Cabled for the future: CH2M HILL engineers a structured solution for higher speeds and future growth - Cover Story

Communications News,  Feb, 2003  by Carol Everett Oliver

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You know a commercial business campus is immense when it has its own phone exchange. When CH2M HILL, multinational professional services firm, moved its four Denver-area operations to a new campus, it also consolidated several thousand direct-dial numbers into a new exchange, procured exclusively for its use. In addition, to assure high-speed, high-bandwidth connectivity, Adam Marsh, the firm's senior systems analyst for LAN and cable plant technologies, led the implementation of an advanced structured-cabling system to handle the firm's complex LAN requirements.

"In a down economy, the best way to manage costs and help protect the firm from future recessions is with office consolidation," notes Marsh, who oversaw the network system from design to implementation. "The majority of our employees reside in local regional offices where our engineers can be located near their customers. The campus contains the firm's main data center that supports the applications our end-users use worldwide. We needed an efficient, high-performance, structured-cabling system to support the firm's information-technology mission."

CH2M HILL is Colorado's largest employee-owned company, providing engineering, construction, operations and related technical services to both public and private clients. The firm's work is concentrated in the areas of water, energy, environment, transportation, telecommunications, construction and industrial facilities.

The new 17-acre campus, which includes three office buildings, and space to build two additional buildings, houses 1,200 Denver employees. As the corporate headquarters, the Denver campus is the technical support center for 10,500 employees in 165 offices worldwide.

The new campus consolidates four previous locations, which oversee worldwide engineering and construction-management services, a new technology solutions center, as well as OMI (Operations Management International), a CH2M HILL company that specializes in operations and maintenance services.

For the high-speed, high-bandwidth connectivity of the campus, Marsh and IDC, a CH2M HILL company, designed a telecommunications infrastructure that included redundant optical fiber between each building, optical fiber and high-speed Category 6e for the buildings' riser cabling, and dual Category 6 cabling to each desk. A Category 3 cabling system interconnects each building for the telephone connectivity.

Ortronics and Berk-Tek [NetClear.sup.GT2] Category 6 and [NetClear.sup.GT3] Category 6e high-performance, end-to-end, structured-cabling systems were the choices for the network, which includes cable, fiber-distribution cabinets, patch panels, patch cords and workstation outlets.

A TEAM APPROACH

Selecting the installation team was a collaborative effort between CH2M HILL and The Weitz Co., the general contractor for the project. Weitz was responsible for bringing a low-voltage contractor on board and performing the construction management. Since the selection of an installation contractor was viewed as mission critical, Weitz involved CH2M HILL and IDC heavily at all levels of the bid and construction process.

"The design documents were very specific with the rack layout and products to be used," notes Marsh. "CH2M HILL has had Ortronics as a company standard at its domestic U.S. locations for five years, so the bidding installers had to make sure their bid corresponded with our distinct requirements."

The Weitz Co., with the approval of Marsh, selected Netversant Denver, a nationally certified installer, to provide the product warranty. Netversant was given a tight construction timeframe, with the bid for the first two buildings approved in January 2002.

The cabling was pulled in March and April 2002 for the first building, which houses OMI and CH2M HILL's regional engineering office. The first building, known as the "south" building, was completed in late July. The second building, known as the "west" building, housing the corporate offices, was completed in late October.

During construction, CH2M HILL's facilities team decided to add another building to house additional staff and also for the new technology solution center, a lab and networking environment meant to showcase technology services related to telecommunications and networking.

"An important factor in meeting the tight timeframes for this project was the ability of the stocking distributor, Graybar, to have necessary cable and connectivity products available when we needed them," states Marsh. "Graybar often had product onsite within five days."

INSTALLING THE CABLE

The first phase of the project was laying the cable and conduit for the outside plant backbone. This consisted of an outer and inner conduit ring throughout the complex, which connected all the buildings. There are four 4-inch conduits, two of which were filled with three 1-1/4-inch innerducts for the fiber and copper. The other two conduits were placed for future use.

Outside plant-rated Category 3 ran between the buildings to connect the voice POTS and T-1 lines from the outside service providers, and also private services between buildings. The campus maintains two points-of-service locations, with telecommunications buildouts from three separate telecom providers to ensure continuous connectivity to the outside world.