Cudjoe Key
Fire Station 11

The Project

Monroe County Fire Station 11 is the new home base for Monroe County Fire Rescue operations in the Lower Keys. Situated on Cudjoe Key - deep in the Florida Keys, roughly 23 miles from Key West - this station serves one of the most storm-exposed communities in the country. It was designed and built accordingly.

The station is elevated on a raised first floor, positioned above the flood plain required for Keys construction. It houses Ladder 11 and an Advanced Life Support rescue truck, and serves as a permanent, hardened piece of Monroe County's emergency infrastructure. The building had to be ready to operate when everything else around it is failing - which sets a clear bar for every component of the building envelope.

The Scope

ACG delivered the commercial glazing package for Station 11 - storefront systems, entrance assemblies, and impact-rated windows throughout. In the Florida Keys, impact performance isn't optional. Every piece of glazing on this building had to meet the load requirements for a structure engineered to withstand Category 5 hurricane conditions and sustained wind gusts up to 200 miles per hour.

The finished station has a clean, modern public-safety aesthetic - two-story, elevated construction, blue and white exterior, the kind of building that announces itself as a permanent institution. The glazing holds the line on both performance and appearance.

The Build

Designed by CPH Corp, one of Florida's most experienced multi-disciplinary firms for municipal and public safety projects. CPH provided architecture, MEP, civil, and construction administration services for the station. ACG executed the glazing scope to spec in a location where logistics, lead times, and hurricane season make execution harder than the mainland - and where shortcuts show up fast.