Can Do

Lovely building, isn't it? That's the City Hall in Pasadena, California, and it just went through some pretty nifty seismic repair and retro-fitting after suffering some minor yet troubling damage in the 1994 Northridge earthquake.

Here's what was done to bring this 80-year old beauty back into safe use:

Structural base isolation—effectively “floating” a building on rubber pads to safely ride out an earthquake—is nothing new in California. But the isolators installed for the structural and architectural renovation of Pasadena’s 1927 City Hall, designed by Bakewell and Brown, represent an innovative approach for addressing historic structures. Instead of placing an isolator under each structural concrete column, as is typically done, the engineers at San Francisco–based Forell/Elsesser Engineers designed a system of transfer beams that reduce the overall number of isolators.

The original building, designed in a California Mediterranean style, was slated for the $117.5 million seismic upgrade and renovation project after suffering minor damage from the 1994 Northridge earthquake and after investigators found the structure to present potential life-safety issues, such as collapse. Although Forell/Elsesser began seismic investigation of the building in 1994, they were joined by ARG and construction manager DMJMH+N for the current completed project in 1999. Construction began in March 2005 and finished in April 2007, a surprising two months ahead of schedule.

Pretty impressive use of technology, isn't it? The amazing thing is that none of the extensive renovation and seismic retro-fitting is at all visible. The building looks and feels just as it did twenty years ago when I first visited it, except, of course, for the fresh paint job.

Now, it occurs to me that this building serves as a pretty good example of what can happen when the innovative use of technology is directed toward solving a problem. The architects, engineers, and construction experts worked together to repair the building and to eliminate the hazards which had developed, yet managed to maintain the architectural integrity of the building. That was what the people of Pasadena demanded, and that is what they got.

This "can-do" attitude is nothing new in the country, and we're pretty good at it. We've just apparently forgotten that part of our heritage. Now would be a good time to pull that trick out of the national hat. Just imagine what would be possible in the realms of global warming, renewable energy, and crumbling infrastructure if we just put our minds and our tax dollars towards solving those problems. And then consider what the effect of that kind of committment would have on the national economy and national psyche. We could get our people back to work at decent wages producing something besides hamburgers. We'd have something to show for those tax dollars besides flag-draped coffins.

This administration, of course, isn't interested in putting money to work in this country. There is, however, an election coming up.

351 days.