Civic & Government
Santa Ana Central Justice Center Courthouse HVAC & Controls
BAS modernization and HVAC retrofit at an active downtown courthouse.
Client
Judicial Council of California
Location
Santa Ana, CA
Service Line
Twenty rooftop units swapped over weekends, the controls rebuilt at night — an occupied Orange County courthouse that never closed.
The cranes only came on weekends.
The cranes only came on weekends. Monday through Friday, the Central Justice Center in Santa Ana was a working Orange County courthouse — so Athena did the heavy lifts, twenty rooftop units out and back in, on Saturdays and Sundays, and saved everything else for after dark. The court opened each morning with its cooling already back on.
The Central Justice Center is an Orange County courthouse owned by the Judicial Council of California — the same client Athena modernized the Pomona courthouse for, again with Kitchell as the owner’s representative. The job replaced the building’s aging rooftop HVAC and rebuilt its controls to the Judicial Council’s BMS standard.
Twenty rooftop units, swapped without closing the court.
Twenty rooftop units, swapped without closing the court. Athena replaced all twenty packaged units, plus seven exhaust fans and a split system, running the cranes on a tight weekend rhythm: Friday to safe off and disconnect, Saturday to pull the old units and set the new ones, Sunday to finalize power and temporary duct, then after-hours through the week to finish the permanent ductwork and connections. Each unit went offline and came back online inside the window, before the courtrooms needed it.
The controls came next. Athena designed and installed a building management system built to the Judicial Council’s standard: a Niagara front-end over Schneider SpaceLogic controllers, with new BACnet thermostats across the air handlers, the split systems brought in for monitoring, and the exhaust fans interlocked to their zones. We also handled the supporting work the older building needed — new duct detectors tied into the fire-alarm system, and thermostats lowered to ADA height. The BMS network wiring went in after five, every weeknight, so the daytime court and the work never got in each other’s way.
By completion, the Central Justice Center had new rooftop HVAC and a controls system that matches the rest of the Judicial Council’s courthouses. The court never changed its hours.
Client: Judicial Council of California. Owner’s Representative / Construction Manager: Kitchell. Delivery: Service Work Order under the JCC Master Contract. Scope: replacement of 20 rooftop packaged units, 7 exhaust fans, and a split system; a building management system built to the JCC’s Niagara standard — Schneider SpaceLogic controllers under a Niagara front-end; new fire-alarm duct detectors; and ADA thermostat work — self-performed by Athena Engineering on night and weekend shifts at an occupied courthouse.
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