From an aging parking structure to a modern marvel, the Noah Hillman Garage is a symbol of Annapolis’s innovative spirit. Integrating historic charm with contemporary design, it offers 586 spaces, electric vehicle charging stations, photovoltaic arrays, and rooftop pickleball courts, redefining urban parking.

Discover the Noah Hillman Garage’s unique blend of functionality and style in our latest video.

Click here to learn more about this garage’s unique style and functionality.

Winter weather conditions are starting, making it a great time to preemptively protect your parking structure with a condition assessment.

A parking structure condition assessment provides in-depth information on your structure, including areas in need of repairs that are important for its stability and longevity. A parking structure requires regular assessments and maintenance to keep it in use and extend the service life. The cost of structural repairs is exponential over time. An assessment at regular intervals can reveal issues before they become significantly more costly to repair.

How Can You Save Money and Time on Parking Structure Maintenance?

Watch this 45-minute presentation by one of Walker’s structural experts to learn about proactive strategies for parking structure asset management and repair.

Walker’s Senior Vice President Al Bustamante, PE covers common types of deterioration and explains why a proactive strategy saves money in the long run.

What is the benefit to hiring an engineer to assess your parking structure?

An engineer’s evaluation of your parking structure can reveal previously unknown deficiencies that can lead to safety hazards and costly repairs. These professionals carefully inspect the exterior structural walls, structural columns, structural support beams, and the exposed portions of foundations to assess the level of deterioration and to provide a recommended prioritization of repairs for you. An engineer can also provide a maintenance repair program to help you plan and budget for repairs.

How can Walker help?

Nationwide, Walker’s condition assessments, asset management plans, and repair designs have been helping government, private, and institutional clients extend the lifespan of their facilities for over 55 years.

Walker’s five- and ten-year asset management plans are tailored to meet the needs of facility managers, developers, and owners, including institutional clients with multiple buildings or parking structures.

Our strategies provide owners with effective planning and budget management tools to maximize available funds for maintenance and repair. The plan includes a baseline evaluation of the existing condition, subsequent periodic repair and restoration, recommendations, opinion of probable cost, and an update of maintenance components based on remaining service life.

Hear the story of Marina Place, a waterfront condo in Florida that was having problems with leaks, and why they were glad they enlisted the engineering services of Walker Consultants.

Walker investigated and developed a plan to correct the water intrusion issues. While work was underway, additional problems were discovered that required a change of plans.

Learn more about how Walker helped Marina Place fix their water intrusion issues and address structural concerns.

The Fresno County community-census-designated place of Biola, CA,  one of the poorest U.S. communities with a 42 percent poverty rate and some of the worst air pollution, lacks a fully-developed infrastructure with social amenities and requires that residents travel to nearby cities for essential services such as groceries, pharmaceuticals, and healthcare, without a reliable transit option. Residents rely on private vehicles for travel, and many spend a disproportionately high percentages of their income on transportation.

To address the poverty issue, Walker worked with the Fresno County Rural Transit Agency (FCRTA) to plan and implement an innovative, low-cost electric vehicle micro-transit service.  The micro-transit service includes transportation provided on demand and without adherence to a fixed schedule. A generous grant supplied by the League of Women Voters of Fresno is helping subsidize rides for residents. This micro-transit service provides a lower-cost alternative to traveling via private automobile.

The plan’s outcome resulted in the addition of a dedicated micro-transit electric vehicle and EV charging station located at the Biola Community Services Center.

Walker’s plan development included multiple outreach efforts in Biola to gain input to plan the electrified, micro-transit service.

Walker Consultants is assisting the owners of a waterfront condo on Florida’s gulf coast with a facade replacement project. Check out the work underway and enjoy the views of this beautiful location!

 

Several of Walker’s experts are featured in this month’s parking publications. Read more about their contributions and accomplishments within the industry below!

Parking Magazine 

• “Facility Spotlight” on the Lenovo HQ Parking Deck in Morrisville, NC by Joey Rowland, PE (page 30).
• Mary Smith and Joe Wilcher in the “Movers & Shakers” column (page 36).

Parking & Mobility

•  Erik Nelson, PCIP in the “Ask the Experts” column (page 20).
• “Boosting Campus Commute Choice” by Eric Haggett and David Lieb, TDM-CP (page 23).

Walker’s Cape Cod Five Cents Savings Bank Parking Garage is featured in the Facility Spotlight section of the November issue of the National Parking Association’s Parking Magazine. Sarah Morkos, Project Architect in our Boston office, shares the landscape-integrated design, natural light, and simple wayfinding of the parking structure in the article.

Read “Massachusetts’ Cape Cod Adds 1st Parking Garage” on page 35 of Parking‘s November issue.

 

 

 

Walker’s Brian McGann is providing subject matter expert consulting services for the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities Campus as they completely replace and re-vision their access and revenue control system. The university campus includes three distinct academic districts: the stadium village (Minneapolis), St. Paul campus, and a hospital campus, all set in an urban location between the downtowns of Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota. Serving over 50,000 students and staff, the system replacement was needed as existing technologies had reached obsolescence. But rather than just replace equipment, the university saw the opportunity to critically assess what tools would best deliver a world-class parking experience for today, modernize payment and security methods, and improve flexibility as uses and technology changes.

The first phase of PCI-DSS compliant improvements and upgrades to 16 parking structures and 19 lots are underway and include introduction of License Plate Recognition (LPR), University card (Ucard) access credentials, credit-card only in-lane transactions, strategically located pay on foot cash and credit accepting stations, along with specific event-mode operations unique to the many athletic and academic events on campus.

Given it’s scope, this phase of the improvements are anticipated to continue into 2021. Future phases are anticipated to renovate permit and on-street parking, as well as improvements to parking guidance.

The Summer 2020 issue of the Precast/Prestressed Concrete Institute’s Ascent is here! The latest digital edition features an article and project spotlight contributed by Walker staff.

• The article “Consider the Human Perspective” written by Joey Rowland, PE begins on page 34.
• The Lenovo Headquarters Parking Deck, in which Walker Consultants provided structural engineering and parking consulting services, is also highlighted. Read the full project spotlight beginning on page 29.

To learn more about how architects and designers have turned to precast concrete and see the latest examples of functional and attractive parking structures, read the full issue.