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Portland Fire & Rescue employees like the new windows in the remodeled Station 1 building for the light they let in. Kent Yu, who led the project’s engineering team, likes them because they prevent damage in case of an earthquake.

The front of the building, on Southwest Naito Parkway, already had huge overhead doors for fire engines. With openings in the front and few in the back, the building would twist in an earthquake.

Yu, an associate principal at Degenkolb Engineers, and the project team worked to stiffen the front and weaken the back of the building. Now, the building will move, but not twist.

“You get better seismic performance, and folks in the building get more lighting,” Yu said.

General contractor Skyward Construction is finishing work on the project, which cost $15.3 million, including $10.7 million for construction. Administrative and investigative personnel have already moved in; firefighters will join them in a few weeks.

Station 1, built in the late 1940s, clearly needed extensive seismic work, said Connie Johnson, facilities construction manager with the city’s Office of Management and Finance. When the city commissioned a geotechnical review of its fire stations, Station 1 failed.

“We were told the current site was so seismically unstable that we’d never be able to have a fire station there,” Johnson said. “They said, ‘We don’t recommend you try it.’ ”

Another review, more in-depth, was more positive, Johnson said: It can be done, but it won’t be easy.

The process the project team arrived at wasn’t easy, said Jason Miles, project superintendent with Skyward. Workers bored more than 200 holes through the basement slab. The holes ranged in depth from 11 to 29 feet, depending on the depth of the gravel layer and bedrock.

Using a process called jet grouting, workers mixed soil with high-pressure streams of grout to form columns that stabilize the building.

“Anytime you’re doing something like that to an existing building, there’s a concern that you move the existing structure,” Miles said.

The structure didn’t shift, but the process did break a concrete slab. “The grout is going into the ground at 6,000 psi,” he said. “One little plug and the pressure has to go somewhere.”

It took more than jet grouting to make Station 1 resistant to earthquakes. Workers built new shear walls and eight collector beams so the building won’t twist or shift. “We put (in) the collector beams to keep it from doing that seesaw movement,” Miles said.

No one knew how deep the bedrock under the station was, or how smoothly the jet grouting would go. If the process required more resources than expected, other parts of the project would have been eliminated.

Because it went well, $283,000 was left for new windows. Station 1 now has low-e, high-efficiency Mercer windows.

The windows and other energy-saving touches help the building perform 30 percent better than code, Johnson said. Also, 93 percent of the project’s construction waste was recycled.

Old wood floors found new life in the basement workout room. Tables in the new, expansive kitchen are made of wood from a handball court. And all five old, brass fire poles remain, though three had to be relocated.

While keeping the building’s historic look, the remodel reflects a changing fire bureau. Male firefighters now have sleeping quarters and bathrooms separate from women firefighters’ facilities.

The third-floor administrative offices have more natural light, thanks to six new skylights and fewer partition walls blocking window views.

“The layout is far superior,” said Brian Alcid, senior facilities maintenance supervisor with Portland Fire & Rescue. “It’s more open, lighter and brighter.”