Recreation - More than Fun and Games New Facilities Invent Entertainment Options

Two new casinos, a family resort and a recreational racetrack will join the list of tourist attractions in Oregon and Washington.

Whether it’s a pair of dice, a race car or a canoe, visitors will be ready to roll when these resorts open.

Three Rivers Casino, Florence, Oregon

After testing the waters with a temporary casino structure for three years, the Confederated Tribes of the Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians opened a new casino, hotel and administration building in December.

The $57 million Three Rivers Casino in Florence, Ore., opened amid heavy rains and high winds on the Oregon Coast. “The storm threw us a little curve ball,” says Tim Rose, COO of the casino. “The city of Florence even lost power. But we invested quite a bit of money into backup power systems so that our guests would never be impacted by a storm.”

The casino is the first integrated casino and entertainment center to be constructed in Oregon in more than a decade, Rose says. “Our mechanical systems are far superior to anything else in the state,” he adds. “We’ve also added electrostatic filters to the ductwork to help eliminate smoke and purify the air. Indoor air quality was a major focus of the owner.

“We do have smoking and nonsmoking slot aisles so that people can make the choice, but you would have to be sitting right next to someone who is smoking to even notice the smoke.”

The 146,000-sq-ft facility includes an office administration building; a 90-room, three-suite hotel; and an 80,200-sq-ft casino, all located on 99-acre site owned by the Confederated Tribes.Chip Laizure, project executive for JE Dunn of Portland, Ore., the general contractor on the project, says that the fast-track construction schedule meant that his crews performed more than $30 million of work in 2 months.

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In addition to working 50-hour weeks, JE Dunn used building image modeling for the HVAC and mechanical portion of the work. “By using JE Dunn’s BIM 3-D software system, we were able to accurately design and size all the HVAC ductwork and associated systems so our HVAC subcontractor (Brainard Sheet Metal of Springfield, Ore.) could construct his duct sections in a controlled shop environment versus building each piece to fit onsite,” Laizure says.

Laizure says this process saved a month on the overall schedule.

He adds that the casino is built on sand, which “made it difficult to move equipment and excavate. Trenches had to be dug larger than normal and on a ‘just-in-time’ basis; otherwise, the sand and wind could potentially fill in the trench.”

Morris & Brown Architects of Solana Beach, Calif., was the architect on the casino project. Other key contractors included Oregon Electric Group of Springfield and Total Mechanical of Portland.

Great Wolf Lodge, Grand Mound, Wash.

Located just outside of Chehalis, Wash., in Grand Mound, Great Wolf Lodge is the latest addition to the family of Great Wolf Resorts in the United States.

“It has been really exciting to watch this resort come together,” says Derrek Kinzel, the lodge’s general manager.

Kinzel describes the new resort as the “fourth generation” of Great Wolf Lodges. What began as an indoor water park and hotel with locations in Wisconsin and Ohio has evolved into a full-service family destination resort complete with the indoor water park, hotel, corporate meeting space, spa, arcade and other amenities.

The 442,000-sq-ft complex includes a 78,000-sq-ft indoor water park; 30,000-sq-ft business conference center; and a 393-suite, eight-story lodge. Total construction costs were approximately $100 million.

The project has been on a fast-track schedule and is slated to open this month.

“We were selected in August 2006 and got the sitework going in December 2006, says Sean Lewis, marketing manager for general contractor Absher Construction of Seattle. “We were building it as they were designing it. This last phase of the project is challenging as there’s so much to coordinate and so many people moving around on the site.”

The owner is Great Wolf Resorts of Madison, Wis., and the Confederated Tribes of Chehalis. The architect was GSBS Architects of Salt Lake City.

Casino Snoqualmie, Snoqualmie, Wash.

Casino Snoqualmie is a new 160,000-sq-ft casino set to open in November in North Bend, Wash. The owner is the Snoqualmie Tribe; architect is Bergman, Walls & Associates of Las Vegas; and the contractor is Skanska USA of Seattle. Total estimated cost is approximately $175 million.

In addition to dining and entertainment amenities, the casino will include 1,600 slot machines, 52 table games and 17 poker tables.

The casino is designed in a Northwest lodge style with open-timber-frame construction inside. There also is a six-story parking garage with 1,000 covered parking spaces.

“This site gets double the rain of Seattle, according to NOAA weather charts,” says Troy Bloedel, project executive at Skanska USA.

The weather had presented some challenges throughout construction. “We’ve had to take advantage of the windows available,” Bloedel adds. “We’ve worked some weekends and had to be creative to maintain the schedule.”

The 56-acre site also required a fair amount of grading and soil preparation. “The site is highly sloped, so there was a significant amount of earth movement to get the site from a natural grade to a design grade,” Bloedel says.

He adds that workers had to cut and fill approximately 375,000 cu yds of dirt and add approximately 25,000 tons of kiln dust to stabilize the soil, which was over optimum moisture content.

JR Hayes & Sons of Maple Valley, Wash., is the site development general contractor. Other key contractors include MacDonald-Miller Facility Solutions and Veca Electric, both of Seattle.

Pacific Northwest Motorsports Park, Boardman, Ore.

Billing itself as a “motorsports country club,” the Pacific Northwest Motorsports Park in Boardman, Ore., is in the early stages of construction. “We are full steam ahead here,” says Billie Jean Morris, director of marketing for the project. “The equipment just arrived to start cutting in the service roads, and surveys are being completed on the road courses.”

Service roads and surveys are just the beginning of what is an ambitious plan for the 700-acre site near the Columbia River in Boardman. With an overall vision for approximately $2 billion of work over the next eight to 10 years, the site will eventually include a total of seven racetracks, a clubhouse, museum, restaurants, garages and condos. The first phase of the project will encompass about $100 million of work on a 6-mi motorsport track and temporary clubhouse tentatively scheduled for completion in early 2009.

“We’re already working with sanctioned racing groups to schedule race times and events for 2009,” Morris says.

“Once the course is up and running, developers will begin the design of a 145,000-sq-ft clubhouse that will house space for the members, a museum, gift store and restaurant,” Morris adds. Eventually, the park will include 10,000 sq ft of space dedicated to hosting events and meetings for up to 500 people.