The Ziggurat is a ten-story, stepped pyramidal

Ziggurat

Ziggurats were massive structures built in the ancient Mesopotamian valley and western Iranian plateau, having the form of a terraced step pyramid of successively receding stories or levels.Notable ziggurats include the Great Ziggurat of Ur near Nasiriyah, Iraq; the Ziggurat of Aqar Quf near...

 office building and adjacent 5 story concrete parking structure located in West Sacramento, California

West Sacramento, California

West Sacramento is a city in Yolo County, California. It is contiguous with Sacramento, but is separated by the Sacramento River which is also the county line, so West Sacramento is in a different county than Sacramento...

 on the shore of the Sacramento River. Designed to resemble the ancient Mesopotamian

Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia is a toponym for the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, largely corresponding to modern-day Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey and southwestern Iran.Widely considered to be the cradle of civilization, Bronze Age Mesopotamia included Sumer and the...

 ziggurats, the building was built by The Money Store in 1997 and is currently leased by the California Department of General Services

California Department of General Services

The California Department of General Services is a state government agency in the California State and Consumer Services Agency of the executive branch of the government of California in the United States...

 (DGS). It is the headquarters

Headquarters

Headquarters denotes the location where most, if not all, of the important functions of an organization are coordinated. In the United States, the corporate headquarters represents the entity at the center or the top of a corporation taking full responsibility managing all business activities...

 to DGS.

Located on more than 7 acres (28,328 m²) adjacent to the Tower Bridge, the unusually designed office building contains more than 320000 square feet (29,729 m²) of usable office area.

Structure and exterior

The structure of the building is a standard column and beam steel superstructure, set upon a pre-stressed concrete pile foundation system. The structural steel is designed to resist a seismic event of up to 6.9 on the Richter scale

Richter magnitude scale

The expression Richter magnitude scale refers to a number of ways to assign a single number to quantify the energy contained in an earthquake....

, an extremely high standard for the Sacramento area. The exterior skin of the building consists of Minnesota Gray Buff limestone panels. Each panel weighs over four tons.

Technology

Critical areas of the building have 75 kW emergency power back-up system and 300 kW UPS (uninterrupted power system). In addition, the building has a dual electric power feed from two separate electrical components.

A centralized monitoring facility allows video security surveillance throughout the interior and exterior of the building.

The communications center has a dual fiber feed from two local fiber communication companies (four separate fiber connections).

In addition to dedicated telephone and computer equipment rooms on each floor, there is a 3600 square feet (334.5 m²) raised floor computer room with isolated Liebert units for controlled temperature and climatic conditions on the third floor.

The building has five traction elevators serving all floors, as well as an additional hydraulic elevator that provides service between the basement parking area and the first floor.

Parking

The on-site parking structure contains places for 1,649 vehicles. There are also accommodations for secured bicycle parking. All access into and out of the structure is controlled by card key access. The first floor is enclosed by wrought iron fence. The parking structure is cast-in-place concrete with tensioned decks. It is designed to withstand a 6.8 seismic event. Two traction elevators serve each floor.

Amenities

The building contains an employee fitness center equipped with Nautilus

Nautilus, Inc.

Nautilus, Inc. , located in Vancouver, Washington, United States, is the marketer, developer, and manufacturer of branded health and fitness products sold under such names as Bowflex, Nautilus, PEARL iZUMi, Schwinn Fitness, StairMaster, Trimline and Universal.Nautilus and its corporate...

-style exercise equipment, shower and locker facilities.