When city officials in Elmsford, N.Y. wanted to expand their town’s library in 2003, they needed public approval to do it. Slide Show Related Links: Best Of 2009 They got the approval they needed – but just barely. “The winning vote was by 60 votes, out of a 1,200-person referendum,” said Salvatore Coco, a principal with Beatty Harvey Coco, the architects on the project. “It was controversial because it was the biggest public project the town has ever done.” The original building, completed in 1968 in modern Brutalist style, was retained and gutted for an open-space area for young adult

In order to maintain clean drinking water for Upstate New York communities whose system had long been polluted by a General Electric manufacturing plant, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was forced to look elsewhere. Related Links: Best Of 2009 The $10 million Hudson River PCBs Alternative Drinking Water Supplies project brought potable water from Troy, N.Y. to Waterford and Halfmoon and a carbon filtration system to Stillwater – all in New York – to ensure residents had clean drinking water while crews dredged the Hudson River to remove 1.3-million pounds of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). “We’re providing a safe source of

When OTG Management was awarded a contract by JetBlue in late February 2008 to create the concession area of the airline’s new terminal at John F. Kennedy Airport, their goal was to get customers to see the OTG philosophy: “We don’t operate airport restaurants; we operate restaurants that happen to be in airports.” Related Links: Best Of 2009 The airline was asking for nine full-service restaurants, three coffee shops, six bar/lounges, a food court, and a gourmet market – all keeping with the hip, modern feel of the terminal itself. The $32 million project was completed in October 2008 and

Clock management is a critical football skill. Hard-fought games come down to decisions based on minutes left in the fourth quarter. But quarterbacks and coaches are never asked, midway through the game, to finish up a quarter early. Related Links: Best Of 2009 That’s essentially what the New York Jets asked their project team to do about a year into construction of the team’s new corporate home and training center in Florham Park, N.J. – finish nearly three months earlier than the original schedule in order to move in before the 2008 season. The team promised to deliver, evoking the

When Yale University decided to expand its facilities and programming for international affairs, which brought distinguished global leaders to New Haven, Conn., officials said they wanted a facility that matched the prestige of the guests who would meet there. Out of that plan came the new Maurice R. Greenberg Conference Center, a $14 million, 14,000-sq-ft green building that is linked by a glazed arcade to the historic Betts House (built in 1868 and restored in 2002), which is home to many of Yale’s international affairs centers and programs. Related Links: Best Of 2009 Designed by Robert A.M. Stern Architects of

The new $12.5 million Melrose Commons Site 5 in the South Bronx, N.Y., is expected to bring LEED-Platinum sustainability to affordable housing. Related Links: Best Of 2009 “It’s a nice thing to do for a segment of the population that is least able to afford it,” says Les Bluestone, co-founder of Blue Sea Development of New York, which has been building exclusively green since 2000. Danois Architects, New York, and Equus Design, Belmont, Mass., designed the building, which consists of one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments, storage and laundry rooms, and a community room. Blue Sea Construction of Huntington, N.Y., built

The $119 million home of the Evelyn H. Lauder Breast Center of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer & Imaging Center is designed to meet the changing medical and social requirements for diagnosing and treating breast cancer. Related Links: Best Of 2009 The 16-story, 240,000-sq.-ft. facility offers a full range of state-of-the-art diagnostic imaging and outpatient treatment services along with cancer prevention and support services under one roof. Housed in the same facility are offices and research facilities for MSKCC’s team of breast cancer specialists and laboratory scientists. Located on Second Ave. between 65th and 66th Streets, the Center includes a pharmacy and

The $125 million Vivian and Seymour Milstein Family Heart Center rose from a sloping courtyard between New York-Presbyterian Hospital’s Milstein Hospital Building at 165th Street in Manhattan and the Herbert Irving Pavilion and will provide advanced cardiac care to patients. Related Links: Best Of 2009 “The hospital keeps expanding and growing as demands for providing health care to the community change,” says owner’s representative Peter Romano, principal of Peter Romano and Co. of Pelham, N.Y. “It’s a signature building.” Structural engineer Thornton Tomasetti of New York incorporated three intriguing facades: a climate wall, a glass-enclosed atrium and a cable net

Cooper Union’s goal to build an iconic, green academic building is fully realized in Thom Mayes’ stunning new structure at 41 Cooper Square. Related Links: Best Of 2009 The $150 million, nine-story facility features a double skin façade with a sculpted layer of perforated stainless steel wrapped around a glass and aluminum window wall. Inside a 20-ft. wide grand staircase surrounded by an undulating lattice ascends four stories through a sky-lit atrium. Housed within the new building are the Albert Nerken School of Engineering and Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences along with facilities for the School of Art and

The roadway that snakes its way between Brooklyn and Queens is one of New York City’s busiest and is notorious for its congestion and high accident rates. The most recent in a series of BQE rehabilitation projects, completed in December 2008, reconstructed the dilapidated, serpentine, section of the highway between 61st St. and Broadway in Queens at a cost of $129 million. Related Links: Best Of 2009 Improvements included resurfacing/replacing pavement, realigning the roadway, widening lanes, creating breakdown shoulders and constructing a highway exchange at Broadway. Twelve bridges were rehabilitated including replacement of the superstructures on six of the spans.