At Naval Academy, construction crane could be school mascot

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GreatAmerican

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Millions of dollars being put into field house, dining hall, sports center

http://www.hometownannapolis.com/cgi-bin/read/2007/05_30-41/NAV

Nothing says "construction" like piles of rebar waiting to be cast in concrete. And right now there's a lot of rebar piled around the Naval Academy.

The federal government is spending $47 million to build the new Wesley Brown Field House, and $24 million to rehab King Hall, the school's 1953 dining facility....
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0530usnaconst.jpg

Top: Lt. j.g. Bob Kendall, project manager for the construction of the new $47 million Wesley Brown Field House at the Naval Academy, shows off the shell of the hi-tech building that will be used for indoor track and other competitions.
Middle pictures: The construction progress
Bottom picture: King Hall

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Tim Rigsby reads plans during the renovation of King Hall. Millions of dollars are going into the dining hall, a field house and a sports center.
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Jeez! They're really going to town, aren't they? :eek:
 
At Naval Academy, construction crane could be school mascot :
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When my class was there, they were commencing Michelson and Rickover, driving the piles. The old steam-driven pile driver had good days and bad days as, I suppose, did the operator. Driving through the upper crust was harder than once the pile hit the substrate.

It took a while to figure the obvious. When the "koo chee"s were down around 40 per minute, everyone was late for class. When they were up around 60, everyone was early. The mids were inadvertently marching in cadence to the pile driving machine.

And don't hold me accountable to the actual cadence, I have no idea what a normal candence is, just picked two numbers.

Then one morning it was eeriely silent. Going to first period class, we all saw the tragedy. The pile driver had turned over. The upper class, for whom it had interrupted their naps during free periods, cheered. The plebes cried.
 
wow the navy kinda went all out there huh, so are seabees putting all of this together?
 
Don't really remember the specific law but Sea Bees are actually prohibited from competing with commercial construction companies here in the United States. They are combat construction battalions.

The work is being done by civilian general contractors. The same type contractor that builds your local schools.

The company with which I was Senior Vice President of Estimating actually bid on the renovation of Bancroft Hall, for which I think the King Hall portion was an additive bid item. We didn't get the contract. Probably because I knew too much about Bancroft Hall and working with USNA. I don't remember if the King Hall portion was actually awarded at that time or if it was rebid.

All government bids have a walk through where contractors might see the project and ask questions of the contracts administrator. RHIP. I got a set of the old dining room chairs with the shelf underneath to store one's cover. Haven't started renovating them yet but anyone coming to my house for dinner when I get them completed, may have to shove out.
 
Oh, man! I wish I had one of those! :yllol:

I'm just worried they are over-building the yard too much. Renovation is one thing, but all these new buildings worry me.

Gate 1 already looks like crap after they installed all that pedestrian fencing. :thumbdown:

I remember Alumni Hall going up. Had all sorts of fun using it as an example for statics and dynamics...
 
Brown Field House is immense! It is located southwest of the basin (Santee?) where Turner Field use to be. We saw the ongoing construction at the end of March during a CVW. That whole complex of buildings that includes Bancroft and King Hall is immense. Talk about high density population sites!

I remember (I'm better with the long term stuff; like USNA69 I'm having trouble with the short term stuff) when I was a kid in the 60's visiting Annapolis, the Academy was MUCH smaller.

Question for USNA69: Was the pile driver for Rickover nuclear steam?
 
There's a new library going up at West Point. I know libraries are subject to heavier loading because of books, but my God, that structure looks like it was designed to survive the kind of blast that took down the Murrah building!
 
SubSquid said:
when I was a kid in the 60's visiting Annapolis, the Academy was MUCH smaller.

Question for USNA69: Was the pile driver for Rickover nuclear steam?
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Michelson, Rickover (my hair is falling out so maybe it was nuclear steam), Alumni, the Library, natitorium, sailing center, and soccer complex, have all been built since I left. The field house was brand new, the NCAA office was built while I was there and was a dorm for the Filipino stewards who served in the mess hall. The stewards had previously lived in APLs (barracks ships) on the sea wall. Just to think, there was still room for classrooms for 4400 mids.
 
"Earlier this month, VIPs gathered at the Wesley Brown Field House for a topping ceremony, where they signed the last major steel truss before a crane raised it to the rooftop, 70 feet above the ground."

To the Class of 2011 and beyond:

How much you want to bet some detailer, in some Company, in some Regiment, in some Brigade, at some SA might query a Plebe "Who signed the last truss in Brown Field House?"

Good Luck!

USNA69: The hair isn't falling out but I can't stop glowing in the dark!
 
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SubSquid said:
Brown Field House is immense! It is located southwest of the basin (Santee?) where Turner Field use to be.
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What utter stupidity!

Doe we REALLY need TWO field houses? Why not just renovate Halsey?

Now they say Halsey will be made into another Alumni Hall. Do we REALLY need TWO such buildings?

I am all for renovations and improvements, but some of what I see when walking the Yard these days makes me sick. The area around Gate 1 looks like a prison and the submarine monument is entirely too gaudy and out of place. Now we have a new field house going up and consuming what little open land is left.

I wonder if they will ever build that parking garage on Hospital Point? :rolleyes:

ETA: At leas the Jewish Center seems not to have chewed up much real estate, and to have really added something of value to the place. Of course, what will happen when the Zoroastrianists want a place of their own, or the Hindus, or the Muslims? What about the Gaeans?

It's getting out of hand, IMO.
 
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Zaphod said:
The area around Gate 1 looks like a prison and the submarine monument is entirely too gaudy and out of place.
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Whoa! Easy with the disparaging remarks about the Submarine Monument young Skimmer!

I'm sure that the USNA Alumni Association will find plenty of uses for Halsey once it's refurbished. Brown will allow the Academy to host winter indoor track and field events and give the Plebes a location to drill in a blizzard. They can use it for indoor crew races after the next hurricane. Be positive! They're adding jewels to your herritage my young paddiwan boat floater. Besides, it's only tax dollars that would otherwise be waisted on silly things like border security.
 
Hum, great for Annapolis....but it's very irritating from the AF side. We are having our funding significantly cut next year and beyond....like losing one summer of Ops and losing our good will workers because we can't afford them. Our airmanship programs will start being cut as well, there are huge character builders.

All I can say is that as days go on, the AF gets more and more bitter as we lose funding for programs at USAFA and in the operational AF. Sad days.
 
How is the new USNA Field House being funded? Is it Alumni funded? The new indoor practice facility at USMA was funded with AOG contributions.
 
According to the article, surprising to me also, it is being funded by federal dollars. Which means the primary purpose must be intramurals and PE. The hockey rink tennis courts are donations.
 
Thanks, I will read the article before I post next time. :redface: Perhaps the proximity of Annapolis to Washington is a factor in getting Federal dollars...
 
Academy campus enjoying building boom

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2007/06/ap_academy_constuction_070610/

The presence of construction cranes on a campus as steeped in tradition and history as the Naval Academy signals not so much change as rejuvenation.

The 338-acre campus on the banks of the Severn River is bristling with construction as the venerable institution undergoes one of its periodic facelifts....
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I'm just glad I don't live in 7th wing. That new field house completely destroyed their view of the Severn. Now 3rd Batt. gets to wake up and stare at yet another brick wall...
 
DMeix said:
I'm just glad I don't live in 7th wing. That new field house completely destroyed their view of the Severn.
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Ain't it the truth. :frown:

I was lucky that in my three upperclass years on 1-4 and 3-4, I had a view of the Severn, a view out over the Yard, and a view of T-Court. If I'd had to stare at another Goat Court (like I did from 4-0 as a Plebe), I would have beaten my head against the nearest bulkhead.

Can't wait to see where they will be expanding the Chapel to.... :rolleyes:
 
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