JACKSON - A mixture of the old and the new awaits some 1,350 Consumers Energy employees as their $70 million new headquarters building nears completion.

The new is a 13-story, 360,000-square-foot office tower that stands as a modern, commanding presence in the east end of the downtown area. The old is an attached 60,000 square-foot post office that was built in 1932, which is being modernized and incorporated into the project.

"We're in the last-minute, panic mode of activity," said a smiling James Legault, project manager for Consumers Energy. The first move into the new headquarters will take place the first of March. Employees of the gas and electric utility will be moving out of four existing locations, including the company's current headquarters in Dearborn.

"Yes, we're making a statement with the building," Legault said of the imposing tower. "But what's most important is this building gives us modern office space at a cost-effective price that will give us infinite flexibility and optimize the space that's used per employee." Granger Construction is acting as construction manager on the project, which is currently employing some 150 building trades workers.

Ground was broken on the new tower in April 2001, 69 years after the Old Main post office opened on the site. Unused for a number of years, the old post office was incorporated into the new project, and will include a conference center, training rooms and a kitchen and cafeteria.

Mike Kissane, Granger's project manager for the post office portion of the project, said the building offered the typical challenges and unknowns of a 70-year-old building renovation: the need to safely remove lead paint, the extent of the asbestos removal, and having to make adjustments when a 10-inch-thick concrete slab is found, rather than the expected 6-inch slab.

He said the old post office offered a pleasant surprise two months ago: underneath the decades-old grime in the lobby was a beautifully painted ceiling, which only needed a few touch-ups. And you'll never guess what they used to wipe off the dirt. "They used bread to clean it," Kissane said, "thousands of loaves of bread."

Before construction began the cleanup for the entire headquarters complex was a little more extensive, and most assuredly didn't involve bread. The "brownfield" location near the Grand River was the site of a number of industrial buildings that were built over the years. When the snow is gone and with some nice landscaping and the erection of parking decks, there will be no trace of what had occupied the 10-acre site.

The office tower's exteriors are curtainwall and precast concrete. The building is a structural concrete frame supported by drilled piers. Inside, adaptability is the name of the game, where space in the building can be easily transformed by ever-changing business and market strategies. It would be easy, for example, to install a call center where none existed.

"Maybe the biggest challenge has been the fast-track, design-build aspect of the project," said Granger's Glenn Simon, the project manager for the main tower. "We started construction before the design was even halfway complete. But things have turned out OK."

Consumers Energy, the principal subsidiary of CMS Energy Corporation, has been headquartered in Jackson since the utility's inception in 1886. It is the nation's fifth-largest natural gas utility and the country's 10th largest electric utility. Consumers Energy provides electric and natural gas service to more than six million of the state's 9.5 million residents in all 68 counties of the Lower Peninsula.

Perhaps appropriately, the utility will be using both natural gas (for heat) and electricity (to run the chillers) to set the climate inside its new headquarters building.

"It's been great working with Granger and the building trades," said Legault. "They haven't missed a major milestone, we've had a safe job, and we're within the budget. As far as the workers go, I would build a building with them anytime. They're that good."

OPERATING A LOADER in front of the new Consumers Energy headquarters building is Tim McCann of Local 324, The low-level building on the left is the 1932 post office that's being renovated as part of the project.

IN THE CHILLER ROOM at the Consumers Energy headquarters building are the plumbers and pipe fitters who helped build it. Working for John E. Green, they are (l-r) foreman Chuck Bunce, Troy Wyatt, Shane Bunce, Blain Lysher, Rob Kenney, Ron Berkshire (all of Plumbers and Pipe Fitters Local 333) and Castle Picklesimer (Local 190).