Multi-Use Facility Integrates Building-Wide Control and Automation

The rooftop at The Station at Othello Park features RTI’s eightbutton RK1 customizable keypad.

Located in one of the most vibrant neighborhoods of Seattle, the Station at Othello Park is a large 420,000-square-foot, mixed-use facility offering 351 luxury studio, one-, and two-bedroom apartments, in addition to 18,000 square-feet of retail space. Adjacent to the Othello Station on Sound Transit’s Link Light Rail line, and bordering the 7.6-acre Othello Park and Playground, the new development offers a truly urban experience and promotes a “green” lifestyle for residents. It also offers them a number of amenity spaces for their enjoyment, each complete with its own AV system.

Controlling multiple AV systems across such a large property had the potential to become a time consuming task for the leasing manager. To keep it simple, owner and developer Othello Partners envisioned a seamless control system that would turn every component on and off automatically at the beginning and end of each day. In addition, residents would be provided with easy-to-use local control over the systems from each amenity space, while the leasing manager would have buildingwide control over all systems from the office. To make its vision a reality, Othello Partners called on The Music Room, a division of Lynwood-based Protection and Communications Inc. For the property, The Music Room relied exclusively on control solutions from RTI.

“We’ve been an RTI dealer for almost eight years, and they have allowed us to accomplish some pretty amazing things for our customers,” said Daniel Hunt, designer/salesman for The Music Room. “The Othello Partners had several demanding requirements for this system, and whether it was controlling the gas shut-off on the roof-top deck or having building-wide control from a single touchpanel, we were able to say ‘we can do that.’”

An RK10 touchpanel controller in the leasing office at The Station at Othello Park was chosen for its 10.2-inch TFT LCD and fully customizable interface.

The Station’s leasing office/lobby area features an AV system, security control panel, and a large gas fireplace. In addition, the building has four amenity spaces: the roof-top deck, the exercise room, the media room, and an amenity room. Each amenity space has its own AV system, with internet radio streamed from the Denon receiver in the leasing office, and offers localized control for residents. The amenity room is controlled with RTI’s K4 6.4-inch color LCD in-wall touchpanel controller, while control on the rooftop comes in the form of RTI’s eight-button RK1 customizable keypad. The media room and exercise room are both controlled with RTI’s 2.4-inch RK2 touchscreen keypad.

In addition to local control, The Music Room utilized multiple RTI PCM-8 port control modules wired to an RTI CB-8 connecting block to enable control over all the building’s systems. An RK10 touchpanel controller in the leasing office was chosen for its 10.2-inch TFT LCD and fully customizable interface.

An RK10 touchpanel controller in the leasing office at The Station at Othello Park was chosen for its 10.2-inch TFT LCD and fully customizable interface.

Every morning, the XP-8 automatically turns on all systems throughout the building and streams internet radio to each amenity space. At night, it automatically turns them all off. Furthermore, with the XP-8 and RK10, the manager on duty is able to view each system’s status feedback throughout the day, such as security, audio source and volume, and override the systems if necessary.

“We haven’t had a single complaint about the control system since the Station officially opened in April 2011. The building already houses a number of tenants and they all find the systems easy to use,” Hunt added. “And the Othello Partners have been thrilled. The biggest ‘wow factor’ for them is that it runs the building automatically. A lot of programming time and design went into this project, and the end result is that every component knows when and how to turn on and off. It just works, and in the control business, that is exactly what you hope for.”

Jeremy J. Glowacki is editorial director of Residential Systems.