2022 — MKA’s Rainier Square project was presented with a Grand Award by The American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC) during the organization’s 55^th Annual Engineering Excellence Awards, a black-tie Gala event held on May 24 in Washington, DC.  As a grand winner, Rainier Square was selected as one of 15 top projects in the nation recognized for exceptional engineering innovation, complexity, achievement, and value.

The 58-story mixed-use tower represents the first high-rise ever built with SpeedCore—a non-proprietary, first-of-its-kind structural system that uses modular, prefabricated core elements with assembly-line-like efficiency to erect high-rise towers faster, safer, and more economically. 

SpeedCore cut 10 months off what would have been a 32-month schedule if constructed with a traditional structural system and was erected 43% faster than usual, with up to four floors completed weekly, resulting in a topping-out milestone just 10 months after the first steel arrived onsite.  The prefabrication of SpeedCore’s modular panels meant less waste, fewer onsite workers, and fewer truck trips.

In addition to SpeedCore, the project was also recognized by ACEC in part for its other unique innovative elements, such as two bi-directional, 35,700-gallon water tanks, which serve as dampers at the roof to reduce wind motion; performance-based seismic and fire engineering; and complex site challenges given its seven levels of below-grade parking that required a 100-foot-deep excavation extending 50 feet below the mat foundation of the neighboring 40-story Rainier Tower.

This marks MKA’s 33rd National ACEC award in the last 36 years.  Congratulations to the entire Design and Construction team on this amazing achievement!

» Rainier Square Earns ACEC National Engineering Excellence Award

04.22.2022 — With the built environment accounting for almost 40 percent of all energy-related carbon emissions worldwide, the AEC industry must take meaningful steps toward significant carbon reduction.

To that end, Hines engaged MKA to create the Hines Embodied Carbon Reduction Guide. This effort spans two years and relies on MKA’s industry-leading knowledge of carbon accounting and involvement in programs such as the Embodied Carbon in Construction Calculator (EC3) Tool. Released on April 22, a date internationally recognized as Earth Day, this free, comprehensive, 108-page program aims to create more sustainable development practices at Hines while establishing an industry standard for quantifying, tracking, and reducing embodied carbon in the commercial real estate development process.

“MKA is honored to be a part of Hines’ strategy to reduce embodied carbon in the built environment,” said MKA President Don Davies. “I am excited to see how Hines’ focused engagement leverages environmentally sustainable change throughout the industry.”

By sharing the Embodied Carbon Reduction Guide with developers, engineers, contractors, material suppliers, investors, and other industry partners, Hines and MKA aim to affect lasting, responsible, and sustainable progress toward reducing the built environment’s carbon footprint.

Click here to visit Hines’ website to see the firm’s launch video, download your copy of the Embodied Carbon Reduction Guide, and learn more about the program.

» MKA+Hines Collaboration Released: The Hines Embodied Carbon Reduction Guide

04.12.2022 — The American Council of Engineering Companies of Washington (ACEC-WA) presented Rainier Square with a Gold Engineering Excellence Award in the Structural Systems category during the organization’s annual gala on March 25 in Bellevue. Completed in November 2020, Rainier Square is a 58-story, 850-foot-tall, mixed-use destination in downtown Seattle offering 1.4 million square feet of space for offices, luxury apartment homes, and retail stores.

Recognized by ACEC-WA as one of the state’s top projects demonstrating an exceptional degree of engineering innovation, complexity, achievement, and value, Rainier Square is the first high-rise building to be constructed using SpeedCore. This innovative, non-proprietary structural system uses modular, prefabricated core elements with assembly-line-like efficiency to erect high-rise towers faster, safer, and more economically. Championed by Magnusson Klemencic Associates (MKA), Rainier Square’s Engineer of Record, SpeedCore’s steel Concrete-Filled, Composite-Plate Shear Wall (CF-CPSW) panels eliminate the need to place formwork or strip and install rebar, allowing developers to build entire structures at the rapid pace of steel construction.

At Rainier Square, SpeedCore cut 10 months off what would have been a 32-month schedule if constructed with a traditional structural system. Rainier Square was erected 43% faster than usual, with four floors completed weekly, resulting in a topping-out milestone just 10 months after the first steel arrived onsite. The attendant savings in general conditions, construction financing interest, and earlier rental revenue streams were significant. The prefabrication of SpeedCore’s modular panels meant less waste, fewer onsite workers, and fewer truck trips.

In addition to SpeedCore, Rainier Square’s design includes two bi-directional, 35,700-gallon water tanks, which serve as dampers at the roof to reduce wind motion, and performance-based seismic and fire engineering. Adding to the complexity, Rainier Square’s seven levels of below-grade parking required a 100-foot-deep excavation extending 50 feet below the mat foundation of the neighboring 40-story Rainier Tower, which was built in the late 1970s. Rainer Tower was supported by an impressive temporary earth retention system provided by geotechnical engineer Hart Crowser that allowed it to remain fully occupied during Rainier Square’s excavation and construction despite both towers’ snug proximities. More information about ACEC-WA’s 2022 Engineering Excellence Award recipients is available here.

With this ACEC-WA Gold Award, Rainier Square advances to ACEC’s national competition, which recognizes the industry’s top engineering achievements. Winners will be announced during ACEC’s Engineering Excellence Awards Gala on May 24 in Washington, DC.

» Rainier Square Earns ACEC-WA Engineering Excellence Award