AUGUSTA-RICHMOND COUNTY Municipal Building

The Augusta-Richmond County Municipal Building is a 125,642 SF nine-story, reinforced concrete structure with marble skin constructed in 1957. When built, the building also served as a fallout shelter, a testament to the Cold War era. The building includes two courtrooms on the second floor and commission chambers on the eighth, each with vaulted ceilings. With the exception of window replacements and roof improvements in 2008, the building has remained untouched since 1957.

The initial program called for a limited scope of work covering only 85,000 SF of renovations to the Municipal Building. In the following weeks, the County decided to renovate the entire Municipal Building and include an addition. The addition changed the orientation and the main entrance so walking around the building from the parking lot was no longer required. The addition also included polling/training space and an elevator tower. Additionally, the new scope called for complete gutting and rebuilding of all nine floors, replacing and upgrading the mechanical and electrical systems, and construction of a new 18,712 SF addition. The new space features two new ADA compliant elevators.

All work was completed while the building remained occupied, meaning phasing and staging played a vital role in accomplishing the work with minimum disruption to the County’s day-to-day operations. Since the building remained open during construction, there were aggressive dust control measures put in place coupled with constant air monitoring to avoid any harm to the building occupants. Safety was a primary consideration whenever the building occupants and construction activities crossed paths.