Exploring Montgomery

The storytelling continues… a collection of stories and photos from Exploring Montgomery!

Monthly Archives: February 2016

Union Clipping — By 1991 the success and acceptance of Dr. Bronner’s initial round of buildings, the RSA Plaza and the Alabama Center for Commerce, had completely changed the political chemistry of the city. Governor Guy Hunt, who had previously fought with Bronner, now offered him the full support of the State. Mayor […]

RSA Union – Political Deals

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged deals / political / rsa / union

WSJ Clipping — Folsom and White David Bronner secured the support and commitment of Governor Hunt before he ever embarked on the RSA Monroe Street development. Early on, every arrangement with the State ran smoothly. The land for The Union Office Building was made available, and desirable state agencies were lined up as […]

RSA Union – Opposition Politics

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged opposition / political / rsa / union

Union Street Washers — Right up front I admit that our dealings with the City on this round ran much smoother than before, especially with our supposed champion and liaison, Roy Boudreaux, in the equation. However, that does not say that things ran perfectly. Because the Union project was in the initial thrust of […]

RSA Union – Encounters With The City

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged city / rsa / union

PSC Commissioners — The array of state agency tenants in the Union was much more impressive than those in the RSA Plaza. With the green light from the Governor’s Office, Bronner had little difficulty in lining up a stellar group. Among the anticipated occupants were the State Purchasing Department, the State Comptroller, the […]

RSA Union – Impressive Tenants

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged rsa / tenants / union

Union Sign — Once David Bronner had made up his mind on something, he allowed nothing to get in the way. He drove us relentlessly. PH&J was never known for speed–care and thoroughness was our forte. And this time we were facing $100 Million in the construction of two office buildings, both of […]

RSA Union – Beating The Schedule

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged bidding / rsa / schedule / union

Union Framed — With over $100 Million in construction in the offing for the Union and Tower, and with the Tower twice as high as anything ever built in Montgomery, Ron Blount and I decided that we needed to devise and implement a qualification procedure for general contractors, and it was necessarily going […]

RSA Union – A Prequalification Procedure

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged prequalification / rsa / union

water works — In September of 1991, six months before the Tower epic began, my residence on Jasmine Road suffered a terrible sewage backup. For two days the formidable Bradley Plumbing Company chased the problem and finally found it in the sewer lateral on the opposite side of Jasmine. The stoppage occurred in […]

RSA Tower – What Goes Around Comes Around

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged peril and intrigue / rsa / tower / water works

Wayne Griffin — Any telling of Tower subs must also include the Wayne Griffin Electric Company, which had its headquarters in Massachusetts, but operated a branch in Birmingham. In the late 1980’s, Griffin had done the electrical work on the huge Gordon Persons State Office Building, located just behind the State Capitol. In […]

RSA Tower – Wayne Griffin Electric

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged contractor / electrical / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

ALDPH — The major tenant in the Tower was to be the Alabama Department of Public Health, a humongous State agency that was to occupy one-half of the available tenant space in the entire building. Their space was reduced from 12 floors to 10 floors, but as a result of the business-like […]

RSA Tower – Vital Statistics at Risk

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged peril and intrigue / public health / rsa / statistics / tower

Tower Signed Beam — There are lots of traditions in the construction trades and probably most of them come from the romance of the iron workers. These high-wire daredevils, who assemble the steel skeletons of high-rise construction, consider themselves the top of the social order of the building trades. Everyone is familiar with the […]

RSA Tower – Topping Out

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged beam / peril and intrigue / rsa / top / tower

One of the frustrating dictums/rules which Ron Blount, RSA’s Owner Representative, brought to our project was a minority participation program. He held job fairs and stirred the issue across two states. After bids were taken on the RSA Union, he coerced Brice Construction Company to release the competent masonry sub […]

RSA Tower – The Unhappy Mason

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged brick / mason / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

The prequalification procedure that Ron Blount and I employed to screen the bidders on the RSA Tower was an absolute disaster. Yet, the need to restrict the work to experienced contractors was obvious. Very few Alabama contractors had ever built a 12-story building, much less a 24-story structure. And few […]

RSA Tower – The Prequalification Disaster

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged peril and intrigue / prequalification / rsa / tower

alabama power — Big industrial giants in large cities usually have operations on several adjacent city blocks and consume much electrical power. To insure that their electric utility rate is kept reasonably high despite the huge consumption, Alabama Power persuaded the Public Service Commission to issue a “Premises Rule”. The rule stated that […]

RSA Tower – The Premises Rule

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged meter / peril and intrigue / power / premise rule / rsa / tower

Tower Flood Barrier Hump — Coming Up Short Because of demands of the Chamber of Commerce, the 1000-car parking deck to serve the Tower was to be located diagonally across the street, connected only by public sidewalk, wind and rain. Legally, additional parking capacity was to be afforded in the RSA’s Bainbridge Street Deck, three […]

RSA Tower – The Parking Area

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged parking / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

Monroe Street — Monroe Street is only nine blocks long and early in the Tower development, we determined that the RSA was proposing to construct a major project on over half of the blocks which comprised its length. That meant that the curbs and sidewalks on these five city blocks would be completely […]

RSA Tower – The Monroe Axis

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged axis / curb / monroe / peril and intrigue / rsa / street / tower

Peking Theater — Probably few people remember the great commotion which the City and Mayor Folmar raised around 1990 to entice the State to construct its proposed new Supreme Court Building on Dexter Avenue, the downtown side of the State Capitol, rather than behind it as the State master plan decreed. A deal […]

RSA Tower – The Little Matter

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged peking / peril and intrigue / rsa / theater / tower

EDP Suite 3 — In 1993, and probably to the present time, the primary industry-seeking agency in our State was the Alabama Power Company. Its efforts in that realm overshadowed that of the State itself, as well as those of the various Chambers of Commerce of the larger cities of the State. Thus it […]

RSA Tower – The EDP Suites

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged alabama power / edp / peril and intrigue / rsa / suites / tower

Chiller Plant Construction Site — The Poison Plume Now we jump back up to September of 1993. By then HH&N had been underway for three months. The concrete column fiasco was in full bloom. Across the street the chiller house excavation was nearing completion. The cut-off wall subcontractor, Spencer, White & Prentis of Virginia, had […]

RSA Tower – The Chiller Dirt Problems

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged chiller / dirt / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

Tower Precast Panels — The Background The Ralph Draughon Library at Auburn University is the design of Davis, Speake and Associates, Architects of Birmingham. Well, in 1983, Auburn decided to double the library in size and PH&J got the job. Our then new field man, David Atkins, drew the assignment during construction, and thus he tumbles […]

RSA Tower – The Castone Corporation

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged castone corporation / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

CCC Lobby — The CCC, as we called it, was actually an arm of Club Corp of America, headquartered in Dallas, and which owned some 230 national and international private clubs. In 1992, when the Tower episode began, CCC was located on the top (3rd) floor of the old Pizitz Department Store building […]

RSA Tower – The Capitol City Club

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged capitol city club / dining / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

The RSA Tower rises out of downtown Montgomery, but is not in the “Capitol Complex” as are all of Bronner’s other buildings. Thus, it faced no traditional height restriction, and no concern that its exterior lighting might overshadow the Capitol. It was to be Dr. Bronner’s crowning construction achievement. Because […]

RSA Tower – The Building Concept

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged concept / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

radio_tower — WSFA As the anticipated mass and height of the Tower became generally known, a hue and cry rose from a very specialized group of citizens connected with line-of-sight broadcast systems – radio, television and radar. Suddenly yours truly was beset with technicians bitterly complaining that we were going to interrupt […]

RSA Tower – The Airways Split Asunder

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged airways / faa / peril and intrigue / radio / rsa / tower / tv

Tower J Cap Casting — Dropping Into The Abyss Sonny Wadsworth’s demo work proceeded without notable incident until he started on the large United Lighting Company showroom, which fronted on Madison Avenue. The structure came down easily under the onslaught of Sonny’s large D-8 Caterpillar tractor. The D-8 Cat was pushing debris about on United’s […]

RSA Tower – The Advance Package

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged early package / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

RSA Sign — This episode concerns the dozen or so construction job signs that identified the various RSA building sites along Monroe Street early in 1995. Goodwyn-Mills jobs and Watson-Watson jobs as well as PH&J jobs. All of the signs followed the State Building Commission format and each one included a panel which denoted […]

RSA Tower – Surreptitious Sign Changes

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged peril and intrigue / rsa / secret / sign / tower

Tower Chiller Yard — Dr. Bronner wanted his building to appear grand at street level on all four sides of the block. The Tower did not have a rear side, and its design precluded rooftop equipment. Of course, we could not avoid a loading dock and service entrance, but the required emergency generators, huge […]

RSA Tower – Remote Chiller Plant

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged chiller plant / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

Tower Show Column — The revived Huber-Hunt Dallas Branch, with no reservoir of experienced personnel, had much difficulty in finding a qualified person to head-up its new Montgomery job. As project manager, they sent in a brusque, rough and tumble man named H. R. (Sonny) Phipps from HH&N’s California Branch. Phipps blew into town […]

RSA Tower – Off To A Bad Start

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged column / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower

Head Down — As 1994, ‘95, and ‘96 rolled by, Huber, Hunt & Nichols’ attempts to complete the job became ever more desperate and pathetic. By 1996 the RSA’s big-time commercial tenants, Morgan-Keegan, AmSouth Bank and Club Corporation of America out of Dallas were all suffering delayed occupancy, and the air was thick […]

RSA Tower – No Turn For The Better

February 21, 2016 in RSA tagged ending / peril and intrigue / rsa / tower