DPR Construction is building Georgia Tech's Fanning Center as part of the school's athletic upgrades. The 100,000 sq. ft. facility will enhance athlete performance with advanced technology and eco-friendly design elements. The project aims to finish by spring 2026, maintaining campus activities during construction. Subcontractors and efficient equipment maintenance are key in the build.
Danny Karnik Photography photo
Workers maneuver into place the beam used for the topping off ceremony of the Thomas A. Fanning Student-Athlete Performance Center at Georgia Tech University.
As part of Georgia Institute of Technology's multi-million-dollar upgrade of its athletic infrastructure through its "Full Steam Ahead" fundraising initiative, DPR Construction is building the Thomas A. Fanning Student-Athlete Performance Center (Fanning Center) at the Bobby Dodd Stadium at Hyundai Field in Atlanta.
Work on the stadium's northeast corner began in March 2024 and should be finished in the spring of 2026, with the building open to the public shortly afterward.
The Fanning Center is replacing the concrete Brutalist–style former Edge/Rice Center with a building that is technologically advanced yet sensitive to the surrounding buildings. The new center will include a significant area of glass, which extends from the exterior of the stadium to a section of seating overlooking the football field's end zone.
S/L/A/M Collaborative (SLAM) designed the 100,000-sq.-ft. building to improve the performance of Georgia Tech athletes. The Fanning Center will include spaces for sports medicine, athlete strength and conditioning, academic support, nutrition support and a sports science lab that employs pro-model motion tracking to analyze athlete performance data.
There is also space dedicated to Georgia Tech football — meeting spaces and coaches' offices.
The building is named in honor of Georgia Tech alumnus Thomas A. Fanning, who holds three degrees from the institute and served as its president and CEO of the Southern Co. from 2010-2023.
SLAM completed the design in 2024. DPR Construction is the contractor.
"The building is on a very tight site that abuts two existing operational buildings," said Marc Clear, a SLAM principal. "Connecting to these buildings to improve circulation on game days and every day was paramount. The building is designed to seamlessly connect to both buildings at roughly 15 different locations. This design dictated an unusual footprint that is structurally challenging as well."
"The building has a high-performing envelope in order to operate efficiently and reduce energy usage for heating and cooling the building," he added. "Connections to these buildings had to be closely coordinated to maintain the performance of the envelope as well as water tightness."
The Fanning Center has a projected lifespan of 50-plus years.
One of the materials being used is cross-laminated timber (CLT), which the APA — The Engineered Wood Association describes as a "large-scale, prefabricated, solid engineered wood panel." CLT is used for two areas of the Fanning Center roof.
"CLT is relatively new and gaining popularity," Clear said. "Benefits include a structural system that is beautiful when left exposed, bringing the warmth of wood to the interior and exterior of the building without requiring an additional applied finish material. Wood structure is also very environmentally friendly as sustainably harvested wood is used that sequesters carbon from the atmosphere, reducing greenhouse gases while requiring significantly less energy to produce and fabricate than traditional steel and concrete building materials."
He added that while the building will not pursue LEED certification, the firm applied the LEED Gold level as a design guide.
Those features include stormwater capture for irrigation; a high-performing envelope allowing HVAC systems to operate based on ventilation requirements rather than heating and cooling, resulting in reduced energy use; and concrete carbon reduction measures such as the reclamation and reuse of demolished building steel, cutting carbon dioxide emissions by more than 25,000 kilograms.
Steel from the portion of Bobby Dodd Stadium's upper deck that was demolished to make room for the Fanning Center was repurposed into the new structure.
That stadium was built in 1913. The construction of the Fanning Center is not interfering with its operations.
A benchmark was attained on March 7 when DPR Construction topped out the Fanning Center.
So far, DPR has completed the following: demolition, site utilities, foundations, steel erection and decking. The remaining elements are CLT/roofing, exterior finishes, interior finishes and hardscape/landscapes.
The construction process is trying to minimize the disruption of campus activities.
"One of the biggest construction challenges is not disturbing the day-to-day activities of the Georgia Tech Athletics Department," said Heather Taylor, DPR's project manager. "DPR Construction works closely with Georgia Tech Athletics staff to ensure all impacts are communicated far in advance so that the teams' schedules are kept as consistent as possible. The work on site is running smoothly and on schedule."
The demolition of the existing structure required careful planning.
"Our team took a strategic, phased approach to the demolition," Taylor said. "We tackled the Edge Building first, before moving on to the northern portion of the stadium. The last phase was the demolition of the Rice Building."
The whole demolition process took approximately eight months.
Approximately 40 tons of the steel removed from the stadium was repurposed into the Fanning Center structure.
The demolition had DPR crews use a Liebherr MK 140-5.1E crane for the stadium dismantling and, for the building demolition, four Link-Belt 300 X4 crawler excavators, a Kobelco SK210LC-11 excavator, a Kobelco SK350LC-10 excavator and other pieces of iron.
With demolition complete, work on the Fanning Center began.
"For the construction of the exterior, there were multiple phases for each side of the building, and each varied depending on the trade," Taylor said. "For the interior construction, each floor was broken up into two phases."
This work involved a Terex SK 415-20 tower crane and MEC Micro 19 scissor lift.
With the Fanning Center topped out, the next steps are the placement of the exterior skin, interior, MEPs, framing, roofing and CLT.
"For exterior skin, we are working from the south side to the east, and then north," Taylor said. "We will finish the project on the west side. For interior MEPs, we started on the first floor and tackled each floor in two separate phases. The big push for this project is to be done with the south exterior before the 2025 football season and hitting the dry in-date is critical to our schedule."
Taylor's DPR management team is Greg Smith, Brad Adams, Zach Brooklere, Josh Matthews, Sarah Rohlsen and Yasir Sadiq.
"Our team works together well," Taylor said. "We balance each other out and step in to help each other when needed. This supportive environment that we foster is the key to our successful projects."
Peak days have 80 DPR Construction and subcontractor employees on site. The subcontractors include Green Circle Demolition, Alan Densmore, Keller, Maxim, Wheeler, Faith, McKenney's, Fitzgerald, PASCO, Chambless, Jollay Masonry, Steel LLC and Place Services.
New materials being brought in include 927 tons of steel and 2,500 cu. yds. of concrete.
DPR's equipment maintenance program is critical to minimizing equipment downtimes.
"We have not run into many wear and tear issues since regular maintenance is always kept up," Taylor said. "If a repair is needed, we can usually have a mechanic/tech on-site within a day, if not the same day. Routine maintenance is called in and performed on-site on a regular basis."
DPR's main equipment partner is OES Equipment.
"OES Equipment is a sister company of DPR Construction," Taylor said. "The connection allows DPR Construction to handle each project smoothly and ensure that equipment being leveraged is reliable to prevent any issues." CEG
Irwin Rapoport
A journalist who started his career at a weekly community newspaper, Irwin Rapoport has written about construction and architecture for more than 15 years, as well as a variety of other subjects, such as recycling, environmental issues, business supply chains, property development, pulp and paper, agriculture, solar power and energy, and education. Getting the story right and illustrating the hard work and professionalism that goes into completing road, bridge, and building projects is important to him. A key element of his construction articles is to provide readers with an opportunity to see how general contractors and departments of transportation complete their projects and address challenges so that lessons learned can be shared with a wider audience.
Rapoport has a BA in History and a Minor in Political Science from Concordia University. His hobbies include hiking, birding, cycling, reading, going to concerts and plays, hanging out with friends and family, and architecture. He is keen to one day write an MA thesis on military and economic planning by the Great Powers prior to the start of the First World War.
Read more from Irwin Rapoport here.
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