New Hydro building focuses on efficiency, flexibility

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Published on Friday, June 23, 2017

By Kate Jackman-Atkinson
The Neepawa Banner

Combining form and function, Neepawa’s newest corporate office is nearing one year in operation. Last September, staff began moving into Manitoba Hydro’s Neepawa Customer Service Centre, a newly constructed 25,000 sq. ft. building showcasing the cutting edge in building design. This month, project manager Mark Pauls, an engineer who works in Manitoba Hydro’s Building Energy Management department, provided a tour of the new facility, which sits at Neepawa’s east entrance.

Pauls explained that following the completion of Manitoba Hydro’s head office in downtown Winnipeg, new customer service centres were planned for both Neepawa and Ashern. These new buildings would make use of many of the techniques and materials used in the construction of the company’s headquarters. Ashern was to be built first, at 15,000 sq. ft, it’s a smaller building and has about half the staff of Neepawa. However, the consolidation of rural service centres in Minnedosa, Gladstone and Erickson into Neepawa meant that more space was needed in Neepawa and the two facilities were essentially built at the same time. 

The Neepawa service centre has a staff of about 40, which includes customer service, maintenance, engineers and business support functions. Because the Neepawa project used many of the same materials and features as the Ashern office, it was able to be built on a shortened timeline.  The facility took about one year to design and two years to build.
Of the Neepawa building’s 25,000 sq. ft, about half is office space, 30 per cent is the garage and 20 per cent is link space, which includes amenities such as locker rooms and washrooms, and separates the “clean” office and public space from the “dirty” garage space. The building is home base for between 20 and 30 field staff who have desk and locker space in the link area as well.

Pauls explained that one of the design features was to cut off the corners, which are often not well utilized. This was applied not only to the building, but also to the yard, where corners are hard for large vehicles and trailers to use. This allowed the Neepawa facility to fit into a compact footprint, measuring between five and six acres. A decade ago, the average size of such a facility was 10 acres.

Another design feature was to separate the customer space from the garage space, for both aesthetics and safety. While customers pull up to the north side of the building, Hydro’s trucks and trailers all safely enter the compound on the south side. 
Flexibility was at the heart of the design and it can be seen right from the building’s entrance.  The use of greenspace creates a buffer between the building and the parking lot, but it also means there’s space available should they need to expand in future. 
The concept of flexibility and low operating costs were central to the interior design as well. The floor in the office area is built 18” above the concrete slab, which means reconfiguring the open floor plan office to create more or less work spaces can be easily done.There are also dividable meeting room spaces and flexible use common areas.

The downside is that with no fixed walls or ceilings over the work areas, there is a lack of privacy.  There are small and large meeting rooms, as well as the winter garden area which can be used for private conversations. Pauls called this one of “biggest challenges,” but added that the staff tend to adapt, as similar work spaces are used in the Winnipeg head office. 
Much of the building is automated, which includes the heating, cooling, sun shades and lighting systems. Pauls explains that the lights dim and brighten depending on the amount of daylight in the space. 

With so many automated services, Pauls explains that they are still working through some issues, which isn’t unexpected, based on their experience with other newly constructed buildings.
The high bay garage is one of the key areas of the service centre and Pauls explains that the building was designed with safety in mind.  The garage is 10’ longer than their longest vehicle and was designed so that all vehicles can pull through forward, without having to back up. The ventilation system, which is separate from the systems used elsewhere in the building, runs based on air quality, as determined by sensors. He explains that this means the system is never working harder than necessary. 
As for the old Neepawa Hydro building, there’s no official word, but it will likely be sold off at some point.