Restore, Expand and Improve

Formerly known as The Edmonton Professional Building, Intact Insurance Building has been a landmark for approximately half a century and now plays a key role in the revitalization of Edmonton's "Main Street."

RJC designed the original building in the 1960’s. It was one of the first high-rise structures designed by our Edmonton team and when the time came to restore it, they called us.

Facing south along Jasper Avenue, half a block east from 109th Street, now stands a modern 11-story glass office building. This leading-edge, cast-in-place concrete building incorporates design, construction, and operational practices that combine healthy, high-quality, and high-performance advantages with reduced environmental impacts.

The original building was stripped down to the structure and completely redeveloped. Only the superstructure and the three existing elevators were retained. Demolition included the exterior envelope in its entirety, all interior partitions on and above the main floor, the main floor exterior retail façades, and all building mechanical and electrical infrastructure.

The original building area was approximately 130,000 square feet. Through strategic expansions of the office tower and parking areas, the final building area is now 236,000 square feet.

Read Jones Christoffersen was the Prime Consultant for the main floor parking and underground parking structure restoration program. Two levels of underground parking and the surface parking structure were expanded and completely retrofitted to ensure structural integrity and an additional 175 parking stalls were created.

The restoration program included the removal and re-construction of the main floor parking, extensive re-construction of the underground parking levels, and the installation of new mechanical and electrical systems.

RJC is pleased to celebrate another first. Intact is the first building in Edmonton to register for Gold LEED®-CS (Core and Shell) certification with the United States Green Building Council (USGBC), which covers base building elements, such as the structure, envelope, and building-level systems, such as central HVAC. LEED-registered buildings offer a healthier indoor environment, while ensuring that the building footprint is reduced. 

This project proves redevelopment is a viable option and can be more cost-effective and sustainable than total demolition.

Designing a healthy workplace

•    Exterior glazing by VisionWall reduces sound transmission, eliminates perimeter heating requirements, and decreases energy consumption.

•    High-efficiency fixtures reduce the building's use of municipal drinking water by over 50% and reduce the burden on the city's infrastructure.

•    Rainwater is collected from all levels of roof resulting in an estimated saving of over 750,000 liters of water per year, the equivalent of providing drinking and cooking water to approximately 15 households of four people.

•    Over 2,500 tonnes of concrete and over 175 tonnes of steel were recycled from the project site. High fly-ash concrete was used to reduce the amount of cement, and thereby energy used in its production. 

•    Regional building materials reduced transportation costs, while also supporting the local economy.

•    The economical yet efficient design uses all-air system with no perimeter heating thanks to the installation of a high-performance building envelope.