VAA provided civil and structural services for this large Slumberland store built with steel joists, beams and columns with non-bearing masonry walls. The roof is supported by steel columns and beams around the perimeter as a means of providing rapid construction without subcontractor coordination delays. The exterior has rock face block, other specialty CMU block and brick, to meet aesthetic requirements of the City of Shakopee.
The front of the store has numerous windows and Slumberland’s distinctive long curved canopy, which is built with mainly light gauge metal framing. The canopy is hung off the CMU walls supported by steel columns and extends into the entry way. The front wall of the building is significantly higher than the rest of the structure and extends close to double the interior height. The interior of the building has the appearance of a warehouse for display of furniture, a center entry area with windows and tile on the floor and an accent wall for visual purposes.
The back wall of the building is at the edge of the site and service road of the development, which is elevated with respect to the rest of the development. This creates a large surcharge of retained earth to be restrained by the back wall of the building, which was a significant design consideration. In order to accommodate the earth’s pressure the wall was reinforced, with heavy retaining wall-type footings.
Design consideration was taken for the extensive concrete retaining walls used for the egress exits, consisting of steps and steep embankments in the rear of the building. The loading dock was located in the rear of the building and designed to extend toward the corner of the site away so that the dock could be accessed by trucks via a relatively flat entryway. Numerous additional retaining walls were required for this design.
The civil engineering team’s challenge was to grade the site so that the water flowed away from the building. This was possible on much of the site except along the back wall where the water flows down the embankment from the roadway toward the building. The civil team met this challenge by designing a French drain; a trough of large aggregate for the water to flow along, redirecting the water away from the building at a ¼ inch per foot pitch.
