Influx

Manhattan is in a state of constant flux, buildings are being renovated and constructed in a seemingly endless cycle. Walking around it’s easy to become oblivious to what’s going on in the construction sites you walk by, that’s unless someone decides to tell you.

Such is the case with the new Bank of America HQ on 42nd Street that is scheduled for completion in 2008. The exterior of the construction site is covered with ads from Bank of America.

These ads contain some pretty interesting information:

- The tower will be constructed largely of recycled and recyclable building materials.
- It will save millions of gallons of water annually through such innovative devices such as a gray-water system to capture and reuse all rain and wastewater.
- Planted roofs will reduce the urban heat island effect.
- Taking advantage of heat energy from the cogeneration plant, a thermal storage system will produce ice in the evenings, which will reduce the building’s peak demand loads on the city’s electrical grid.
- Daylight dimming and LED lights will reduce electric usage while carbon dioxide monitors automatically introduce more fresh air when necessary.
- It will filter the air, making the internal air quality higher than that outside the building

The new building, when completed, will be 2.1 million sq ft in size and house six of the banks trading floors, which will range from 43,000 to 99,000 sq ft.

Given the impressive scale of this building, the predictable thing for a bank to have done, would be to gloat about how big it is.

So, to formally tout the building’s green credentials, is a progressive move for Bank of America.

Here is an interview with the tower’s architect Rick Cook