 |
|
· History · Board · Staff · KCDC in the News |
KC Fed Bank unveils design for headquarters
Some observers criticize the new look.
Kansas City Star
November 16, 2004
Kevin Collison
The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City unveiled the design of its new headquarters Monday, a 14-story limestone-clad tower bordering the south edge of Penn Valley Park.
Federal Reserve officials acknowledged that the design, which includes a two-story conference and visitor center, was shaped more by a need for functionality and security than by an overt desire to make an architectural statement.
"We don't want a tribute to ourselves," said Thomas M. Hoenig, president and CEO of the Kansas City Fed. "We want an office building that's usable, but is still substantial and they delivered it to us."
The principal architect of the $200 million, 600,000-square-foot complex is Henry N. Cobb of Pei Cobb Freed & Partners of New York. Ellerbe Becket of Kansas City is assisting on the project. It will occupy a 15.7-acre site along Main Street on the south edge of Penn Valley Park and will be about the same height as Liberty Memorial, which is located north of the Fed site.
Cobb said his design for the project plays on the relationship between the front wall of the office tower and a curved wall behind it that extends to the conference and visitor center. "The main challenge was how best to shape the building so it would have the institutional presence it should have and at the same time acknowledge the Liberty Memorial," he said.
Some observers, however, were disappointed in the design, saying the complex was isolated and cut off from nearby Main Street and the park.
"This design is a shining fortress on a hill," said Dave Scott, speaking on behalf of the Urban Society of Kansas City, a group dedicated to promoting good design and urban planning in the community.
"It may be pretty to look at from a distance, but it connects poorly to the park, to Crown Center, to Main Street - standing aloof from all that surrounds it."
Cobb acknowledged he was restrained by the Fed's security requirement of a 100-foot buffer around the complex, which will be the first Federal Reserve Bank built since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But he added that design elements such as an open colonnade at the base of the tower, extensive landscaping and the curve of the two-story base means his building is "not just a lump on the hill.
"It's true the security requirements mean it has to set back from the street, but its engagement to the park is quite natural," Cobb said. "The two-story base makes it comfortable for pedestrians and not overwhelming for the park."
As part of the project, the Federal Reserve Bank has agreed to maintain a three-acre section of Penn Valley Park directly in front of the building for 50 years.
Demolition of buildings, including the old St. Mary's Hospital building, for the complex is well under way. A formal groundbreaking for the project is scheduled for late spring 2005 and completion is anticipated in spring 2008. J.E. Dunn Construction is the builder.
The Federal Reserve Bank plans to sell its current quarters at 925 Grand Blvd. within the next three months and lease the space back until the new building is completed. The asking price for the building is $10.8 million.
The 21-story building, which was completed in 1921, has a 450-space garage and is expected to be redeveloped as a residential project.
"We've had considerable interest," Hoenig said. "I don't think we'll have trouble selling. It's a very attractive building."
The new Federal Reserve complex will have a five-level, 925-space employee garage to the south. The tower will rise above a two-level building that will serve as an operations center on the first floor and a 400- to 500-person conference center, cafeteria and training center on the second floor. Employees and delivery vehicles will enter the rear of the complex via Wyandotte Street.
Visitors, after passing through security screening, will be able to enter an exhibition center on the northeast corner of the complex that is expected to house a coin museum, and displays on the Federal Reserve Bank system and the U.S. economy. They also will be able to view the vault and observe how the Fed processes money.
The entire complex will be well-landscaped and the parking garage is expected to be located mostly underground with about 30 feet above grade facing Main Street tapering to about 20 feet above grade on the south edge. A 6-foot combination wall and iron fence will surround the entire property.
Cobb described the location as wonderful.
"I know of very few sites in any American city as splendid as this," he said. "What makes it particularly interesting is it's in the center of the city and adjacent to Crown Center. It's just south of Liberty Memorial, and it's in a park and on a hill. You can't get any more privileged than that for an institutional building.
The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City serves the Tenth Federal Reserve District, which encompasses the western third of Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Wyoming, Colorado and the northern half of New Mexico.
Several observers on Monday said the design for the new Kansas City Fed, at least at this point, fails to take full advantage of a special location.
"The architecture is stately and conservative, as you would expect for a Federal Bank," said Raymond Braswell, co-founder of the Urban Core Group, a downtown advocacy organization. "My only frustration with projects like this is the lack of context to its surroundings.
"This appears to be a building unto itself with no relation to anything around it. Security makes it harder for federal buildings to weave into a community, but with a little creativity this might become less of a fortress and more of a catalyst to further development along the Main Street Corridor.
Reeves Wiedeman, the president-elect of the American Institute of Architects Kansas City Chapter, which represents 750 local architects, said the design, while good and well-detailed, didn't strike him as being particularly noteworthy, particularly after all the attention that had been paid to the project.
The Fed disappointed some downtown business interests last year when it decided to move outside the traditional central business district and build near Penn Valley Park. In doing so, the Kansas City Fed followed a pattern set in other cities in recent years as the Federal Reserve System replaced district banks in downtown core locations with new ones at the edges of downtowns. In Kansas City, there had been a strong effort at City Hall and by the Downtown Council, an influential group of downtown property owners, to persuade the bank to build on a site east of Ilus W. Davis Park near City Hall.
"They picked a signature site. It'll be prominent and a building. But at first glance, it looks like `so what,'" Wiedeman said. "There are many architects in Kansas City capable of accomplishing the same thing so why did the Federal Reserve go out of town to accomplish this?"
Daniel Serda, executive director of the Kansas City Design Center, another organization established to promote good urban planning and design, said the project was "disappointing, but hardly unexpected" because the Federal Reserve had emphasized security and isolation in its requirements.
"I'm sure the tenants will have glorious views of Penn Valley Park, the Liberty Memorial, Union Station and downtown," Serda said. "The public, on the other hand, gains little from a cold and austere building that makes an intensely powerful and secretive institution appear evermore so.
"We should expect - and receive - more from the architecture of our public institutions."
Return to the news index.