The Oakland Federal Building faced an ambitious design program: incorporate leading-edge thinking on office design, meet the needs of 26 government agencies, and fulfill an important civic role. It's three times a winner.

As the federal agency responsible for managing 276 million square feet of space in nearly 8,000 buildings across the United States, the General Services Administration (GSA) has good reason to wonder about the office of the future. Common sense would seem to dictate that a pleasant and functional work environment can improve employee morale and boost productivity, essential if the government is to carry out its responsibilities with a dwindling work force.

The need for additional space in its Pacific Rim Region gave the GSA's Public Buildings Service the opportunity to move into the forefront of office design. Considering the fairly pervasive perception of government offices as "Beige and Boring," these could be considered fighting words. If so, the GSA emerged a clear victor when the first government employees moved into the new Oakland Federal Building in 1993.

It is a beautiful building. Its twin pyramid-topped towers, distinctive mid-air bridge and soaring, open rotunda mark it as a building of stature. Its detailing, from limestone striping to marble inlay floors, constitute the kind of tribute to civic importance that too often falls victim to modern construction budgets. But what makes it an office building for the future?

An open framework, not a fixed formula
At the heart of the Unigrid program's longevity is the fact that it is an open framework, not a fixed formula. There is room for creativity on the part of the many designers, both in-house and contract, who work with it. This is essential for an organization as content- driven as the National Park Service, whose goal is to communicate not just superficial facts about a site, but to "excavate the invisible truth."

With Unigrid, the Publications Division's design and editorial staff can focus on working with park interpreters to identify the real essence of a site by recreating scenes from a prior time or depicting life forms, concepts or relationships not readily apparent to park visitors. It is information enriched by insight. The NPS wants people to understand why a site is special, where it fits in our natural, political or social history, why it is worthy of preservation. These goals constitute the mission of every NPS employee, of every map, brochure, wayside exhibit, video and visitor center. The Unigrid system fosters this mission.

Changes to the program over two decades have been surprisingly limited. Type sizes have become larger to accommodate the growing number of senior citizens. Quality has improved, due in part to changes in production and print technology that permit better color reproduction and registration in maps, photos and artwork. Beyond that, Unigrid has helped the Publications Division clarify its mission and focus on improving content, organization and overall quality. While today's brochures may look much like their predecessors at first glance, close examination uncovers a brochure that uses text, graphic elements and maps to communicate more and communicate it in a more dynamic and compelling way.

Defining the future office
Perhaps the most notable shift in office design. Change is ongoing. Functions and processes continue to evolve, affecting the number, expertise and deployment of employees. Cross-functional teams are creating a need for interim offices and team meeting spaces. Managers need to be able to move people around and facilitate contact with a variety of co-workers.

If flexibility heads the list of requirements for the office of the future, the need to provide the tools - read technology - employees need, adequate computing power, voice and data communications are not far behind. There are other changes that need to be considered as well in designing an office today. New computer technology is making large file storage areas obsolete and diminishing the need for dedicated computer rooms. The same technology is also determining more efficient and cost-effective ways to monitor and maintain building systems.

The recognition that environment does indeed affect productivity has produced an increase in people-related requirements for new office design. People need to feel safe (security), to be able to work without worrying about their children (day care), to be in a space that values them and the work they perform (windows and light).

Tenant needs and civic demands
These were the needs the Oakland Federal Building had to meet to represent the latest thinking in office design. But they were not the only considerations. In addition to accommodating general changes in how work is accomplished today, the OFB had to meet specific requirements of the 26 federal agencies - ranging from 10 employees to 1,200 - that are now in residence. Among these requirements were conference facilities and a civic auditorium, not to mention courtrooms and support facilities for the U.S. District Court, all somewhat separate from the main building for security reasons.

The Oakland Federal Building was also charged with revitalizing downtown Oakland. It was to be a building for the future, but it was situated in an historic district, straddling a major pedestrian walk-way and near a neighborhood of Victorian homes. In fact, the city donated the land as a means of furthering its economic development plan to make Oakland an administrative center for both public and private sectors.

With such an ambitious program, the GSA turned to Kaplan/McLaughlin/Diaz (KMD), the San Francisco-based architectural firm most noted for its hospital work but chosen by the GSA for its familiarity with a variety of public facilities and for its stylistic adaptability.

Why the OFB works
KMD was an apt choice. The Oakland Federal Building is a success in the eyes of the federal employees who work there, the GSA and the managers of tenant agencies. The city of Oakland has embraced it. Its pyramid-topped towers have transformed the skyline, creating a figurative as well as literal gateway to the city.

The building's success as a work environment begins on the outside. Who wouldn't want to go to work in a beautiful building? Even the approach is attractive; the entrance is flanked by two five-story wings, one housing the court system, the other home to the auditorium and conference space. The fifth floor features joint-use space: a walkway connecting both towers, low- and high-rise elevator cross-overs, as well as day care, cafeteria and restaurant facilities. Throughout the building attention has been paid to creating an attractive environment, from excellent lighting to attractive colors and furnishings.

An unusual raised floor system
Needed flexibility is achieved in a variety of ways. The most unusual is the raised floor system beneath which all voice, computer and power cables are carried. The floor tiles include interface modules incorporating all connections. These can be moved where desired, restricted only by the density of the power distribution grid established when the cable is first laid beneath the floor. As a result, where offices or desks are located is not restricted by fixed electrical or telephone outlets.

When the plug-in floor modules are used in conjunction with system work stations, the flexibility to customize work space is enhanced still further. Replacing fixed walls with modular furniture not only minimizes build-out time and expense, it limits reconfiguration expenses to the labor required to design a new space plan and move the modules. Built-in desks, shelves and drawers minimize furniture to be moved, and systems furniture provides flexible lighting, power and phone connections through a single snap-together juncture with the floor module.

The Internal Revenue Service, which employs 1,200 people and occupies almost all of the South tower, has taken greatest advantage of the building's adaptability. Like many government agencies, the IRS contracts and expands periodically as Congress dictates. Currently closing, downsizing and relocating offices, the IRS has relocated employees and reconfigured portions of its space several times already.

The moves have been easy to accomplish because of the ability to reshape the layout of each floor. Among the special considerations: high computing needs of some groups, differences in the ratio of workstations to employees (field people who are out of the office frequently have 20 percent fewer stations than personnel), denser interface grids in areas occupied by telephone representatives.

Horizontal and vertical links
Flexibility in the use of the Oakland Federal Building as a whole is also provided by strong vertical and, on selected floors, strong horizontal links to adjoining work space. Stairs between floors are not claustrophobic connectors but wide, glass-enclosed spaces with views to the outside; they are meant to be used, to encourage passage from one floor to another.

Recognizing that the size of many government agencies might sometime dictate the need for a single employer to have space in both towers, the architects of the Oakland Federal Building connected the 13th and 14th floors of the North and South towers with a glass-enclosed bridge that is one of the building's most distinctive features.

The towers themselves also play important functional roles. The primary office space is on floors 6-18, each of which has approximately 20,000 square feet. This is much smaller than the floor plate of many federal buildings, but it permits lease depths much more consistent with those offered by private developers. The result, especially when walls are kept to a minimum, as in the IRS offices, is a pleasant work environment filled with natural light that offers numerous window views.

Behind-the-scenes features
Behind the visible attributes of the OFB are features that also make an important contribution to the building's functionality. Building and security systems are automated and easily monitored. Security is a particular concern since the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. The OFB incorporates numerous safety features like closed circuit surveillance, drop-down grills in key parking areas, key card entry to stairwells and underground parking, and electronic monitoring at key entry points.

The Oakland Federal Building has now been occupied for nearly three years. It has delivered what it promised. When it was built, it cost slightly more than standard construction. As is true with any building, there are things the GSA would do differently. The 300-seat auditorium and conference space has proved so popular with tenants that additional conference rooms have already been added. Sign- age, although esthetically pleasing, is not as clear or posted as frequently as it could be. The pyramid roof shape, although a striking contributor to the Oakland skyline, does not permit the installation of the satellite or microwave dishes that could generate savings in communications costs.

Hindsight aside, there is general agreement within the GSA and resident agencies that taxpayers' dollars have been invested well. Current estimates suggest that the IRS is saving close to $500,000 annually in office reconfiguration expenses alone. KMD has begun a study for the GSA to quantify savings and hopes to confirm that good design yields quantifiable productivity improvements as well. Until the study is completed, the OFB's success is best expressed in human terms by a judge interviewed for a post-occupancy video, "This is a happy building. People like to come to work here."