After nearly three years of tackling unexpected project challenges including substantial design-related change orders, long lead times for permanent power, and a slight inconvenience known as COVID-19, the Bay Meadows Station 5 team celebrated achieving TCO (temporary certificate of occupancy) on Feb. 23 — a commendable 45 days ahead of schedule.

“When it came to planning and coordination, this team constantly pushed the boundaries,” says Construction Manager Anthony Sammut. “We always asked ourselves, ‘Do we have an opportunity to start activities sooner, i.e. build some float in the back end and create some breathing room in case anything goes wrong?’ It was hard, but the team definitely took the challenge and ran with it.”

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Bay Meadows Stations 1 and 5 were One Webcor projects delivered by Webcor Builders, Concrete, Drywall, and Carpentry in partnership with architect firm HOK. Station 5 is a ground up, multi-story office building. It is one of the five Station Block buildings, all of which were delivered by Webcor and are a part of the commercial component of the Bay Meadows urban village in San Mateo. The 504,000-GSF project and 195,600-rentable-SF structure is composed of a concrete core and shear wall construction, built on a mat foundation, with a mix of mild steel and post-tension slabs. The Station 5 team fulfilled all required points for LEED Gold certification and expects to receive the official paperwork in the coming months.

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Thanks in large part to Station 5’s driven, highly collaborative team, the project was a huge success that survived significant scheduling challenges, beginning with a delayed construction start date from March 2020 to October 2020 due to COVID-19. Before the project began, the project required a significant change order that involved redesigning the shoring system due to a neighboring city project. The team had to install internal bracing (temporary steel to shore up and brace the systems) shortly before the project began—a major design change process that significantly impacted the project cost and schedule.

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“Thankfully, everything went smoothly,” Anthony says. “We partnered closely with Drill Tech Drilling & Shoring, FERMA Corporation, and Webcor Concrete on the strategic planning to ensure we were as efficient as possible to minimize schedule impacts.”

Unfortunately, the change order for internal bracing installation wouldn’t be the last of the schedule-related hurdles facing the Station 5 team. Around the time PG&E was scheduled to install permanent power for the construction crews, unexpected storms hit the Bay Area. Since construction projects’ needs took a backseat to those of public safety, PG&E had to cancel and reschedule Webcor’s permanent power installation several times, resulting in long lead times for construction crews’ access to permanent power. Fortunately, the Station 5 team was able to build a strong relationship with their PG&E representative, who streamlined the process as best they could for the team.

“We also took advantage of temporary power as much as possible,” Anthony says. “We moved commissioning and start-up as far along as we could so that when permanent power was eventually installed, we’d be ready to distribute power and turn on equipment right away. It was a successful effort in partnership with Brayer Electric.”

Reaching TCO nearly two months early despite such substantial schedule-related obstacles was a true testament to the highly functional team guided by Anthony and Project Director Ted Williams, Anthony says. That culture wasn’t limited to the Webcor side—all involved trade partners were rightfully valued as critical team members whose partnership was essential to project success. This approach was key to achieving TCO as early as they did, particularly due to the pull planning process.

“There was an extensive amount of pull planning with our trade partners,” Anthony says. “We prioritized building solid relationships with our trade partners and ensuring they knew we were all in this together. We asked ourselves how we could be successful as an overall team—we never wanted anyone to feel that one person was positioned for success while everyone else suffered.”

The Station 5 team was also highly collaborative from a One Webcor perspective; both the Builders and Craft groups enthusiastically embraced the One Webcor approach from the beginning. Anthony and Ted immediately involved Webcor Carpentry, Concrete, and Drywall with meetings at the job site office so everyone could openly share their ideas on what they would need to be successful.

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“Ted and I built a great relationship with each other as team leaders,” Anthony says. “It was the first time we were able to influence a team’s structure, manage the groups within it, and run it the way we wanted to right from the start. We were incredibly lucky to work with a group of high-performing people who truly got along with one another. Of course, there were moments of struggle as there are on any project, but no one ever let issues fester—we always addressed them right away. Everyone trusted, listened to, and communicated with one another. It also really helped that everyone knew one another’s roles and responsibilities. There was never any confusion as to who was responsible for what, which can sometimes create strife amongst team members.” \

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Anthony also credits Station 5’s success to the many valuable trade partners that helped deliver it, as well as the longstanding relationship Webcor shares with the Owner and Developer.

“Everyone understood how important it was to maintain these relationships,” Anthony says. “We came out of the project with an even stronger partner in them and look forward to future work together.”

Currently, Webcor’s contracted to deliver Bay Meadows 6 and 7, but the exact start dates will depend on the state of the market/rates.