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The second phase of the Lane County Armed Forces Reserve Center project in Springfield qualified for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold certification.

and turned silver into gold with their work on the second phase of the Lane County Armed Forces Reserve Center in Springfield.

The 153,000-square-foot facility is part of a development designed to serve as the Oregon base for units of the National Guard, the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves and the U.S. Navy Reserve. The center also houses district offices for the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management.

The mixing of several agencies under one roof posed a unique challenge when it came to design, according to BBL Architects’ Mark Danielson.

“The whole idea was to build a building … with classroom and meeting space they would share while having their own administrative spaces,” said Danielson, who served as project architect.

The first phase called for construction of a $7.5 million field maintenance shop. That project, designed by BBL and built by Wildish, earned Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold certification from the U.S. Green Building Council in 2008.

The $22.4 million second phase, which included an addition to the maintenance shop and a 25,000-square-foot warehouse, also was designed with LEED in mind.

“The requirement was silver, but we got gold,” Danielson said.

The silver LEED designation is the standard goal for Oregon Military Department buildings, but the agency is willing to raise that bar if it is feasible, according to Jim Willeford, chief of construction for the military department.

“When (the design and construction team members) see a project is within ‘striking’ distance of LEED gold certification, they look closely at which elements make sense for the project, within the budget and mission parameters,” Willeford said.