Friendlier, bigger City Hall planned

Erin Neff

Thursday, June 22, 2000 | 10:21 a.m.

Las Vegas City Hall has been derisively called many things, including a toilet bowl. It's been criticized as a callous tower with its back to downtown's other businesses and civic buildings.

A Taj Mahal it ain't.

An expansion project approved Wednesday by the City Council will help correct, not exacerbate, the problem, an architect predicted.

The planned seven-story parking garage, two-story addition and separate two-story communication center will create a civic campus, said Gary Garlock, partner at KGA Architects, which is designing the addition.

"We think we have a real good integration here," he said. "It is an extension of a campus."

The project, which will cost $14.2 million, has three main components. A 33,069-square-foot addition will be built on the current City Hall building facing Stewart Avenue.

Across Stewart, a seven-level parking garage with 643 spaces will rise from the site of what is currently a metered lot. South of the garage, the city will build a two-story office building to house the city's KCLV television offices and two studios.

Another $3 million will be spent on design and related costs.

The ground floor of the parking garage includes 2,500 square feet of retail space already being eyed by city employees for a Starbuck's or Einstein Brothers Bagels shop.

But employees weren't the only ones in mind when designing the expansion, Garlock said.

"One of the things your staff instructed us to do was not to view this as employee-driven," Garlock said. "It's very much pedestrian and community friendly."

The two-story addition to the existing City Hall will be linked to the parking garage by a pedestrian bridge above Stewart Avenue. Offices nearest the bridge will be the ones most commonly used by City Hall visitors for contracts and employment applications.

"I think this is going to be a great enhancement," City Councilman Lawrence Weekly said. "I think we can now finally say this is a nice City Hall."

The addition to the current City Hall tower will wipe out the Plexiglas art project many have ridiculed over the years.

William Maxwell's creation was dedicated in 1993 at a taxpayer cost of about $200,000. The area currently scheduled for the addition was once a reflecting pool designed to capture desert shapes in the water.