SM&W Contribution
Shen Milsom & Wilke (SM&W) provided acoustical and audiovisual consulting expertise for the Long Island Railroad Train Hall Renovation Phase II – Concourse Improvements at New York Penn Station. In conjunction with a fire alarm engineering subconsultant, SM&W designed the mass notification system for Phase II of the Long Island Railroad 33rd Street Concourse Renovation. The mass notification system designed incorporates a combined customer information public address system for train announcements and a NFPA-72 compliant mass notification system for emergency announcements and the audible portion of the fire alarm system. SM&W’s acoustics and audiovisual teams collaborated with our fire alarm sub-consultant and the client’s fire alarm engineer to deliver a system that exceeds the performance code and MTA minimum intelligibility requirements.
SM&W’s acoustics team developed a 3-D computer acoustical model of the train concourse to evaluate the proposed loudspeaker design in terms of speech intelligibility of announcements, as well as the acoustic performance of the proposed material finishes impact on reverberation time. Using the acoustic model, SM&W was able to verify design criteria and performance requirements prior to construction. Additionally, SM&W provided acoustic recommendations for the Station Master’s Office, including conference rooms, private offices, and back-of-house spaces.
The project’s biggest challenge was working in Penn Station, the busiest train station in the Western Hemisphere, while the station remained operational throughout construction. This was accomplished by implementing a demolition wall. While the head house was demolished in the 1960s, much of the underground areas and infrastructure that serve the LIRR 33rd Street Concourse were built in 1910. The project’s goals of congestion relief and safety improvement were aided by 15K SF in public space expansion, congestion and ADA improvements.