Columbia River Maritime Museum - Mariners Hall

A Sustainable Expansion to a Historic Museum

The Columbia River Maritime Museum in Astoria, Oregon, is set to undergo a transformative $30 million expansion, nearly doubling its size to enhance its role as an educational, research, and tourist destination in the Pacific Northwest. The new addition, Mariners Hall, will add 25,000 sqft of exhibit space, showcasing a vast collection of maritime artifacts and historic vessels – and even a US Coast Guard helicopter hanging from the ceiling!

Mariners Hall showcases a curved timber roof that vaults over the exhibition area, providing a visually striking open space that can be seen from the outside through full-height windows. Curved glulam ribs spanning up to 60’ are topped with purlin-plywood panels to create an all-wood roof supported by strategically placed timber and steel columns.

Upper levels and catwalks consist of steel framing and concrete-on-steel deck supported by steel columns and tension rods attached to the roof’s glulam ribs, enabling un-shored construction and providing robust support for various exhibit configurations.

The site is underlain by poor soils, with silts and clays down to 45 ft (13.7 m), so our engineers selected a pile system to prevent building settlement. Steel piles were driven down 50 ft (15 m) to embed into a denser bearing stratum.

Atop the piles sits a reinforced concrete slab that spans up to 22 ft (6.7 m) and steps down in certain locations to accept the museum's full size boat exhibits. The electrical/plumbing for the structure is also embedded in the slab to allow for an open floor plan, expansive exhibits, and a clean timber ceiling. The slab was analyzed using RAM Concept.

Mariners Hall emphasizes an innovative and sustainable approach to structural design, nodding to the history of wood structures on the Museum’s campus, in maritime construction, and throughout the Pacific Northwest.