We’ve seen this grotesque piece of “architecture” going up at the far end of Morris Park just below Pelham Parkway and next to the Hutch and for many of us Star Trek fans, we can’t help but see a giant Borg cube ship instead of the life-saving building that it is.
Now, we get to see a little more inside (but not completely due to the sensitive nature of the facility) this 450,000 square foot 24 story monstrosity so out of character with the neighborhood.
The $800 million (yes, you read that correctly, almost $1 billion…) building is finally complete after being under construction since 2010 and test calls are being routed but it won’t be officially operational until some time later this year.
Driving along the Pelham Parkway or Hutchinson River Parkway in Pelham Bay you might notice a silvery, somewhat monolithic structure along the road. That recently completed structure is New York City’s Public Safety Awareness Center II (PSAC II) otherwise known as the center where 911 calls are answered by emergency response workers from three different agencies: the police department, the fire department, and emergency medical services.
The 450,000-square-foot building was designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) as a perfect cube. To avoid that monolithic feel to a structure that is supposed to prioritize safety and privacy above all else, the architects on the project developed a serrated facade for this building with aluminum panels.The few windows that do exist are mostly centered around “the 50,000-square-foot, L-shaped call room, which has 30-foot ceilings,” the New York Times described, when it stopped by at the building last year.
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