Johnson County Library at Lenexa City Center

AVANT ACOUSTICS designed the Audio-Visual systems and Acoustical aspects of the Library located in Lenexa City Center. Because the library was part of the overall development of the relocation of downtown Lenexa, it is the center focus which is connected to many other facilities, including City Hall, a great food hall and shopping. There was a lot of excitement for the project in the community since it provides a much-needed resource to people of all ages.

AVANT ACOUSTICS provided the following services:

• Acoustical Consulting
• Audio-Visual Consulting and Design
• Construction Administration
• System Commissioning

Project Highlights:

AVANT provided room acoustics consultation to establish proper acoustical characteristics for the spaces within the building. This included recommendations relating to the selection of interior surface shapes, finish materials, seating, and other design considerations. AVANT made audio-visual presentation and sound reinforcement systems for all of the common spaces, multiple conference rooms of all sizes as well as staff meeting spaces.

Location: Lenexa, KS
Facilities: Libraries
Client: Hollis + Miller
Designer: Jill Elmers, Emily Jaumard, David Wetzel, Andrew VonFeldt

County Commissioners Broadcast System

The Johnson County Board of County Commissioners meets in the county’s Administration Building. The county recently converted this space into a television broadcast facility so that board meetings and other events could be live broadcast.

AVANT ACOUSTICS provided the following services:

• Broadcast system design
• Audio-visual system design
• Sound reinforcement system design
• On-site system commissioning, including operator training and assistance during the first use

Project Highlights:

The broadcast system includes five high-definition pan-tilt-zoom cameras. The new production video switcher has live streaming capabilities and a control surface that provides both video switching and camera control. A digital video recording device allows for the archival recording of proceedings.

The audio-visual system includes 80-inch displays at the front of the room and personal monitors on the dais. The entire system is controlled by touchpanels with intuitive AVANT-designed interfaces. One touchpanel is located at the clerk’s desk on the dais, and the other, which includes more advanced functions is located in the control room.

Location: Olathe, KS
Facilities: Hearing Room/Television Broadcast Facility
Client: Johnson County, Kansas
Designer: Jill C. Elmers

City of Independence Utilities Building

This $11 million project transformed an empty building on a former hospital campus into a LEED Platinum office building. The 47,500-square-foot space now houses three city departments, a customer service center, and a public meeting space.

This project received the 2017 Kansas City Business Journal Capstone Award.

AVANT ACOUSTICS provided the following services:

• Audio-visual system design
• Sound reinforcement system design
• Digital signage design
• On-site commissioning, including operator training and assistance during the first use

Project Highlights:

AVANT ACOUSTICS designed and commissioned AV presentation, sound reinforcement, and conferencing/recording systems for the large training room and large conference room. Both rooms feature wireless audio-video sharing and collaboration capabilities from personal mobile devices such as phones and tablets.  

In addition, AVANT created simple presentation systems for the smaller conference and training spaces.

Location: Independence, MO
Facilities: Lobby, Conference Rooms, Training Rooms, Community Room
Client: Burns & McDonnell
Designer: Robert G. Ledo

Johnson County Criminalistics Lab

The Johnson County, Kansas, Criminalistics Laboratory is a 62,500 square-foot laboratory and administration office building. This facility includes laboratories for biology, controlled substances, crime scene investigation, digital, and multimedia evidence, firearms, latent prints, and trace evidence. 

The building was designed to the Platinum Level LEED certification. 

AVANT ACOUSTICS provided the following services:

• Room acoustics consultation
• Mechanical noise control recommendations
• Audio-visual system design
• On-site system commissioning

Project Highlights:

The building included an indoor firing range, fume hoods, and an emergency generator, each of which required detailed noise control analyses.  The audio-visual systems were all designed as digital video systems with HDCP compliance.  AVANT ACOUSTICS designed the training rooms’ audio-visual system to include the capability to web stream the training sessions taking place.

Location: Olathe, KS
Facilities: Crime Lab, Offices, Training Rooms
Client: Johnson County, KS
Designer: Jill C. Elmers

Detention Center Noise Control

After receiving complaints about loud, echoing noise in the dayrooms and interview rooms at this detention center, Johnson County contacted AVANT ACOUSTICS for help.

AVANT ACOUSTICS provided the following services:

• Acoustical consulting and noise control
• Comparative acoustical study

Project Highlights:

AVANT ACOUSTICS performed a site visit to measure reverberation times and examine the acoustical characteristics of the spaces. After analyzing the results, AVANT recommended low-cost absorption products for installation on various surfaces in the Dayrooms. These changes were calculated to decrease the reverberation time in the rooms from 6.8 seconds to 1.1 second.

For the Interview Rooms, AVANT determined that the acoustical issues could be solved with an inexpensive off-the-shelf kit that the County could install without the aid of a contractor. The kit included door seals and acoustical wall panels.

Location: New Century, KS
Facilities: Dayrooms, Interview Rooms
Client: Johnson County Facilities Management
Designer: John M. Hodgson

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Emergency Operations Center

The Kansas City District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers recently upgraded their Emergency Operations Center to be a self-supporting environment capable of 24-hour operations. The facility includes the Command Center, a small conference room, offices, kitchen, and restroom/shower facilities.

AVANT ACOUSTICS provided the following services:

• Room acoustics consultation
• Audio-visual presentation and video display systems design
• On-site system commissioning including operator training

Project Highlights:

The Command Center is served by a large video display wall constructed with 24 high-definition video modules to form a 27 x 7.5-foot video canvas.  In the reception lobby, guests are greeted with a 12×1 video ribbon feature.  The video ribbon is remotely managed, and can dynamically accept a variety of content.

In addition to the emergency operations function, the Center also hosts monthly project review board meetings and other related events. AVANT’s design included extremely flexible video display and audio-video conferencing capabilities to support these diverse uses.

Location: Kansas City, MO
Facilities: Emergency Operations Center
Client: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Designer: Robert G. Ledo