RATIONALE FOR THE RESOLUTION OF THE DESIGN PROBLEMS
- Increase diversity of spaces within the park in addition to sports fields to provide pleasurable areas for gathering spaces, event spaces, and impromptu activities; the pavilion project is composed of built form that simultaneously enfolds and defines a new vocabulary of open spaces - forecourts, loggias/ verandahs, courtyards, raised lawns;
- Provide areas within the larger organization of sports fields to provide softer areas for cultural meeting places, gardens, 'passive' uses; the pavilion project introduces 'middle spaces' as new thresholds and interconnected open spaces that introduce new adjacencies to open sports fields;
- Strengthen the organization of the parks by providing pathways that respond to usage and landforms linking to a multi-directional focus for the pavilion; pathways are introduced that are responsive, extensive and intensive, varying in width and oriented by surface creating choice and redundancy;
- Create spaces that can be appropriated by the public and be resilient for evolving new uses over time; the pavilion enfolds and infers new outdoor rooms that allow for change and evolving uses. The threshold spaces created between built form and open spaces encourages interconnection and more social activity.
- Create a new precedent for 'a park within a park' that brings a new scale of public outdoor rooms into the larger recreational park format; the pavilion typology scribes a territory within the larger park, bringing a new vocabulary of interconnected open space types that create an intensity of public space and environmental diversity which is complementary to the present recreational uses.
- Create spaces where biological systems are re-awakened with new cultured and indigenous landscapes that respond to park histories and landforms; create an emerging ecology where nature, architecture and culture are more reciprocal; the new vocabulary of open space types interconnected to built form allow for new interpretations of heritage and landforms. The new equilibrium promotes a balanced understanding of building in the park and the formative influence of landscape on its architecture.
- Create a new building typology for parks that generates dynamic behaviours; the building type can bring resiliency and an ability to evolve through community use and appropriation. The building type introduces a threshold space that interconnects interior and exterior spaces and embeds itself into new landscape forms that further extend the territory of the pavilion programme. Building techniques are introduced like layered and operable screens that can modify the nature of the middle spaces. The pavilion does not act as a Single focal point but rather as a multi-directional tableau.
- Strengthen the connections of the park to the adjacent city streets and neighbourhoods; the pavilion composition includes elements of pathways, bosques and allees that extend the directionality of the pavilion spaces - both interior and exterior - towards existing networks and city patterns.
- Promote the use of the park for all seasons; the physical arrangement of interior and exterior spaces can provide significant shelter from wind, rain and temperature. The operable screens create a double skin that modifies the threshold space of the pavilion - warming in the winter, cooling in the summer.
- Integrate sustainable practices with the building typology; compartmentalized structures add to flexibility of heating demands, low roofs are ideal for implementation of low profile solar arrays, high emissive roofing and green roof installations. Water conservations initiatives like waterless urinals, dual flush toilets, sensored fixtures to be used. Enjoy natural day lighting, ventilation and views.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DESIGN SOLUTION
The geological and hydrological character of Victoria Park makes it a unique urban river valley space. As a flat land between the North Saskatchewan River and the land sloping to the city, its golf course and spatial organization contain traces of the tree enclosures and gradients that echo the large form of the park and river morphology. The site for the new pavilion is located at the threshold pinch point of three interconnected open spaces, organized by the dominant view towards the Saskatchewan River. Three parts of the pavilion plan are formed by a branching out of long forms - two built, one open - slightly angled to each other with an intent to create a microclimate in a south western orientation as a direct response to Victoria Park's strong winter programme, deflecting towards the dominant view of the River, and, on the other side, to the speed skating track. The southwestern orientation of the middle open zone makes a space where it is will be possible to use and enjoy the park amenities on more days in the winter. While air temperature can be very cold, on a bright sunny day sheltered from the wind, the outside can be enjoyable. This wedge-shaped courtyard would be cleared of snow with moveable seating to allow for informal socializing and shifting the seating to catch the moving rays of sun across the space. A grouping of ash trees would provide dappled shade between the patios during the summer months. On either side of the middle open zone, two wings are nestled into the ground to create a sheltered sun pocket. Crossing through and between these pavilions, the sheltered wedge creates a threshold between inside and outside, an accommodation for both events and the spontaneous company of a wide range of users. Additional space that moves beyond the main branches of the pavilion extends the dynamic directions of the pavilions and spaces with landscape elements of raised plateaus, terraces, and double lines of trees. The existing skating track is directly connected in both a practical gesture to servicing the track by Zamboni, and as a broader gesture to arching over the track as a lookout. Similarly, new pathways emanate from the pavilion to connect to the river valley road and cycling / pedestrian paths. The layout of the program elements takes into consideration that there may be more than one phase of construction. The larger wing has the community room with a veranda type patio as its first feature in the approach, with washroom located next to it. The entrances to both washrooms are taken from a breezeway that can be opened or closed depending on the weather. In the summer, it will likely be open to permit cooling breezes through the building, which also includes office space, the wax room and storage for bicycles or skis. Along the north face of the building a special screen has been placed that will improve the heat efficiency of the building at night, but can be opened up during the day to take advantage of solar gain and to augment the 'middle space' between built and open forms of the pavilions. The screen is composed of larger floral tree-like figures that are composed alternately of coloured glass in a vertical layered pattern, suggesting crossings, lapping metaphorical leaves, exposing their broad surfaces to the sun. Openings on this screen pivot outwards bring the inside outside, with reflections toward the Saskatchewan River. The smaller wing closer to the ice surfaces contains the skate change area. The kitchen is located to provide an opportunity for concession both inside during the skating season and directly outside to a patio in the summer. The workshop room and Zamboni garage are placed at the east end of the pavilion to reduce potential conflicts between skaters and the Zamboni operations, with ice scrapings deposited at the east end of the building. The participation of the artist within this dynamic composition will be particularly welcome, as the strong compositional 'movement' of the branches of built form and open space present a strong invitation for either an 'object' that expresses a stabilizing point within the shifting forms, or for an expression that augments the feeling of movement in the composition. The position of the artist's installation could be either firmly embedded within the composition or set up as a strong extension beyond the pavilions set into the remarkable landscape of Victoria Park.
The composite pavilions of Victoria Park are massed in a rhythmic and undulating manner, in a profile that moves through the ground to the sky offering thin wedge-like yet bounded spaces between their pathways, reinforcing the multiple fragments as ambassadors to explore the park, capturing space and landscape with nodes and punctuations. As contrast and complement to the vast open-ness and nature of the park, the unique traits of the middle spaces of the pavilion present an adjacent nature as culture and an intensity, open to the contingent and the unexpected.
SUSTAINABLE CONSIDERATIONS
The design process has included rigorous considerations of the sustainable aspects of the project, generally following the LEED Canada - NC Checklist. We acknowledge the fact that these structures are to be built on a Greenfield site however this is offset by the enhanced use and development of the park system, landscaping, suggested reconnection to the existing landscape and future development of the landscape elements, together with the reduced footprint and resulting Reduced Site Disturbance of the structures themselves from the required areas of the given program. The design of the roof planes offers the ideal conditions for the implementation of low profile solar arrays, high emissive roofing and green roof installations. The project uses all of these, operating in unison to the advantage of the site and structures. This approach addresses the Storm Water Management, Heat Island Effect, Reduced Energy, Renewable Energy and Green Power categories outlined in the LEED checklist. All site lighting will be 100% cut-off fixtures. The structures are compartmentalized, allowing for a range of heating solutions from none (storage) to year-round (occupied areas), dramatically reducing energy use. The mechanical system indicated for those areas requiring heating is in-slab, hydronic heating, reducing energy demands and allowing an on demand use of heating. Hot water heating is accomplished through the use of tank-less, on demand water heaters, in close proximity to fixtures supplied.
No landscape irrigation is required for the project and water conservation initiatives include waterless urinals, dual flush toilets, sensored fixtures. Mechanical hand dryers will be used in lieu of paper towels, reducing paper waste and maintenance requirements for the washrooms.
The structures are composed of simple, locally sourced materials and indigenous landscape materials, plants and trees. These materials are appropriate to the durability that isolated structures require in a park setting and reduce or eliminate the requirement for finishes on the interiors. The use of anti-graffiti coatings will reduce the maintenance costs of the structures. All habitable spaces within the structures will have controllable natural day lighting, ventilation and views and all interior finishes and materials will be low to no emitting. We have four LEED Accredited Professionals on our team of designers.
SUMMARY OF THE TECHNICAL ASPECTS OF THE DESIGN SOLUTION
The design approach focuses on the use of proven, durable assemblies utilizing basic materials of concrete substructure, steel superstructure and concrete block wall and partition infill. Continuous 600mm high operable strip windows at the clerestorey level provide for natural through ventilation. Special areas are provided with full glazing. Fabricated metal screens and/or trellis structures serve to shelter specific areas from wind and provide solar shading. Wherever possible, the pavilion circulation is externalized, reducing floor area while integrating the structure into the park setting; cost savings generated by this strategy are applied to landscape and site features further enriching the diversity of spaces created.
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