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Despite Delays, Suburban Halliburton Campus Developments Take Shape

Houston Business Journal, December 25, 2009—by Jennifer Dawson

Then

When completed, Halliburton’s Oak Park campus will accomodate about 3,000 employees.

The Story

Halliburton Co. announces plans to consolidate 5,200 Houston-area employees from five locations into two local sites by 2012.

The energy services company’s plan involves moving the corporate headquarters out of downtown Houston to a 94-acre North Belt Campus near George Bush Intercontinental Airport. Halliburton leases 26,000 square feet in downtown’s 5 Houston Center, and has a second corporate headquarters that opened in 2007 in Dubai.

The North Belt Campus is to include a new research and development facility, two parking garages, cafeteria, child care facility and employee wellness/fitness center.

The company’s second main site is the 41-acre Oak Park Campus that is earmarked for more development. Approximately 1,700 Halliburton employees currently work at the Oak Park Campus at Beltway 8 and Bellaire in the Westchase District. Another 1,000 employees who work in leased space nearby will be joining them as part of the consolidation effort.

Halliburton intends to construct a new 16-story office building, a two-story life center, parking garage, cafeteria and child care facility in Oak Park.

The beefed-up location will be able to accommodate as many as 3,000 employees when completed.

Architectural firm Gensler is designing the new Halliburton campus in Westchase, while D.E. Harvey Builders Inc. is providing preconstruction services related to the planned North Belt Campus redevelopment.

Halliburton’s manufacturing facility in The Woodlands will not be affected by the consolidation.

Now

Although development plans have been delayed by a year, they are still on track, according to the company.

Both the North Belt and Oak Park campuses are moving forward with completion scheduled for 2013, according to an e-mail response from Zelma Branch in Halliburton’s corporate affairs department.

Renderings of each campus, that were previously unavailable, show the extent of the company’s development plans.

Halliburton expects to break ground during the second quarter of 2010 on the North Belt site, which is currently in the design phase, Branch said. Construction will initially target the research and development building, and south parking garage, as well as the life center, which will include a training center, auditorium, conference center, boardroom, cafeteria and fitness center.

Construction is scheduled to start on the North Belt administration building during the fourth quarter of 2010, Branch said.

Yahoo!Finance data shows the publicly traded company has 51,000 employees worldwide, 10 percent fewer than in April, but Halliburton officials say the number of local employees being shifted to the new campuses has not changed.

Halliburton spokeswoman Diana Gabriel says 6,000 jobs were eliminated worldwide in 2009. With those staff reductions, the company has 5,000 Houston-area employees.

When the North Belt campus is complete, it will have approximately 1.1 million square feet of space and be able to accommodate 2,200 employees, while the Oak Park Campus will have approximately 1 million square feet of space.

Oak Park buildings being planned include the office structure, a building for the fitness and day-care centers and a life center, which will have a large auditorium, training center and cafeteria.

Halliburton’s new buildings will seek Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, or LEED, certification from the U.S. Green Building Council for sustainable development. Branch said construction plans call for energy-efficient building envelopes and systems, water-saving devices, the use of recycled materials and minimized waste in the construction process.