Gresham Smith Projects Honored with ACEC Tennessee Awards
Three Gresham Smith-designed projects were honored with awards at the American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC) Tennessee’s 2019 Engineering Excellence Awards. LG Electronics’ new appliance manufacturing plant and the Tennessee Department of Transportation’s (TDOT) comprehensive multimodal design guidelines took home Grand Awards, while the Metro Nashville Public Library parking garage expansion received an Honor Award. The project teams accepted their awards at ACEC Tennessee’s annual Gala on November 21st at the Renaissance Nashville Hotel.
“Gresham Smith is honored to win awards from ACEC Tennessee for the fifth year in a row,” said Al Pramuk, chairman and CEO, Gresham Smith. “From roadways that connect people and places to efficient manufacturing facilities that optimize the bottom line, our teams are committed to providing our clients with creative, technically sound solutions. We share these awards with our clients, because these projects were true team efforts, and we thank our peers for recognizing our innovative engineering solutions.”
LG Electronics’ new $360 million, one million-square-foot manufacturing plant in Clarksville, Tennessee, produces front- and top-loading washing machines on a 310-acre site that also includes a central utility building and additional support buildings. Gresham Smith provided full engineering and architectural services for the project on an unprecedented fast-track schedule for a project of this scope: 14 total months for design and construction. The team took LGE’s vision for the state-of-the-art facility and made it a reality, creating a manufacturing plant that raises the bar and sets a new standard for home-appliance production.
TDOT’s new comprehensive multimodal design guidelines, which includes a 160-page Multimodal Design Best Practices Report and a new chapter in TDOT’s Roadway Design Guidelines, provide guidance for implementing pedestrian, bicycle and transit facilities, shared-use paths, and multimodal roadways in communities. After developing the documents, Gresham Smith’s team spent nearly two weeks training planning organizations and TDOT regional offices across the state on successfully using the tools.
Due to the surge in business and tourism traffic, the Nashville Downtown Partnership and Metro Nashville Government saw the need for more parking and called on Gresham Smith to expand the Main Library’s parking garage. The project team’s state-of-the-art steel solution added 350 additional parking spaces, but the real success was the improvement made to the garage’s outward appearance. Working with the project’s architect, Gresham Smith engineers designed a colorful curtain wall system to create an immediately recognizable facade.
Gresham Smith is a three-time Grand Iris Award winner in ACEC Tennessee’s EEA program for the TDOT I-40/SR-66 diverging diamond interchange (DDI) in Sevierville, the I-40 Fast Fix 8 Accelerated Bridge Construction project in Nashville, and the SR-254 over Otter Creek Bridge in Davidson County. Additional winning projects recognized by ACEC Tennessee have included the Division Street Extension Bridge in Nashville, Bowling Green Wastewater Treatment Plant expansion in Bowling Green, Kentucky, the Lower Big Haynes Regional Pumping System in Georgia’s Gwinnett County and KUB’s Second Creek Wastewater Storage Facility in Knoxville, Tennessee.