Join Our Email List Email:

Join our email list to subscribe to a monthly issue of SCI FYI delivered directly to your inbox. Each issue of SCI FYI is designed to keep our clients abreast of the newest regulatory developments affecting our industry, or to share little known information about some of our more unique services. Email addresses are kept confidential. SCI uses SafeUnsubscribe® which guarantees the permanent removal of your email address from its mailing lists.

St. Charles, MO. May 18, 2007 – SCI Engineering, Inc. (SCI) received a National Finalist award for its brownfields work on the Gaslight Square redevelopment project in the Engineering Excellence Awards competition sponsored by the American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC). SCI and the project were recognized during the EEA Gala dinner and awards ceremony on May 8 in Washington, D.C., an event referred to as the “Academy Awards for the engineering industry.”

The firm was permitted to submit the project to ACEC’s national competition after it received the Grand Award in the environmental category from the Missouri Chapter of ACEC earlier this year. SCI Vice President and Director of Environmental Services Karl Ruhmann, P.E., R.G. accepted the award on behalf of the company.

SCI served as primary environmental engineering consultant in the redevelopment of a block in midtown St. Louis known as Gaslight Square. Starting in 2003 and continuing into 2006, SCI provided a range of consulting services, including: Phase One and Phase Two Environmental Site Assessments (ESAs); negotiation and closure of the site through the Missouri Department of Natural Resources (MDNR) Brownfields/Voluntary Cleanup Program (B/VCP); geotechnical investigations; and construction testing and observation services.

As a sign of how quickly the area turned around, the block that was blighted in 2003 was featured as the CITIRama site in October, 2004 by the Home Builders Association (HBA) of St. Louis, and mostly completed and inhabited in 2005. The event featured just five single-family homes and seven townhouses available for viewing, but it attracted more than 20,000 people during its threeweek run, making it the best-attended single site home tour event ever held in the city. C.F. Vatterott was the lead developer of Gaslight Square and one of the builders featured at the CITIRama event.

Redeveloping the site as a new urban residential neighborhood has demonstrated what is possible with an older brownfield area that had been environmentally impacted. The site has proven to be a huge success and is widely noted as proof that new higher-end residential construction can be successful within the city.

The project has re-built and stabilized a key link between Grand Center and the Central West End. What had been a significant St. Louis neighborhood with national name recognition has been saved and, in the process, Gaslight Square has helped to restore a sense of pride to Midtown St. Louis, serving as a catalyst for growth that is continuing today.