Projects

Shah Smith & Associates, Inc. (SSA) provided MEP Engineering services for Phase 2 of the Austin Community College (ACC) renovation of a once major Austin shopping center, Highland Mall.  Phase 2 of the ACC Highland Campus project includes the conversion of approximately 420,000 GSF of the mall space into educational spaces to support the diverse array of programs offered by Austin Community College.   

ACC previously converted one of the former stores during Phase 1 of the Highland Campus project. In Phase 2 and subsequent phases, ACC is converting the remainder of the mall space and redeveloping a portion of the remaining site to further expand the campus. Once completed, the ACC Highland Campus will not only be the flagship of the Austin Community College system, but also will anchor a walkable urban center.
 
This project creates space for many different educational programs:

Culinary Arts
The culinary arts spaces in Highland Campus include six teaching kitchens, including a pastry kitchen, a baking kitchen, and a commercial type kitchen.

Hospitality Management
In addition to classrooms and simulated hospitality office environments, this area includes a complete mock hotel room.

Health Sciences Regional Simulation Center
The health sciences center includes numerous mock clinical settings, including nursing labs, dental labs, hemodialysis labs, phlebotomy labs, as well as classrooms and support spaces.

Creative Digital Media Center (Fine Arts, Performing Arts and Digital Arts)
The building contains a musical performance hall, a dance studio, a black box theater, a costume shop, and a scene shop. The fine arts spaces include traditional studios, graphic design labs, computer game design labs, 2D and 3D animation studios, portraiture studios, media labs, multiple recording studios, and a TV studio.

CAD and GIS
In addition to numerous computer labs, the building contains an advanced rapid prototyping lab (3-D printing).

Instruction and office space for continuing and adult education
Offices for faculty and staff
Building support and services spaces as needed to support the larger campus
 
In order to maintain the architectural openness of the building’s public spaces as well as to support the integrated program of the college, the building was classified as an unlimited area building. This impacted the design of the fire protection and fire alarm systems, as well as how this portion of the building was zoned and connected to the rest of the campus.
 
Using energy saving measures including chilled beam air conditioning, energy efficient LED lighting with daylighting and occupancy controls, and ultra-low flow faucets, SSA designed the second phase of ACC Highland’s mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems for sustainability.
 
The building’s mechanical systems combine comfort with efficiency. Chilled beams provide cooling for most of the building. This air conditioning technology allows for local cooling and ventilating of individual spaces, while reducing the amount of ventilation air and reheat energy from what would be required by typical variable air volume (VAV) systems.
 
At ACC Highland, ventilation air is provided to the chilled beams by a pair of dedicated outside air systems. Each of these systems uses three air handling units headered together to provide partial redundancy for each system, allowing an air handling unit to be removed from service for maintenance while still allowing the system to provide up to 66% of its maximum design capacity. SSA designed each chilled beam air handling unit with not only standard exhaust air heat recovery to precool the outside air coming into the unit, but also an additional desiccant wheel to reheat and dehumidify the supply air from the units without drawing reheat energy from the campus plant. This enables the system to provide a consistent flow of low humidity, perfectly tempered air, improving occupant comfort while saving energy.
 
For the building’s dance studio, musical performance hall, and black box theater, acoustical concerns took center stage. Air is supplied to these spaces through ultra-quiet fabric ducts hidden above the ceiling clouds. Perforated ductwork, selected for its acoustical properties, is used to quiet the air before it reaches the rooms. To reduce the amount of energy consumed by the system, a separate pretreatment air handling unit with energy recovery coils dehumidifies the ventilation air before distributing it to the main air handling units.
 
In order to meet site-specific constraints for storm water control, SSA used a syphonic roof drain system. This not only allowed the storm water to be transported across the entire span of the building, it also reduced the amount of head space required for the building’s storm piping.

Rendering by BGK Architects.