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on view

Omaha’s Gene Leahy Mall at the Riverfront

Gene Leahy Mall, a centerpiece of Omaha’s Riverfront Revitalization, reconnects downtown with the Missouri River through a transformed 14.8-acre park. Originally constructed in 1977, the park’s redesign addresses accessibility by raising it to street level, which now features amenities like a performance pavilion, event lawn, sculpture garden, and playground. Mercer Zimmerman played an essential role in coordinating with manufacturers and lighting designers to ensure that lighting systems worked seamlessly across the park.

Creating a welcoming environment both day and night was supported by a number of our lighting and controls manufacturers: Acclaim Lighting, Cole Lighting, ERCO, HK Lighting, Lumascape, VistaPro, and ETC. The lighting design is inspired by Nebraska’s skies, capturing the warmth of a prairie sunset and the chill of a winter morning. Key elements such as glowing benches, decorative tree lighting, and spotlights enhance the park’s space while improving safety and ensuring visitors’ comfort throughout their experience.

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insight to light

Q&A with Mercer Zimmerman: Color-Changing Technology

Want to project up to 16 million different colors on your building?

It has been 20 years since RGB fixtures turned Kansas City’s Barney Allis Plaza into an overlook for a larger-than-life Lite-Brite installed on the south façade of the Downtown Marriott. Even you Nebraskans and Iowans have gazed at its grandeur. Since then, the lighting industry has learned a lot about using color-changing fixtures to enhance outdoor spaces and city skylines. Throw in updates in fixture technology, fixture reliability, and reduction in fixture cost (plus a few Super Bowl victories), these lighting systems are becoming commonplace, allowing for commercial businesses of any size and scale the opportunity to find their color mojo. 

Color-changing LED lighting—specifically RGBW, RGBA, RGBWA, RGBWAL (and RGB-RoyalB-RoyalB-W for you K-Staters)—is increasingly being employed as a signature architectural asset, with building owners recognizing the branding, storytelling, and community-engagement benefits it provides. Lighting up iconic buildings and landmarks with colorful, customizable designs enables community leaders to promote important activities and affairs, such as national holidays, sporting events, and charitable causes. For example, in Kansas City this past October, civic institutions, commercial businesses, and community landmarks alike were lit up blue to celebrate the KC Royals making it to the MLB playoffs.

Mercer Zimmerman has worked with design teams, contractors, and building owners on hundreds of color-changing installations across our territories in Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Iowa—providing ideas, advice, and service to bring this technology to life. Samira Kiger, director of sales and marketing, and Autumn Nieland, business development, answer some questions about color-changing lights and how Mercer Zimmerman can assist.

First, the basics: What is RGBW light?

Standard RGBW LEDs consist of red, green, blue, and white LED chips in a single luminaire. They are like RGB LEDs but with the addition of a white chip. That little addition makes a big difference, as RGBW LED light can create an extraordinarily wide range of colors by mixing the lights of four chips together in different proportions. Our manufacturing partners can even create custom chip sets to match specific hues to match team, school, and corporate color schemes.   

To control the color and brightness of RGBW lights, a protocol called DMX is often used. Long considered the industry standard, DMX sends data digitally between the lighting fixtures and the lighting controller.

Is color-changing lighting only used outside?

While exterior applications might be more visible and attention-grabbing, RGBW color-changing lighting is used for a variety of interior uses, including healthcare settings, fitness centers, theaters, performing arts centers, and so on. In addition to aesthetics, the goal might be safety or wellness, as light and color affect emotional and physical well-being. The technology can also solve problems. For example, school administrators and parents were worried about young students bypassing a crosswalk because it was covered by a tunnel that was shadowy. Installing color-changing lights inside the tunnel removed the “scary factor,” and made it fun for students to be safe.

What RGBW color-changing products and services does Mercer Zimmerman provide?

More than 40 percent of the lighting and controls manufacturers Mercer Zimmerman represents have color-changing capabilities, so we have lots of options for a wide array of situations—including bringing power to building exteriors, which can be challenging. We work with designers, engineers, contractors, and facility managers to meet their specific needs, including making site visits, providing fixtures to designers for mockups, providing installation education to contractors, and providing system programming.

We also have a special expertise in helping owners create brand-specific colors. One fun example: Mercer Zimmerman assisted the design crew tasked with finding the exact shade of purple to light the stadium tunnel for the Kansas State University football team.

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fact-ology

The A: 55 Percent

The Q: What percentage of components of a lighting product must be made in the US to be compliant under the Build America, Buy America (BABA) Act?

BABA compliance in the lighting industry is part of the US Department of Commerce’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act passed in 2021. This legislation mandates that federally funded infrastructure projects use materials and products primarily manufactured in the United States. To be compliant, lighting products must have at least 55 percent of their components made in the United States, with final assembly occurring within the country.

Using BABA-compliant lighting ensures eligibility for federal funding, supports domestic manufacturing, and aligns with sustainability and quality standards. Prioritizing U.S.-made products also helps to create jobs and economic growth while ensuring high-quality and durable lighting solutions.

Mercer Zimmerman represents a number of manufacturers that offer BABA-compliant products. Some manufacturers provide fully compliant product lines, while others have specific fixtures that meet the required standards. For assistance with projects requiring BABA-compliant fixtures, please reach out for more information!

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happy holidays

Favorite Christmas Memory, Movie, or Tradition