Willoughby Corner was a landmark project filled with amazing challenges, managed by a team of seasoned professionals operating as true partners who were able to turn near catastrophic challenges into landmark successes.
Located southwest of the intersection of 120th and Emma streets in East Lafayette, Willoughby Corner is a master-planned greenfield project born of an intergovernmental agreement among Boulder County Housing Authority (BCHA), Boulder County, and the City of Lafayette. Pinkard Construction was the CM/GC construction manager at risk collaborating with RS&H Architects and BCHA.
The Willoughby Corner project was an exceptionally well planned and designed development, accounting for the lifestyle needs of low-income families, seniors, and individuals. As a Colorado leader in affordable housing construction, Pinkard was well positioned with a senior staff and a great construction plan, ready to go to work to meet BCHA’s funding and construction expectations. Pinkard was tasked to build Phase 1, which included a 63-unit apartment building for 55-and-over residents, four multi-family buildings totaling 129 units, a community center, pickleball courts, and considerable roads and infrastructure (R&I) improvements.
Pinkard would also be working to meet BCHA’s expectations for sustainable design and construction, hoping to achieve the status of Colorado’s largest ZERH (Zero Energy Ready Home) housing community.
PRECONSTRUCTION
With numerous funding sources covering various aspects of this large project, Pinkard provided 30+ estimates during the complicated two-year-long preconstruction phase. Working closely with RS&H Architects, Pinkard’s intensive collaboration and creativity in design optimization ensured a timely, in-budget construction start. Funding included 4% and 9% CHFA tax credits, “plus 30 other components of the Capital Stack that brought the funding together for this project,” says Leighton Neff, Pinkard’s chief preconstruction manager. The site and infrastructure portion was paid by ARPA funds.
Key preconstruction achievements included finding room in the budget to keep the development’s central clubhouse, which serves as the centralized hub for all security, low voltage systems and infrastructure. Willoughby was not originally planned as a ZERH community, so when BCHA decided to incorporate that level of sustainability into the project, Pinkard devoted considerable time and manpower to learning everything about Willoughby’s ZERH requirements and BCHA’s expectations. “There are no petroleum-based services on this entire 24-acre site," says Neff. "There is no gas other than a diesel generator for backup, which at one point BCHA didn't even want. This is true ZERH.”
Willoughby Corner’s energy plan includes extensive geothermal and solar energy systems. The geothermal system – which will provide space heating and cooling to units – consists of 90 vertical bores, each 600 feet deep. The available rooftop solar array is expected to offset about 40 percent of energy use.
ROADS & INFRASTRUCTURE (R&I) DELAYS
The roads and infrastructure improvements came with considerable jurisdictional challenges as Pinkard collaborated with the City of Lafayette to work through the city’s long-term R&I plans. Thanks to a strong collaboration among the owner/design team, Pinkard, WT Excavating (WT), and the city, Pinkard and WT made significant modifications to the existing construction and logistics plans to accommodate the city’s evolving requirements. Despite this great teamwork, the R&I modifications resulted in a five-month delay to construction start. BCHA granted Pinkard a five-month schedule extension, but all parties agreed that meeting the originally contracted completion date was critical to BCHA’s funding needs.
The R&I components included the early construction of a road that bisected Pinkard’s jobsite and served as a main feeder for an adjacent school. As a result, Pinkard managed school traffic daily mornings and afternoons, which included managing pedestrian traffic and rerouting or rescheduling materials deliveries for two full school years.
Unforeseen R&I conditions that potentially threatened the schedule included the discovery of a crumbling sanitary line tie-in that forced an early resequencing while details of the unforeseen work were worked out with the City.
PINKARD FRAMEWORKS
During this time, Pinkard’s in-house framing division, Pinkard Frameworks, was responsible for constructing all six buildings of the Willoughby development. Fortunately, unlike traditional framers, Pinkard Frameworks’ approach included an in-depth planning process and comprehensive constructability review to set up the construction phase for success.
“Willoughby’s complex framing design came with challenging non-standard wall heights, specialty long-span floor trusses, and angled cantilevers requiring modified truss designs,” says Pinkard’s Wood Frame Manager Dan Harris. “There were also unique parapets, recessed decks, five different truss types, three different floor levels, and 13 different wall heights for any given building. A typical multi-family project has two or three different wall heights and simple runs of stairs. For Willoughby, this complex design required every single stud to be a custom cut – that’s no exaggeration.”
Stairs presented another unique condition challenging the team to balance the architect’s intent with the post-and-beam requirements for landings.
To find the perfect blend of structural integrity, aesthetics, and efficiency, Pinkard brought a truss designer into the team to refine floor and roof framing detailing, eventually settling on the perfect blend of style, integrity and efficiencies. Pinkard then brought in a specialty supplier to provide stair design solutions with custom steel brackets.
According to RS&H Principal and Architect Tino Leone, “The partnership between cost estimating, constructability reviews, and our design team was very fruitful. We were able to have lots of good, productive conversations about different building systems and details of how the wood framing went together.”
Dan Harris agrees, saying “The architect and engineer were generous with reviewing our teams ‘ solutions and providing timely responses. Their real-time assistance was invaluable in keeping the project on track.”
To ensure the right blend of speed and quality, Pinkard Frameworks augmented the production framing crews with a top specialty carpentry crew to build stairs and complete custom framing. Light gauge metal framing (LGMF) also came into play. “Pinkard used LGMF with the drywall contractor for more efficient sequencing,” explains Tino Leone. “Not having to get the rough carpentry sub back out onto the site definitely helped the schedule.”
Thanks to Frameworks’ approach to in-depth planning and constructability review during preconstruction, most of the framing quality control effort was complete before construction started and played a key role in keeping the project on schedule. Frameworks’ focus was saving money for BCHA while maximizing construction efficiencies and avoiding in-field redesigns – all on top of the near-occupied conditions, with heavy school traffic jams and significant road closures and detours impacting site access and deliveries.
OWNER FUNDING SAVINGS
With Pinkard’s owner-approved schedule extension offsetting the five-month construction start delay, things were running smoothly on the jobsite, but behind the scenes a perilous situation was developing that could cost BCHA approximately $500,000 in year-dated tax funds.
“The entire OAC team knew almost from the beginning that BCHA’s funding was based upon a December 31, 2024 construction completion,” explains Construction Manager Joe Revielle. “At first, our delayed construction start seemed like we would miss the 12/31/24 deadline. But we made strong progress that suggested we had a shot at making the original schedule. So BCHA consulted with the rest of the team, and we all agreed to pull out all the stops to see if we could finish within the originally scheduled deadline.”
With this new very challenging objective, Pinkard was now endeavoring to construct $83 million dollars in roads, infrastructure, and affordable housing in less than 16 months.
MANPOWER CHALLENGES
“From the beginning, our Willoughby construction plan was solid,” says Revielle. “Our strong buyout phase ensured adequate staffing and in-depth understanding of scope, quality, and safety requirements. We were ready to roll. But this schedule compression took away our timely start and then we lost five months at the end of construction shooting for the 12/31 deadline.”
Pinkard Frameworks was able to ramp up framing crew sizes midway through construction to expedite framing, but other major trades like mechanical, electrical, plumbing, and fire protection were locked in with few options for manpower increases. As a result, the only options were to work smarter and longer.
Pinkard immediately held scheduling and sequencing charettes with all major trades to evaluate opportunities for tighter sequencing, more effective site logistics and materials handling, and possibilities for overtime with employee incentives.
Thanks to dedicated trade partners who bought into the schedule goals, Pinkard was able to shave weeks off the schedule with minimal stacking of trades. But the new challenge was in maintaining a strong quality control program despite the frantic work pace.
ENSURING HIGH QUALITY FIT AND FINISH
As mentioned earlier, Pinkard Frameworks’ in-depth preconstruction process set the stage for a more efficient wood-framing effort, eliminating waste and improving overall construction quality through better planning. Frameworks’ ability to also ramp up the manpower helped to maintain productivity despite the earlier end date.
Says Joe Revielle: “WT Excavating was our ‘super subcontractor’, efficiently performing all wet utility work, dirtwork, site concrete, off-site and on-site paving, and all landscaping. Their performance smoothed the way for the work of other major subcontractors.”
To ensure quality with other major trades, Pinkard worked to enhance its existing seven-phased quality control program with an even greater emphasis on architectural mockups and training, additional specialty installation inspections, extra as-built field documentation with 360-degree cloud-based photography, and staying ahead on punch list.
Pinkard took advantage of the overall sequencing of the development to use the senior building as an “in-place” mock-up. As the first to be constructed, and having numerous similar components to the rest of the development, Pinkard used the senior building for quality instruction and training. This approach allowed Pinkard and its trade partners a great series of lessons learned that could be applied to the rest of the development, simplifying quality control inspections and punch list throughout.
“DOWN TO THE WIRE”
Despite these concerted efforts, there was still a lot of schedule uncertainty. “Near the end of November, nobody thought we were going to make the schedule,” says Revielle. “We were getting nervous comments from investors, attorneys, even people in the field. But we continued to pour on the manpower, spice up our work incentives, and focus on quality and safety. And somehow it all came together. My hat is off to our entire project team. They started in earnest in September 2023 and finished December 31, 2024. That’s 16 months of quality construction under an incredible schedule load.”
Pinkard began this $83 million (hard costs) ZERH affordable housing community with an efficient preconstruction phase and a strong construction plan, never expecting to have so many scheduling demands. Without this strong foundation of planning and foresight, the pressures of the schedule could have caused the project to collapse.
But Pinkard’s intensive resequencing, major revamping of the construction plan, the enhanced quality control plan, and numerous manpower adjustments resulted in a completion that one design team member described as “miraculous.”
In the words of BCHA Executive Director Susana Lopez-Baker: “We delivered a $100+ million project with $15 million in infrastructure improvements—plus 192 housing units—in just 16 months. Pinkard was flexible and solutions focused every step of the way. The result is a beautiful development that the community truly loves.”
Currently, Pinkard is continuing with the City’s R&I improvements surrounding the Willoughby development. Roads and infrastructure upgrades are expected to be complete in June 2025.
