TDIndustries Completes Design/Build Mechanical for Dallas Office Tower

plumbing and building controls for the project, including three 300-ton chillers on the building’s roof.

'On a core and shell office tower, the primary design challenge is providing for the future," Welch said. "You don’t want to bring in a tenant and have them rip out what you just put in.'

"We embrace the collaboration of the entire design and construction team using design-build methods to enhance owner value," said TD’s Vice President of Design-Build Business Development Gary Roden. "With Balfour Beatty, BOKA Powell and Kaizen Development, we were able to bring to

to the table a design-build partnership that ensured premier quality and innovation while speeding up the project timeline."

Well Planned Project

With thoughtful planning early on from TD’s professional engineering team of Elizabeth Welch, mechanical engineer, and Ken Luong, senior project manager, TD’s service and facilities maintenance expertise influenced design decisions that will save future repair and maintenance costs throughout the life of the building.

Early planning in 2019 allowed TD to get onto the job site, understand the project and reduce schedule durations, especially critical given the COVID-19 disruptions no one knew were coming, Luong says.

The immersive design-build experience and partnership in decision-making added tremendous value to the project, adds Elizabeth Welch, Mechanical Engineer. "Ken and I went to all of the design meetings together, starting from the beginning when we were just issuing a narrative."

That allowed the construction team to help shape design from constructability, safety and maintenance standpoints to drive client goals. TD provided A3s, or system comparisons, on equipment such as the chiller types, for the owner to consider during the design phase, offering available options suited to the footprint, pricing tiers and environmental and performance benefits.

Welch noted that because sustainability and energy efficiency are essential to the owner, Kaizen chose air-cooled chillers based on the analysis. The team, collaborating early with Balfour Beatty, explained the challenge of mounting the selected chillers on the roof downtown in a tight footprint. That influenced the type of tower crane needed to save money and potential risk on a helicopter lift.

The TD team’s challenges included the tight downtown Dallas footprint, busy traffic, high visibility and the COVID-19 pandemic. "As complex as the location is with the tight footprint and high visibility, TD ran its processes very lean," Luong says.

"On a core and shell office tower, the primary design challenge is providing for the future," Welch said. "You don’t want to bring in a tenant and have them rip out what you just put in. With the plumbing, you want to offer flexibility for a break room at the far end of the floor or a private restroom for an executive, yet still execute cost-effectively."

By adopting a collaborative culture within a construction project from the beginning, TD projects that use Design/Build deliver the owner’s vision with savings in both cost and completion time. For more information on The Link at Uptown, visit the TD Talks Blog.