Today, the public got to see the chosen design of the next NGA West in North St. Louis. The renderings come as as a joint venture between McCarthy and HITT Construction was selected last month. The architecture firm is Gensler.
The NGA West project came out of a competition, from 5 few years ago, to replace the ageing NGA Facility near Anheuser-Busch. The $1.7 Billion project brought a ton of controversy when it was unveiled as multiple homes and lots had to be eminent domained. The process had an offer to any owner of houses within the zone (bounded by Cass, 22nd, Montgomery and Jefferson-Parnell) could have their homes moved. Only one owner accepted the offer and move her home to the corner of 22nd and St. Louis. The City of St. Louis handled site preparation and handed the property over to the Army Corps of Engineers last December.
Construction will officially start in the summer of 2020 with construction ending in 2025. The NGA sees the project as an opportunity to spur more investment in North St. Louis. More recently, the FBI was exploring the idea of building their St. Louis office on the NGA property and a couple million dollars was allocated to explore the concept and initiate architecture designs for the potential building. No timeline on that was given.
According to the NGA, the facility will include declassified areas where businesses and students can meet and learn about new technologies. Labs and classrooms will be the primary part of the declassified areas. The ultimate goal, as it appears, is to be part of the community.
More renderings of the NGA are below. According to my computer, they were rendered in July 2018.
Learn more at nextngawest.com