This high-profile public-private redevelopment adapted the building’s 129,000-sf Flight Center, which hadn’t been used since 2001, into a massive lobby bookended by two wings with 512 hotel rooms, a subterranean 46,000-sf conference center with a 7,000-sf banquet hall and 43 meeting rooms, six restaurants, eight bars (including one that was built inside of the fuselage of a 1958 Lockheed Constellation jet), an observation deck, retail shops, and a rooftop pool. All of these are connected via an underground service system that links to JetBlue Terminal 5.
New mechanicals were added to support new amenity areas and the hotel’s operational spaces that surpass current hospitality and transportation industry performance standards. The hotel now has its own onsite, continuous-duty cogeneration plant that produces all of its electricity and heating independent of the airport’s utility grids. All of the lighting was converted to LEDs, and the sprinkler system was replaced.
HONORABLE MENTION
BUILDING TEAM Jaros, Baum & Bolles (submitting firm, MEP) MCR/MORSE Development (owner/developer) Beyer Blinder Belle (architect) Lubranco Ciavarra Architects (hotel designer) Stonehill Taylor (interior designer–hotel) INC Architecture & Design (interior designer–event spaces) Arup (SE) Turner Construction (CM) DETAILS 440,000 sf Total cost $265 million Construction time December 2016 to May 2019 Delivery method Design-bid-build
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