Most Recent News at RTA

RTA congratulates Architect Joey Bahnsen, AIA, NCARB for being named a 2022 ENR—ACE Outstanding Mentor by ACE Mentor Program of America and Engineering News-Record. Joey was one of five Outstanding Mentors from a field of 85 nominees from chapters across the country. The award recognizes contributions by ACE Mentors to students, fellow mentors, and affiliates that epitomize the dedication and effectiveness of ACE’s over 4,100 mentors. Each of the 2022 Outstanding Mentors has received a student scholarship to be named after them, supported by Engineering News-Record and its parent company BNP Media. Joey received the award at a ceremony held in Washington D.C. at the ACE Mentor Program Board of Directors meeting. Outstanding Mentors also attended the C.I.R.T. National Design Competition.

Joey has been involved in the ACE Program since his participation as a high school student. His passion for the program, which introduces high school students to the fields of architecture, interior design, structural engineering, civil engineering, HVAC construction, and general contracting, led him to work with Colorado Springs District 11 to bring it to Palmer High School for the 2021-2022 school year, the first time the ACE Mentor Program of Colorado has had a program in Colorado Springs.

Visit https://www.acementor.org/mentors-volunteers/outstanding-mentors to read more about his contribution to this unique program and all 2022 ENR-ACE Outstanding Mentor recipients.

Two RTA-GE Johnson design-build projects were recognized as the best in their categories at the 2022 DBIA Rocky Mountain Region award ceremony. The High Altitude Research Laboratory atop Pikes Peak won Best Government / Municipal Project, and the projects for Canon City Schools - the Canon City Middle School Addition and Renovation and the new Washington Elementary School - won Best Education Project, marking the third in a row that an RTA-designed project has won the Education category!

Thank you to these incredible design and construction teams and our clients who make these great design-build projects possible! 

📷 courtesy of GE Johnson

Check out this month's issue of Colorado Construction & Design magazine for a great feature on Peak Vista Community Health Centers' new location in downtown Colorado Springs. This full-service health center provides expanded services for those at risk of or currently experiencing, homelessness, as well as care for a quickly growing number of residents and their families near downtown.

Read more here!

Harrison High School, previously renovated by RTA in Harrison District 2, is the fourth school in Colorado to be awarded the status of AVID National Demonstration School after an extensive validation process. The AVID Program (Achievement Via Individual Determination) provides students with opportunities to be college and career ready, and Harrison High School joins an elite group of only 200 National Demonstration Schools in the U.S.

Congratulations Panthers! Learn more here. 👇

Taco 'bout a party! Happy (late) Cinco de Mayo from the RTA office!

It’s that time of year! The Colorado Springs Business Journal is holding its annual Best in Business awards. RTA Architects is proud to serve our community and would appreciate your vote here.

Voting ends May 13^th.

Did you know that buildings generate nearly 40% of annual global CO2 emissions? As architects, we have a unique opportunity to make a big difference in combating climate change. Building materials and processes emit carbon dioxide throughout the life cycle of a building and related infrastructure. RTA is committed to implementing sustainable design practices and sourcing environmentally-friendly materials across our projects to help minimize embodied carbon emissions for a healthier environment. Click here to learn more about embodied carbon and how design and construction can drive significant change.

The sun was shining on Peak Vista Community Health Center Downtown as staff, community members, and Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers gathered to celebrate the opening of Peak Vista's newest facility. This new health center will offer medical, dental, and behavioral health services to those at risk of, or who are currently experiencing, homelessness and provide care to a quickly growing number of residents and their families in downtown Colorado Springs. The health center will see its first patients Friday, April 22.

The Pueblo Community Health Center East Side Clinic was a recent feature in Healthcare Snapshots, and we'd love to give you a peek into the interior of this state-of-the-art medical building.

Calming. Natural. Timeless. These adjectives describe the mood that the East Side clinic wanted to achieve with its interior environment. To support these ideas, we looked to nature. Biophilia is the idea that people innately connect to nature; therefore, an environment design based on nature will reflect a mood of calm, nature, and even be timeless.

Through color, each floor represents a different element of nature - plants/green/first, animals/yellow/second and sky/blue/third. The colors also help with wayfinding to tell patients where they are just by the accent colors they see. Accent-colored carpet also denotes the exit path for the clients within the clinic areas. Textural carpet, with different levels of the accent color, adorns the open areas. The pattern in the flooring utilizes fractals, a pattern found in nature that repeats itself randomly at different scales. This introduces nature into the space with the same innate feeling that nature evokes in us.

The result is a space that makes the people feel comfortable and relaxed when they enter, and then helps to set them on the path toward recovery as they leave. 

Read more about this project here.

Frigid temperatures didn’t dim our excitement in celebrating the for exciting milestones for two new schools designed by the joint venture of RTA and MOA Architecture for Pueblo School District 60, Franklin School of Innovation and Sunset Park Elementary School. A big shout out to Nunn Construction for efficiently moving the festivities indoors! These energy-efficient BEST Grant funded schools are scheduled to open for the 2023 school year.

Read more about the groundbreakings here.