Architects unveil new design for NextGen aviation research park
By STEVEN LEMONGELLO Staff Writer | Posted: Wednesday, July 14, 2010
NORTHFIELD — The new plans for the NextGen aviation research park feature glass-ribboned
buildings built closer together and nestled in among the trees at the site, according to designs unveiled
by architects at Tuesday's Atlantic County Board of Chosen Freeholders meeting.
Gordon Dahl, executive director of the South Jersey Economic Development District, also said that the
first of seven planned buildings at the 58-acre Next Generation Air Transportation System at the FAA
facilities in Egg Harbor Township should be completed and ready for occupancy by the next summer.
"It was a pretty exhaustive process of selecting an architectural team," Dahl said. "We had 28 proposals
from architectural firms with specific expertise."
He said Philadelphia-based Environetics was chosen in part beacuse of its approach of "designing
buildings that are workable for its tenants. ... With over $5 billion in contracts awarded over the last
three months for the NextGen project, with more to come in the fall, we need to have the very best,
nationally if not internationally, to show corporate clients."
Local lead architect Robert Curtin, of Curtin Design Group of Mays Landing, said the design is for "an
organic building around the types of research they'll be doing" at the FAA facility, which Environetics
architect John Kohlhas described in specific terms.
"There are two major influences on a building like this," Kohlhas said. "One is the office environment.
Instead of sitting in a cubicle next to two or three people that gives off 200 BTUs apiece, you're next to
a piece of electronic equipment that gives off 1,000 BTUs."
The other consideration, he said, is the site. Most of the infrastructure - such as the roads and
stormwater basins - was already in place when Environetics came onto the project five weeks ago,
Kohlhas said, so what he and landscape architect Mike Levkulich did was to "improve the ways the
buildings relate to each other."
Each parcel, while retaining the same size and parameters - so as not to require re-approval from the
New Jersey Pinelands Commission - was slightly "morphed," Kohlhas said.
"The buildings begin to migrate," he said. "They're more gathered around the internal loop, so people
will be able to walk from one building to another.
Levkulich, of Melillo and Bauer Associates of Manasquan, said the buildings "will be nestled in trees a
little bit, so it's more appropriate to the site," adding that a series of graphic panels displaying images
from aviation history will be placed along the internal roadway "to create a greater sense of function
throughout."
"We really want to make a social place," Kohlhas said.
While slightly shifted, the 66,000-square-foot footprint for the first building - Building 3, the farthest
north on the site and close to Amelia Earhart Boulevard - would essentially remain the same as in the
original plans, Kohlhas said.
The three-story building will feature "a continuous ribbon of windows, panels and sunscreens, on a
large open glass wall with curves," he said, and would be flexible to accommodate one or two tenants
per floor or as many as nine or 10. A planned educational center would be adjacent to the two-story
lobby.
"If a picture is worth a thousand words," Freeholder Alisa Cooper told the architectural team, "there
are a thousand adjectives for how fantastic this project looks."
Freeholder Frank Formica suggested placing graphic panels similar to those planned inside the complex
throughout the county, "so that somebody living here could start to experience the evolution of
NextGen as the new economic generator for the county."
Formica added that he hopes some of the subcontracting, from such corporations as Boeing, ITT and
General Dynamics, would be awarded to local contractors.
"I'd hate to think that with $4 billion to $5 billion in contracts, we (wouldn't) employ our contractors
here in South Jersey."
Dahl said after the presentation that the process of awarding FAA contracts is ongoing, adding that with
multibillion-dollar contracts, it takes a month or two to figure out how to move forward.
He said he and others, including U.S. Rep. Frank LoBiondo, R-2nd, would be meeting with some of the
larger contractors next week in Washington, D.C.
As far as construction contracts, Dahl said open bids for a pump station at the site will be requested
beginning Thursday. Freeholder Charles Garrett said bids for the elimination of the Delilah Road traffic
circle will be requested beginning this month and the contract will be awarded in September.
Howard Kyle, chief of staff to Atlantic County Executive Dennis Levinson, said the county is "moving
beyond an aviation park to building an aviation industry. Firms in aviation research may be located in
the area beyond what's going on in the park."
Contact Steven Lemongello:
609-272-7275
SLemongello@pressofac.com
NORTHFIELD — The new plans for the NextGen aviation research park feature glass-ribboned
buildings built closer together and nestled in among the trees at the site, according to designs unveiled
by architects at Tuesday's Atlantic County Board of Chosen Freeholders meeting.
Gordon Dahl, executive director of the South Jersey Economic Development District, also said that the
first of seven planned buildings at the 58-acre Next Generation Air Transportation System at the FAA
facilities in Egg Harbor Township should be completed and ready for occupancy by the next summer.
"It was a pretty exhaustive process of selecting an architectural team," Dahl said. "We had 28 proposals
from architectural firms with specific expertise."
He said Philadelphia-based Environetics was chosen in part beacuse of its approach of "designing
buildings that are workable for its tenants. ... With over $5 billion in contracts awarded over the last
three months for the NextGen project, with more to come in the fall, we need to have the very best,
nationally if not internationally, to show corporate clients."
Local lead architect Robert Curtin, of Curtin Design Group of Mays Landing, said the design is for "an
organic building around the types of research they'll be doing" at the FAA facility, which Environetics
architect John Kohlhas described in specific terms.
"There are two major influences on a building like this," Kohlhas said. "One is the office environment.
Instead of sitting in a cubicle next to two or three people that gives off 200 BTUs apiece, you're next to
a piece of electronic equipment that gives off 1,000 BTUs."
The other consideration, he said, is the site. Most of the infrastructure - such as the roads and
stormwater basins - was already in place when Environetics came onto the project five weeks ago,
Kohlhas said, so what he and landscape architect Mike Levkulich did was to "improve the ways the
buildings relate to each other."
Each parcel, while retaining the same size and parameters - so as not to require re-approval from the
New Jersey Pinelands Commission - was slightly "morphed," Kohlhas said.
"The buildings begin to migrate," he said. "They're more gathered around the internal loop, so people
will be able to walk from one building to another.
Levkulich, of Melillo and Bauer Associates of Manasquan, said the buildings "will be nestled in trees a
little bit, so it's more appropriate to the site," adding that a series of graphic panels displaying images
from aviation history will be placed along the internal roadway "to create a greater sense of function
throughout."
"We really want to make a social place," Kohlhas said.
While slightly shifted, the 66,000-square-foot footprint for the first building - Building 3, the farthest
north on the site and close to Amelia Earhart Boulevard - would essentially remain the same as in the
original plans, Kohlhas said.
The three-story building will feature "a continuous ribbon of windows, panels and sunscreens, on a
large open glass wall with curves," he said, and would be flexible to accommodate one or two tenants
per floor or as many as nine or 10. A planned educational center would be adjacent to the two-story
lobby.
"If a picture is worth a thousand words," Freeholder Alisa Cooper told the architectural team, "there
are a thousand adjectives for how fantastic this project looks."
Freeholder Frank Formica suggested placing graphic panels similar to those planned inside the complex
throughout the county, "so that somebody living here could start to experience the evolution of
NextGen as the new economic generator for the county."
Formica added that he hopes some of the subcontracting, from such corporations as Boeing, ITT and
General Dynamics, would be awarded to local contractors.
"I'd hate to think that with $4 billion to $5 billion in contracts, we (wouldn't) employ our contractors
here in South Jersey."
Dahl said after the presentation that the process of awarding FAA contracts is ongoing, adding that with
multibillion-dollar contracts, it takes a month or two to figure out how to move forward.
He said he and others, including U.S. Rep. Frank LoBiondo, R-2nd, would be meeting with some of the
larger contractors next week in Washington, D.C.
As far as construction contracts, Dahl said open bids for a pump station at the site will be requested
beginning Thursday. Freeholder Charles Garrett said bids for the elimination of the Delilah Road traffic
circle will be requested beginning this month and the contract will be awarded in September.
Howard Kyle, chief of staff to Atlantic County Executive Dennis Levinson, said the county is "moving
beyond an aviation park to building an aviation industry. Firms in aviation research may be located in
the area beyond what's going on in the park."
Contact Steven Lemongello:
609-272-7275
SLemongello@pressofac.com
