Curb appeal: Making the most of a pump station makeover

As cities in America were growing in the 19th and early 20th centuries, they celebrated their advanced public water and sewer projects. They housed them in impressive civic architecture. The style of waterworks buildings matched the character of the city’s other municipal facilities or captured the popular design style of the era. Fairmont Waterworks in Philadelphia was designed in the early...

HRSD assembled a team from a cross-section of its staff, including representatives from senior management, engineering, operations, and facilities maintenance, to share ideas for better pump station architecture. HRSD sought to elevate its design standards, but also needed to control the potential cost implications. The team needed to consider construction and maintenance costs as well as limit...

Working with HRSD’s team, the firm identified four significant design issues that influence the overall appearance of pump stations:

With the draft outline of the guidelines developed, the HRSD team selected four existing pump stations for the firm to test the guidelines. The test consisted of two questions:

HRSD’s architectural guidelines strive to achieve five principles: