The Hill School Modular Swingspace

Pottstown, PA

The Challenge

The Hill School in Pottstown, PA is a prestige’s, boarding, private school in eastern Pennsylvania. The campus had a major renovation scheduled to their science building on campus. The construction schedule was very tight with a start date after school commenced and an occupancy during the summer of 2019. Modular Genius, Inc. was contracted to design / build a relocatable modular classroom that would house the school’s biology, chemistry and engineering departments. The new 12,012 sf building was designed with the main entrance and foyer on the side of the building to fit the campus’s pedestrian flow needs. The administration offices and restrooms are centrally located with a hallway that T’s off from there. Four Chemistry and Four Biology classrooms are at one end with the Engineering department at the other end.

The Solution

The site was an old ice-skating rink with a concrete slab. The slab had perfect bearing for the building’s piers so that no below grade footings were needed. The challenge was getting the modules to the site, which was a not truck accessible. Modular Genius hired a 350 ton crawler crane that had 202’ of boom reach. The crane required 11 trucks of counterweights and rigging. A second crane was used for assembly of this massive crane. The VB wood studded building was designed with future re-use in mind. The units were built with additional support beams in the roof structure to provide supplementary clear span space so that classrooms can be reconfigured into offices for the second use. Industry standard materials were utilized; including smart panel siding, low E windows, gypsum ceiling, vinyl floor tile and vinyl gypsum.