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Smith Center Bell Tower Tops Off
An arrangement of skilled craftspeople recently erected the stainless steel spire atop a 16-story bell tower at The Smith Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Las Vegas. The Art-Deco style designed cap marks the highest point at the $470 million still under construction music and performance complex at Grand Central Parkway and Bonneville Avenue. HKS Inc. is executive architect, with David M. Schwarz as design architect. The 170-ft-high tower will house 46 bronze cast carillon bells with a combined weight of 29,500 lbs.
The project consists of two buildings, on 4.75 acres, including the 2,050-seat Reynolds Hall with 23 box balconies and a 100-person orchestra pit. There is also a 300-seat cabaret theater overlooking a two-acre park and a 200-seat studio theater for
rehearsals and community events. Yet, the Smith Center’s most impressive features may also be the least visible: it’s the rich sound, great views and intimate visitor experience.
Smith Center, for instance, neighbors the Union Pacific Railroad tracks. Rumbling railcars could rattle the building and ruin a show. But, the building has a super-thick concrete mat foundation with hundreds of underground pylons that reduce vibration. In addition, Reynolds Hall is constructed independently, as a building within a building, with its own frame and foundation. Walter P. Moore is the project’s structural engineer.
Reynolds Hall also has clear views free of columns. Buildings normally have supporting columns that counteract shear stress and gravity; they hold the building upright but also obstruct views. Some seats have bad vantage points, as a result. Reynolds Hall has no columns. The 110-ft-tall structure displaces the building load through a super-sized roof and beefed-up exterior walls, which are more costly to construct but make for more memorable performances, say project officials.
The auditorium roof is supported by three 10-ft deep steel trusses as long a basketball court; the largest truss weighs 36 tons or slightly more than a Sherman tank. The roof consists of a one-foot-thick concrete slab that deadens overhead airplane and helicopter noise, while providing sufficient support for a catwalk and stage lighting. Smith Center uses a total of 4,000 tons of structural steel, which is enough to build 1,556 full-size cargo containers.
The 200,000-sq-ft Smith Center, which broke ground earlier last year, is scheduled to open in May 2012.
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