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Compuware's new HQ starts to rise

Date Posted: August 17 2001

The $350 million Compuware Headquarters building, which will reshape the heart of Detroit, is shaping up nicely, thanks to the work of the building trades and general contractor Walbridge-Aldinger.

"We're right on schedule, and down the road we expect to be ahead of schedule," said Walbridge Group Vice President E.G. Clawson. "We're very happy with the progress; the tradespeople out here have been terrific."

On July 16, the structure's first structural steel was set into place, and the trades wasted no time putting up more in the days immediately afterward. All told, Bristol Steel workers will install 8,700 tons of iron in the 15-story building, with the goal of putting up one floor a week

"We're extraordinarily pleased to reach this milestone," said Denise Knobblock, Compuware's executive vice president, human resources and administration. "This steel is a visible sign of our commitment to creating a wonderful facility for our employees, customers and the community in downtown Detroit."

The Compuware headquarters building will stand atop the old Kern Block, just south of the old Hudson's building, whose vacated area is becoming the Premier parking deck. The headquarters building, which includes 2,300 spaces, will be 15 stories tall and roughly one million square feet, nearly 60,000 of which will be retail. The new headquarters building will consolidate the operations of nine existing Compuware facilities in metropolitan Detroit,

The building's front entrance will be at the corner of Woodward and Monroe streets, the site of numerous generations of buildings in Detroit and the epicenter of the Campus Martius Project. Those generations have also left numerous foundations, and many of those along the perimeter of the new skyscraper will be kept, mainly for earth retention.

Clawson said about 220 of the building's 350 caissons are complete, and one of the headaches of the project so far has been trying to bore through some of the buried foundations.

Surprisingly, iron scrap from the construction of the People Mover is giving the drills the most difficulty. The rear of the Compuware building will be "gingerly" built to enclose part of the existing People Mover track, Clawson said.

Little of interest has been dug up during the excavation process, Clawson said, with the exception of a previously unknown water main that was broken and repaired.

About 200 construction workers are currently on the project, said Walbridge Project Manager Dean Reader. "The most difficult thing we're dealing with here is the tight space," he said. "You're looking at our layout area - there isn't any. So we're off-loading the steel a lot during the night shift, so we don't interfere with traffic and so we can use the cranes to put it up during the day." More than 3,000 Compuware employees will begin occupying the building in 2002, with the remaining employees arriving in 2003.


FOOTINGS FOR a ramp on the ground floor of the Compuware site are set by laborers Glen Stagheit of Local 334 and Jeff Deller of Local 1076. They were working for Colasanti. Operating the pump is Alan Kirchoff of Operating Engineers Local 324.


A COLUMN AT the Compuware site is set by Bret Shannon Jr., Kevin Oliver and Todd Masters of Iron Workers Local 25.