Long Beach Civic Center City Hall and Port Headquarters

Long Beach Civic Center City Hall and Port Headquarters
Long Beach Civic Center City Hall and Port Headquarters
Long Beach Civic Center City Hall and Port Headquarters

Project Facts
  • Status Construction Complete
  • Completion Year 2021
  • Design Finish Year 2016
  • Size Site Area: 958,320 square feet Building Height: 163 feet Number of Stories: 11 Building Gross Area: 504,000 square feet
  • Awards 2021, New Construction - Award of Excellence, Structural Engineers Association of Southern California
  • Sustainability Certifications LEED BD+C NC (New Construction) Gold, BD+C, Gold
  • Collaborators
    Syska Hennessy Group, Inc. - Los Angeles Morrow-Meadows Corp Langan Engineering & Environmental Services, Inc. Critchfield Mechanical, Inc. Nabih Youssef Associates Bennitt Design Group Largo Concrete Cosco Fire Protection Murray Company Gustafson, Guthrie, Nichol Ltd. Benson Industries Inc. Johnson Controls, Inc. International Parking Design Inc. Curtainwall Design Consulting (Cdc)
Project Facts
  • Status Construction Complete
  • Completion Year 2021
  • Design Finish Year 2016
  • Size Site Area: 958,320 square feet Building Height: 163 feet Number of Stories: 11 Building Gross Area: 504,000 square feet
  • Awards 2021, New Construction - Award of Excellence, Structural Engineers Association of Southern California
  • Sustainability Certifications LEED BD+C NC (New Construction) Gold, BD+C, Gold
  • Collaborators
    Syska Hennessy Group, Inc. - Los Angeles Morrow-Meadows Corp Langan Engineering & Environmental Services, Inc. Critchfield Mechanical, Inc. Nabih Youssef Associates Bennitt Design Group Largo Concrete Cosco Fire Protection Murray Company Gustafson, Guthrie, Nichol Ltd. Benson Industries Inc. Johnson Controls, Inc. International Parking Design Inc. Curtainwall Design Consulting (Cdc)

The Long Beach City Hall and Port Headquarters buildings are the defining elements of the Long Beach Civic Center Master Plan, along with the Billie Jean King Main Library. SOM designed the master plan to revitalize 22 acres of the city’s downtown area by creating a vibrant, mixed-use district and reactivating the historic Lincoln Park.

Identical in mass and proportion, the City Hall and Port Headquarters buildings are designed with long, narrow floors and split cores that link interior spaces, create large open office plans, and visually connect the interiors to the outdoors. The elliptical-shaped council chambers, shared by the city council and port commissioners and located in City Hall, prominently anchor the west end of the Civic Center plaza. The chambers are clad in clear vision glass to symbolize civic transparency and public access to government.

© Benny Chan | Fotoworks

Both buildings are certified LEED Gold and designed to prioritize environmental performance. They also feature energy efficient, under-floor air conditioning systems that eliminate the need for air ducts and mechanical equipment in the ceiling, which allows for higher finished ceiling heights and the ability to expose the ceiling to the structure for increased natural light.

The exterior curtain walls are composed of alternating panels of floor-to-ceiling vision glass and solid panels. The height of the vision panels allows daylight to penetrate into the depth of the floors. Solid panels limit solar heat gain. Balconies are located on the top floor of both buildings. City Hall’s solid exterior wall portions are expressed as white metal panels, while the Port Headquarters building’s are recessed color strips behind vision glass, designed to echo the color variations found in shipping containers at the nearby Long Beach Port.

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