For the Life of Your Building - AKF Group LLC

PERSPECTIVE
NEW YORK
The comprehensive view of real estate, design and construction
top SAFETY & SECURITY
CONSULTANTS
PerspectiveNY November 2009 | 1
cover price $6.00
VOL. 8, NO. 8 November 2009
AKF GROUP
...For the Life of Your Building
INSIDE:
• 2009 GREEN BUILDING AWARDS:
GOTHAM DEVELOPERS’ 200 WEST, ING INVESTMENT
MANAGEMENT, and SAYVILLE LIBRARY win top honors
SPECIAL INFRASTRUCTURE, SAFETY & SECURITY SECTION:
• SAFETY TESTING FOR STRUCTURAL ELEMENTS, ENERGY
EFFICIENCY STRATEGIES, AND PREPARING YOUR
BUILDING FOR THE H1N1 OUTBREAK
• NEW YORK’S HOTTEST PROJECTS
…STARWOOD and CNY BUILDERS’ ELEMENT NEW YORK
TIMES SQUARE WEST, CETRARUDDY and MCGOWAN
BUILDERS’ LINCOLN SQUARE SYNAGOGUE
• NEIGHBORHOOD SPOTLIGHT:
THE FUTURE OF THE WORLD TRADE CENTER SITE:
‘WHAT’S TAKING SO LONG?’

AKF GROUP
…For the Life of Your Building
AKF was founded 20 years ago on three core values: support of
the internal client, empowerment and integrity. “Maintaining an
unwavering level of commitment and service to each other lets us
do the same for the client,” says Lenny Koven, founding partner.
“We empower members of the firm so that they can achieve their
greater potential, and we conduct our business with honesty and
trust, which maintains our longstanding client relationships.”
With 27 partners and over 350 firm members, AKF is one of
the leading full-service engineering firms, with public and private
sector clients throughout the world. “This organization has
always had a horizontal structure,” says Robert Diemer, partner.
“It is not the kind of place with the internal hierarchy that most
engineers are used to, and that’s a reason for our success. Everyone
can achieve here.”
AKF provides services through the life cycle of a building from
pre-conceptual analysis through engineering, commissioning,
testing and technology services. Its service lines grow and
evolve as the firm anticipates its clients’ needs and the dynamics
of the marketplace.
AN IMPORTANT MILESTONE
AKF was founded in New York in
1989 by three engineers, and now, as
it celebrates its 20th anniversary, has
offices in seven cities in the U.S. and
Mexico. The firm’s strength lies with
the members it recruits and retains,
and that is due in large part to the
open culture of the firm. “The people
2 | November 2009 PerspectiveNY
By Jan Wilson
Most of the 350 firm members at AKF Group are lacking something that professionals in their field
seem to think is vital—titles. “Titles inhibit flexibility,” says Paul Bello, managing partner. “We expect
our engineers to serve all aspects of a project and serve the client. Titles may prevent people from performing
certain tasks, rather than take on whatever functions are needed to get the job done.”
“Titles inhibit flexibility. We expect
our engineers to serve all aspects of
a project and serve the client.”
Paul Bello, Managing Partner
are what keeps us coming back to work everyday,” says Jacob
Lawrence, partner. “On each project we can mix and match talents
depending on what the client needs and tap into the firm’s
entire pool of knowledge and skills.”
Frank Lorenz, a partner who has been with the firm since 2000,
says that the firm attracts top talent because of its appetite for new
technologies that advance the practice of engineering. “We have
always prided ourselves at looking ahead, not behind,” he says.
“We were one of the first firms to go from drafting to computeraided
design (CAD) and later to building information modeling
(BIM).” The firm doesn’t just rely on technology, however—its
members are also acknowledged experts in their fields. “We have
a deep bench of professionals who are known throughout our industry,”
says Lawrence, “With the experience that we have, there is
very little we haven’t seen and no problem we can’t resolve.”
Koven says that client relationships, with organizations such as
Mount Sinai Medical Center, go back to the founding of the firm,
and that longevity reflects its core values. “Culture makes the difference
here, and our core values create our culture,” he says.
Newer partners can attest to the fact that there are no barriers
to growth at the firm. “You have to ask questions when you
don’t know something, because you
are also expected to be able to make
decisions without having to run it by
layers of management,” says Robert
Gibson, who has been with the firm 14
years and became a partner in 2005.
“You can take on as much responsibility
here as you want and can handle.”
Photo by Lisa shiffLett PhotograPhy

opposite pa g e: The AKF Partners; left: Novartis
Pharmaceutical Corporation Atrium; m i d d l e: Cold
Spring Harbor Laboratory; r i g h t: One New York Plaza
Boiler Room
Left Photo by PaúL rivera–archPhoto; MiDDLe Photo by aDriane K. haMiLton–aKf; right Photo courtesy of aKf; iLLustration by Muir Design, inc.
LIFE CYCLE ENGINEERS
“We are not just looking for the next project—we are looking
for the next relationship,” says Rudy Frank, a partner in the
Princeton office. “Each project is important in the client’s eyes
and AKF takes the same viewpoint.” Although its roots are as an
MEP firm, AKF has added services that help its clients operate
and maintain their buildings, such as high-level commissioning
and testing. As Diemer says, “we will be there for them from
Day 1 through occupancy and beyond.”
The firm’s partners describe the life cycle of a building like
this: Day 1 is the construction of the project, Day 2 is the ongoing
operations of the project and Day 3 is the eventual re-
Lifecycle of a Building
positioning and renovation of the building. “Any building that
hasn’t been commissioned recently is a gold mine of an opportunity
for the owner to improve operations and reduce costs,”
says Diemer. Bello notes that the firm does commissioning in
both the mechanical and mission critical areas. “It’s important
to detect problems before systems fail,” he says. “For instance,
building engineers need to know that a fan motor shaft is out
of alignment or working without proper lubrication, and owners
with foresight know that they need to have this testing done.”
Diemer adds that these diagnostic tests are vital to any successful
owner’s business plan. “A capital budget that takes into
account how a building ages is key to predicting costs,” he says.
PerspectiveNY November 2009 | 3

“If you can predict these costs over the medium and long term,
you are more effective at meeting your budgetary targets.”
Frank adds that in a challenging economy: “Companies aren’t
taking on as many new projects and there is renewed interest in
maintaining the systems that they have, and making them run as
consistently and efficiently as possible.”
A SUSTAINABILITY FOCUS
Interest in sustainability is a given at AKF, which has been a
member of the U.S. Green Building Council since 2001. “We
didn’t need to have several meetings to commit to carbon
neutrality for the firm,” says Diemer. “I had one conversation
with Paul Bello and that was it.” AKF understands that
carbon neutrality today is just one step in the evolution towards
making construction more green. “We need to design
buildings that are regenerative and restorative, that generate
more energy than they use, that export clean water instead
of waste, and that create rather than destroy habitats,’
says Diemer. “To get to this ideal we need to recalibrate our
thinking from only considering buildings as using resources,
and instead recognize that every building has the potential
to capture and make beneficial use of the solar and geothermal
energy and storm/groundwater resources available. If
we start the design process with this mindset we are more
likely to recognize and fully leverage the opportunities available
on any given project.”
As for existing buildings, the evaluation of the efficiency of
their ongoing operations is key. “This is truly on the frontier of
sustainable design,” says Rice. “If a building is built with sustainable
features that don’t operate as they should over time,
the engineer is only doing part of the job.”
AKF provided St. John’s University with sustainability design
services to comply with their “3010 challenge”, as part of the
U.S. Mayors’ climate protection agreement. New York City requested
higher education institutions to reduce their carbon
footprint by 30 percent over 10 years (3010).
St. John’s has over 2.75 million square feet of buildings at
50,000 tons of carbon dioxide, and a reduction goal of 30 percent,
or 15,000 tons. AKF developed a five-year master plan for
this task including:
4 | November 2009 PerspectiveNY
St. John’s University St. Augustine Hall
• Retrofitting existing buildings on campus with green
technologies
• Converting boiler plants and chiller plants to state-of-
the-art technologies
• Improving building operations
• Instituting a campus-wide Building Management System
to reduce wasted energy
• Retro-commissioning building systems
• Integrating on-site generation and cogeneration tech-
nologies with existing campus low pressure steam
distribution
“AKF’s expertise has been invaluable in
advising us on meeting the ‘3010 Challenge’.
They have provided us with creative and yet
practical solutions to meet our infrastructure
upgrades while respecting our capital
constraints.”
Brij Anand, Vice President, Facilities,
Design and Construction, St. John’s University
AKF’s philosophy for sustainable design has three basic principles.
Through having a ‘seat at the first table’ when a project
is in its conceptual design phase, AKF can utilize these methods
together for maximum impact:
• Seek Harvest Free Energy—including advantageous
building orientation and massing, maximizing day
lighting and solar gain, natural ventilation, passive
heating and cooling and geothermal and renewable
energy where appropriate.
• Reduce Building Loads—through efficient electric
lighting systems, realistic plug load allowances, and
optimized building envelopes. “We also educate the
owner about how alternative indoor environmental
control systems and strategies have a major impact
on the affordability of sustainable strategies,” says Diemer.
Photo by Lisa shiffLett PhotograPhy

toP Photo by Peter stahL; bottoM Photo by shagawatPhoto
• Employ Efficient Systems—These systems are ‘right
sized’ based on an optimized building, require less
capacity and have a lower ‘first cost’ than systems that
are not designed in this manner.
In Philadelphia, AKF renovated
an office building and
the adjacent historic meeting
house for The Friend’s
Center Corporation. A
major goal of the Quakers
for the Friends Center project
is to significantly reduce
the environmental footprint
of their facility. The LEED-
NC Gold building is being
designed to limit potable
water use, use no fossil fuels
and to prevent stormwater
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory from leaving the site. “All
stormwater captured will be
piped to underground infiltration basins and will also be to used
to charge a water garden,” says Diemer, “while waste water will
be treated and recycled for use in flushing plumbing fixtures.”
A SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LEADER
The majority of people who suffer hearing loss have a deterioration
of the ear’s hair cells. AKF was retained by Rockefeller
University (Dr. Hudspeth Ear Cell Lab, Bronk Building)
in Manhattan, to design acoustical, magnetic, electrical, and
air velocity criteria to support successful experimentation on
these cells. “Since the cells are so sensitive to sound and since
their electrical outputs are so small, the testing environment
must be free of significant ambient and mechanical noises,
and have no electrical and magnetic interferences which affect
measuring the hair cells’ signal output,” says partner Michael
Rutgers University Life Science Center
Sammut, “so we designed five ‘isolation test chambers’ that
were a soft porous inner box within a hard reflecting outer box.
This environment offers the greatest amount of isolation from
all outside auditory stimuli when conducting research.”
AKF’s approach was very academic, but it
was also very practical and well thought out,
resulting in great engineering that I am sure
will meet all of the facility challenges well
into the future.”
Art Brings, Chief Executive Officer,
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
The Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory hillside facilities project
in Cold Spring Harbor, NY, consisted of two phases. Phase
one was the design and construction of a central remote chiller
plant. Phase two was the design and construction of the six laboratories
and a data center. The Laboratories are literally built
into a hillside and are interconnected beneath ground level.
Part of the electrical design included a state-of-the-art direct
digital control Building Management System. To support the
lab’s scientific needs, the 3,000 SF data center includes redundant
power and air conditioning,” says Michael Sammut. The
new chiller plant includes two, 400-ton high efficiency centrifugal
water-cooled chillers, with a winter water-side economizer.
There is expansion space, piping, and cooling tower space and
power for the addition of a third 400 to 600-ton centrifugal chiller
in the future. “The complexity of the project presented many
engineering challenges including being able to precisely heat
and cool spaces used for so many different functions in an energy
efficient manner without compromising health and safety,”
states Art Brings, Chief Executive Officer of Cold Spring Harbor
Laboratory. “AKF’s approach was very academic, but it was also
very practical and well thought out, resulting in great engineering
that I am sure will meet all of the challenges outlined above
well into the future.”
“This project was extremely difficult to
design and construct given the limited
amount of space and a very tight budget.
AKF took ownership of the project and has
been a great asset for our design team.”
Andy Lee, PE, Senior Project Manager,
Rutgers University, Newark Campus
AKF provided mechanical, engineering and plumbing design
for the 67,000 SF Rutgers University Life Science Center
in Newark. The facility includes labs, an imaging suite,
a nuclear magnetic resonance suite and a multi-purpose
seminar room for 50 people. Engineering features included
two, 400-ton electric centrifugal chillers with cooling towers
located on the roof and a 3,000 amp 460V electric service.
The penthouse accommodates two 25,000 CFM air handling
units, providing 100 percent outside air to the laboratories
with dual strobic exhaust fans located at the roof of the pent-
PerspectiveNY November 2009 | 5

Novartis Pharmaceutical Corporation
house. A 30,000 CFM recirculated air handling unit is provided
for the building’s general areas and a 250KW gas-driven
electric generator provides back-up power to the building’s
life safety system as well as critical laboratory equipment.
“AKF was a terrific partner on the Novartis
East Village project, on which many new
technologies were incorporated. Many
thanks to the AKF team for guiding us
to a very successful completion.”
MEETING THE CORPORATE CHALLENGE
Working with an aggressive schedule which allowed less
than a year from its start to the occupancy of the space, AKF
had to work quickly with the architect and all of the contractors
on Google’s 375,000 SF regional headquarters facility in
New York. “Although it was in an existing building, the absence
of existing infrastructure meant that engineering had
to be done immediately to allow long lead items to be obtained,
and to work around the tenants on the other floors,”
says Lorenz. “Since planning was not yet complete, we had
to use our judgment and cooperate with the rest of the team
and the client to determine the performance criteria, size and
location of equipment.”
Major equipment and systems included the upgrade of an
existing condenser water system through the addition of new
heat exchangers and pumps and installation of 17 air conditioning
units varying from 40 to 60 tons each. This included
all new piping from the condenser water pumps to all air conditioning
units, upgrade of six existing CRAC units with two
Google Inc.
Jonathan Smith, Associate Director, Engineering,
Novartis Pharmaceutical Corporation
6 | November 2009 PerspectiveNY
added units and 400kVa UPS module for the Data Center
along with supplemental air conditioning units of varying sizes
for the IDF and electrical distribution closets throughout to accommodate
24-hour and high density heat loads. “The aggressive
schedule also meant that we were dealing with many
contractors in each trade and had to carefully track shop drawing
submissions to make sure that installations were consistent
and that contractors working on the same floors coordinated
their work,” Lorenz says.
The construction of two office buildings in New Jersey for Novartis
Pharmaceutical Corporation, a LEED Silver-certified project,
utilized several sustainable features. This project consists of
two 200,000 SF office buildings and an 1,100 car above-ground
garage. “We used the raised
access floor being constructed
for electrical and data usage to
install an underfloor air distribution
system to provide flexibility
with a high level of comfort
control,” says Frank Lorenz.
“Air is delivered through manual
diffusers placed at each
workstation.” The building has
roof-mounted, self-contained
chilled water air handling units
with steam heating coils serving
the workstation/office
floors with smaller dedicated
units for the specialty functions.
Chilled water is supplied One New York Plaza
by roof-mounted air cooled
chillers on each building. An energy management system monitors
and control all mechanical system features.
CENTRAL UTILITIES AND CRITICAL
SYSTEMS ExPERTISE
A leading college retirement equities fund required a new
chiller plant to cool offices as well as serve critical systems.
Phase 1 of the project included required a new chiller plant to
cool offices as well as serve critical systems at 730 Third Avenue.
Phase 1 of the project included replacement of two existing
900-ton, two stage absorption chillers with one new nominal
1,000-ton and one new nominal 900-ton electric centrifugal
chillers. “One chiller has been designed as dual function, which
can operate during peak hours for comfort cooling and during
off-peak hours to produce ice for peak load reduction,” says
Gregory Socrates, senior project manager. The second chiller
is ultra high efficiency and operates as the base load chiller. A
new four cell cooling tower, heat exchanger, pumps, auxiliaries,
and control systems have also been designed to serve the new
plant. The design also included provisions for future condenser
water system expansion. The next phase included installation
of a new roof mounted 2,000 KW emergency generator with
8,000 gallon fuel oil storage tanks, fuel oil transfer pumps, fuel
oil riser, leak detection system, and controls system.
Brookfield Properties decided to upgrade and modernize its
existing refrigeration plant at One New York Plaza as part of
an effort to make the building more sustainable and energy efficient.
“What they had in place exceeded its expected use-
toP Left Photo by PaúL rivera–archPhoto; bottoM Left Photo courtesy of googLe inc.; right Photo courtesy of aKf

toP Photo by DKeLLy PhotograPhy; bottoM Photo courtesy of MeMoriaL sLoan-Kettering cancer center
ful service life and was not energy efficient by
today’s standards,” says Joseph Rubino, AKF
partner. AKF designed four steam turbine
drive chillers of 2000 tons capacity each. Two
of these machines were fitted with gas engine
parallel drivelines of 2000 tons capacity
each. The existing electric chillers remained.
Brookfield now has a tri-fuel plant with a total
installed tonnage of 13,000 tons. This is approximately
double the capacity of the first
tri-fuel plant, designed by AKF at the Time
Life building in 1999. The premium paid for
the engines will be recovered or paid back in
less than three years.
The Telx Group, Inc.
The Telx Group, Inc. was looking to expand
their New York metropolitan footprint into
New Jersey based upon customer demand. AKF participated in the planning stages
of the project to ensure that the facility would be able to support the space and power
needs of Telx customers. AKF helped launch the building’s upgrade from its existing
13.2 kV service to a new 26 kV electrical service, and designed a scalable solution to
accommodate Telx aggressive growth while maintaining levels of redundancy in excess
of industry standards. AKF also provided telecommunications and information
technology infrastructure design services to support the base building requirements
of the project including entrance facilities, redundant pathways and telecommunications
risers, equipment racks, and other spaces designed to support the mission critical
nature of the facility. AKF also did the commissioning and acceptance services on
the project.
“No team I have ever worked with has endured the number of scope
changes and churn in the middle of a project as this one, and kept
their focus at the same time. My thanks to AKF for making the
project special for Google and the experience special for me.”
Doug Schmitt, Northeast Project Manager, Google Headquarters
A HEALTHCARE FOCUS
AKF has completed the conceptual studies, plans and construction for The
Evelyn H. Lauder Breast Center of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center’s
(MSKCC) and MSKCC Imaging Breast/Imaging
Center, which encompasses a new
building with one sub-grade level, 15 levels
above grade, plus a mechanical penthouse.
The total gross area of the building
is 236,900 SF. “The challenge of this project
was to provide state-of-the-art treatment for
patients with a light carbon footprint and do
so economically and efficiently,” says Mario
Carmiciano, senior project manager.
A beam height of 8’-9’’ works fine in a parking
lot, but it is not ideal for a medical building.
That was one of the challenges that AKF
faced in converting a 75-year-old parking
structure in the Center for Advanced Medicine
at Mount Sinai Medical Center. “The
structure had no mechanical or electrical in-
The Evelyn H.Lauder Breast Center of Memofrastructure and required all new systems to
rial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) comply with current standards,” says Dino
and MSKCC Imaging Center
DeFeo, partner. “It was also a fast track con-
PROJECT TEAM MEMBERS
ABCO Peerless Sprinkler
Services: Design/Build, Installation, Maintenance, Inspection
Projects: The Brompton, JPMC, Beacon Capital Partners, NYU, Macy’s
Merchandising, AKF Group, Mount Sinai Medical Center, Coach, Trinity
Real Estate, Merrill Lynch, Empire State Building, Milstein Properties, HCC
Allied Cleaning Service
Services: Office Cleaning
Cauldwell Wingate Company
Services: Construction Management
Projects: Learning Spring School, NYU Ambulatory Surgery Center,
Roosevelt Hospital NY Structural Biology Center, Barnard College
ComRent New York LLC
Services: Load Bank Rentals
Projects: Bloomberg, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, and Lehman Brothers
Diebold Incorporated
Services: Security Systems Integration
Electro Static Technology
Services: Aegis Motor Protection and Reliability
Projects: Time-Life Building
Energy Management Control Corp.
Services: Engineering & Installation of Building Automation Systems
Energy Options Inc.
Services: BMS & Branch Circuit Monitoring
Projects: Carteret Data Center, Telx Data Center
Francis Cauffman Architects
Services: Architecture, Planning, Interior Design
Projects: Mount Sinai Medical Center, NY, GlaxoSmithKline,
Mercy Fore River-Medical Office Building, Bryn Mawr Hospital Health
Center
High Rise Fire & Security
Services: Fire, Card Access, Camera Surveillance
Projects: 222 Broadway, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Institute,
Fashion Institute of Technology
HLW International LLP
Services: Architecture, Interior Design, Engineering, Planning
Projects: Google Inc., JPMorgan Chase
Hugh O’ Kane Electric Company Inc.
Services: Electrical & Telecommunications Contracting
Projects: Rockefeller Group, Morgan Stanley, Seventh Regiment Armory/
Park Avenue Armory, Royal Bank of Canada
Interstate Fire Protection Inc.
Services: HVAC, 24 Hour Service, Fire Protection
Projects: Time & Life Chiller Plant, Mt. Sinai Hospital, 1400 Broadway,
Morgan Stanley Ice Storage
Interstate Mechanical Services Inc.
Services: HVAC, 24 Hour Service, Fire Protection
Projects: Time & Life Chiller Plant, Mt. Sinai Hospital, 1400 Broadway,
Morgan Stanley Ice Storage
Kleinknecht Electric Company, Inc.
Services: Electrical, Data and Telecommunications,
Maintenance Service
Projects: Bank of Tokyo, Grey Group, Cohn & Wolf, Mizuho
Mancini•Duffy
Services: Architecture, Design, Planning, Workplace Strategy
Projects: AOL, Citigroup, Cushman & Wakefield, Deutsche Bank,
Federal Reserve Bank of New York, GE Real Estate, NexCen Brands,
PENCIL, SportsNet New York, Trinity Real Estate
Matrix Mechanical Corp.
Services: Quality HVAC, Sheet Metal & Piping
Projects: NY State Theatre, Cornell Hospital, Mt. Sinai Hospital
MWSK Equipment Corp.
Services: Manufacturer’s Representative for HVAC Equipment
Projects: Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Institute, Cornell Medical Center,
Columbia University,
Bubba Gump Shrimp
Perkins Eastman
Services: Architecture, Planning, Interior Design
Projects: Beth Israel, Calvary Hospital, Cornell University Medical Center,
Dannon Company, Deutsche Bank, Fairleigh Dickinson University,
Hudson Valley Hospital Center, Manhattan College, Montefiore Medical
Center, Mount Sinai, Museum of Natural History, New York Hospital,
NYU, St. John’s University and the University of Virginia
Ted Moudis Associates
Services: Architectural and Interior Design
Projects: Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank, SAC Capital Management,
Prudential Bache Commodities
The Switzer Group
Services: Interior Design
Projects: NY Life Capital Partners
Weidlinger Associates
Services: Structural Engineering, Protective Design
PerspectiveNY November 2009 | 7

struction project that didn’t have final programming
in place when it was launched.”
Once construction started, AKF coordinated
numerous programming changes
while keeping the budget under control.
The design consisted of two interconnected
90,000 CFM rooftop air handlers
to support the building, and a newly created
core which incorporated the vertical
distribution. The parking garage ramping
system was demolished to make way for
new elevators and vertical mechanical and
electrical infrastructure. Multiple risers allowed
for numerous duct taps on each
floor to reduce the size of the horizontal
ductwork, which maintained an 8’ ceiling
height. An atrium was added to the building
with an independent HVAC system.
RESIDENTIAL AND RETAIL
AKF is providing mechanical, electrical,
fire protection, telecommunications,
and security design and construction The Brompton
administration services for The Brompton,
a new luxury development located on Third Avenue
between East 86th and East 85th Streets. The project will
consist of two separate buildings totaling 327,554 SF. The
buildings are to be joined at both
the cellar and ground floor levels.
The tallest structure is a 20-story
mixed use building, composed of
both retail and residential common
areas on the first floor. Residential
units comprise the program from
the 2nd floor up to the 20th floor.
The 2nd floor will include amenities, such as a health club,
party room, and outdoor terrace. The lower building is a
five-story structure, which includes both
town homes and residential units.
The Port Authority of New York
and New Jersey has engaged AKF for
major design and consulting work on
the World Trade Center site, including
an above- and below-grade retail component
totaling over 600,000 SF spread
throughout all of the buildings and transportation
hub station. AKF is also advising
the PANYNJ on all MEP-related design,
construction and operational issues
on the entire site, including assisting in
the development of utility and operating
budgets for the whole site. AKF is also
designing the new central chiller plant
in a joint venture arrangement with WM
Engineers.
AN AWARD-WINNING FIRM
AKF has won several awards for
its work in a variety of areas, including
8 | November 2009 PerspectiveNY
“AKF will continue to be a firm
that will lead, diversify and evolve
to meet our clients’ needs.”
Lenny Koven, Founding Partner, AKF
The Argonaut Building
Perspective New York’s 2009 Green
Building Awards for the LEED Gold offices
of ING Investment Management
(1 st Place – Office Buildings & Interiors),
the LEED-CS Silver renovation of
the Argonaut Building (2 nd Place – Office
Buildings & Interiors), and the new
38,000 SF Sayville Library (1 st Place –
Mixed Use & Institutional Buildings),
New York Construction News’ Best of
2008 Award for the Best Green Project/
Award of Merit for the National Audubon
Society Home Office in New York;
the 2008 Green Building Award (Region
2 - Grand Prize Winner) for the Battery
Park City Parks Conservancy Maintenance
Building and a similar award (Region
2 – Winner) for West Harlem Environmental
Action in New York. “For
the BPC project we integrated the climate
control systems into the architecture
and the structural systems of the
building,” says John Rice, partner. “In
the winter, a glazed walkway generates
heat that goes into the space and in the spring and fall the
façade opens up and the building is naturally ventilated.”
The firm also won several awards from the American
Council Engineers Companies
in 2008 including two for work at
Rockefeller University and one for
a project at the Weill Cornell Medical
College. “While it’s always nice
to be recognized through awards
on big projects, the strength of the
firm lies in the belief that no project
is too small if it is in service to our client relationships,”
says Bello. “We want to help our clients with their ongoing
building operations.”
FUTURE VISION
The partners at AKF believe that as
corporations carefully manage their budgets
and become more aware of the importance
of sustainability, the need for
life cycle engineering will only grow. “As
engineers, we help educate our clients
about the value of thinking beyond expedient
options and considering the
long term implications of energy usage
and the carbon footprint,” says Bello.
Adds Koven: “As we look forward, we
recognize that the effects of the global
economy, new technologies, and the
need for environmental efficiency will
present challenges and opportunities
for our clients across all market sectors.
AKF will continue to be a firm that will
lead, diversify and evolve to meet our
clients’ needs.” n
toP Photo by robert a.M. stern architects, LLP; bottoM Photo courtesy of first service wiLLiaMs