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New York Avenue frontage. The building at far left occupies
the only part of the block not included in the project.
The 19 historic commercial buildings that were
integrated into the new structure date from the pre-
Civil War period to the 1930s. SBA’s design for the
project didn’t just save those buildings’ facades—in
most cases, their entire masonry shells were preserved.
To create uninterrupted stretches of historic buildings
and avoid cases of solitary historic structures looking
like isolated, pitiful remnants, two of the historic
buildings (both on New York Avenue) were dismantled
and reconstructed farther down the block, while
two others (one on New York, the other on L Street)
were carefully jacked up, put onto rails, and then slid
into new positions. That New York Avenue building,
weighing 880 tons, set an apparent local record for the
heaviest building moved in that manner—a record that
was then broken when the L Street building, weighing
1,100-tons, was similarly shifted into its new position.
“In order to move the two large buildings only
once, innovative engineering and architecture
techniques were required,” the architects said. “New
permanent foundations were created by installing
concrete-and-steel caissons supporting 30-inch-thick
concrete podium slabs in the final locations. From
there, temporary steel bracing was installed throughout
the buildings, which were then raised by a hydraulic
jack system, lifted off their original foundations, and
moved to the new locations via a temporary steel roll
beam rail system. Hydraulic push rams then slowly slid
the buildings into their final locations and lower walls
were rebuilt.”
Project: 655 New York Avenue, NW,
Washington, DC

Architect: Shalom Baranes Associates
Landscape Architect/MEP Engineer/Civil Engineer: Dewberry
Structural Engineer: KCE Structural Engineers
Envelope Consultant: Simpson Gumpertz & Heger (SGH)
Architectural Historian: EHT Traceries
Preservation Consultant: Aeon Preservation Services
Life Safety Consultant: Jensen Hughes
General Contractor: DAVIS
655 New York Avenue, as seen from the corner of 6th Street and New York.
All photos © Mary Ford Parker, except as noted
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