NEW WAY OF LIFE

VANCOUVER'S OLYMPIC VILLAGE REVEALS ITS BID FOR SUSTAINABILITY AND ITS TRANSFORMATIVE EFFECT O N SOUTHEAST FALSE CREEK.
MILLENNIUM WATER2010 ATHLETES' VILLAGE, VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA ARCHITECTS GBL ARCHITECTS I N C , MERRICK ARCHITECTURE_BOROWSKI LINTOn SAKUMOTO FLIGG LTD., NICK MILKOVICH ARCHITECTS INC., WALTER FRANCL ARCHITECTURE I N C , ACTON OSTRY ARCHITECTURE I N C , AND IBl GROUPLAWRENCE DOYLE YOUNG + WRIGHT nxT HANNAH TEICHER Conversations on building are often centred on sustainability these days. claims to LEED credits flying, either as one-upmanship or creative bluster. What is often lost in these conversations is a sense of the underlying transformation that any real bid for sustainability would require. The City of Vancouver and the Millennium Water design team set ambitious goals for the Olympic Village, alternatively referring to developing "new ways of living in the city" or more simply, developing "a sustainable community." And there is a sense in much of the framing policy documents and design work that realizing this goal necessitates more than the sum of its technical parts. But when it is actually built, how does it work towards fostering the shift in attitudes or ways of living that it seeks? The sanitary engineering movement of the 19th century made huge

WORKERS RAPIDLY PUT TOGETHER THE FINAL ELEMENTS OF GBL ARCHITECTS' RESIDENTIAL PROJECTS ALONG WEST 1ST AVENUETWO OF THE MANY BUILDINGS THAT COMPRISE THE ATHLETES' VILLAGE FOR THE 2 0 1 0 WINTER OLYMPICS. strides in creating more livable, healthier cities, conducive to density. There's little question that anyone who has grown accustomed to its benefits would roll hack the clock to a time when a hapless stroll down the street could involve the overturned contents of a chaniber pot landing in unfortunate places. And it is hard to fathom the basic disconnect between "in here" and "out there" on the part of the person doing the overturning, a person who would surely be walking down that same street that same day. However, the sanitary sewer, the storm sewer and all their attendant advances have only served to reinforce that disconnect, fostering a convenient dependence on underground systems to hide the unpleasant realities of eveiyday life. Intricately connected to those unpleasant realities is the more unpleasant reality which has now come to the fore, one which will inform urban engineering just as much if not more so than the 19th centuiy s advances. The growing unease about climate change and resource depletion underlies the design team"sstatedgoalof developing "new ways of living in the city." While these unpleasant realities could inform the design but be incorporated to disappear, both the design team and the city seem to have strongly taken the side that they should be incorporated as a legible aspect of the development. In the Official Development Plan, this is stated very plainly.
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LED BY DURANTE KREUK lANDSCAPE ARCHITEaS, SOME MARVELLOUS A N D SURPRISING LANDSCAPE ELEMENTS HAVE BEEN INSERTED INTO THE ATHLETES' VILLAGE SITE, R.GHT AND OPPOSITE SEVERAL VIEWS ILLUSTRATING GBL ARCHfTECTS' RESIDENTIAL PROJECTS THAT COMPRISE THE ATHLETES' VILLAGE.

"SEFC (Southeast False Creek) is to demonstrate a comprehensive approach to austainahility reected in both open space and huilding design." This is a useful point of departure, hut could still lead in a numher of directions: displaying technical prowess, offering up the suhtleties of passive design, or revealing the nuances of everyday systems deiiherately manipulated to foster a more sustainahie version of modern urban life. Where the Olympic Village achieves the latter. it is most successful in laying the groundwork for a new way forward for development in Vancouver, another stated goal of the ODP. "SEFC is to promote the implementation of sustainahie development principles n an urhan setting, and thereby contribute to improving the mainstream practices ofurban development throughout the region." This occurs most strongly on an infrastructural level; both the stormwaler manage1 8 CANADIAN ARCHITECT 11/09

ment system and the neighbourhood energy util ity bring the bowels of the city to the surface, affording selective glimpses of systems at work. hints of Ihe messy realities behind comfortable, convenient human inhahitation. Though incentives for disconnecting downspouts are taken up in a haphazard fashion around Vancouver, most stormwater goes directly into the combined stormwater and sanitary system with the result that in heavy rainfall events, sewage overflows into False Creek. This untenable situation has added to the impetus for alternative approaches to stormwater management, relieving the hurden on the comhined system by allowing rainwater to infiltrate where it hits the ground. Within the Olympic Village's huilding parcels, rainwater is collected in cisterns to provide irrigation and feed a greywater system for toilet flushing, a feature which recjuired an ardu-

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ous negotiation process with the Engineering Department due to concerns over non-potable water in residential units. This is a significant accomplishment which could begin to have an impact city-wide by establishing a precedent; for good and for had, nobody using the facilities would give a second thought to where the water in the toilet came from. In the public realm, on the other hand, stormwater management is made highly visible. Rather than sloping toward the curb, the streets slope toward the middle. A narrow, open runnel carries water to pipes at the end of the street, which then drain inlo a bioswale on one side of the site and a wetland on the other. The meandering wetland with its habitat shelves and dark water provides a glimpse of a water system at work for anyone who cares to pause and consider it, and a picturesque diversion for anyone who doesn t. More subtle, and perhaps more powerful, are the direct rainwater outfalls which punctuate the boarded slips protruding from the seawall. Where groupings of large granite blocks step down to the water in between the slips, steel channels protrude from the level of the seawall promenade. If someone with an affinity for the rain happened to be sitting on the granite blocks appreciating a wet day, they just might be surprised by a sudden waterfall as the rain reached a critical mass in the channel ahove. More than Ihe other visible stormwater strategies, this episodic event stitches together the constructed system branching tbrougb the site and the large body of waterwbichabsorhs the effluvia of its urban surround. At the edge, it cracks open a reveal, It visceraily challenges the lingering notion that the city is functionally distinct from an uneonstructed "nature," This seemingly minor moment has the potential to act as a catalyst, transforming attitudes about

the city's relationship to the resources it draws in and discharges. Expressing this interface of water systems could have been taken further, exposing the stream that had been boarded over during the site's industrial period. Restoring it would have created a practical challenge for the developer by cutting the site in two, hut could have offered an oppoi'tunity to preserve a piece of ecological heritage in a city whose small streams have been lost to development. It might also have provided a unique site constraint for the residential huildings. pushing the quest for a new form of development beyond the adoption of a mid-rise form. Filling in the stream did give rise to one distinct feature. Though the stream's habitat value had been low as a consequence of heing covered over for 60 years, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans required 2 to 1 compensation for filling it in. The result has taken the form of reconstructed fish hahitat along the length of the foreshore and a "Habitat Compensation Island," This highly visible reshaping of the interface of land and water in just one single instance reveals the possibility of many more such constructive operations in tbe future. Imagine an altered False Creek dotted vrith habitat compensation islands, peninsulas and spits. Where "the reveal" in architecture operates in a limited manner, expressing the junction of two materials, here it operates instnimentally, ata larger scale, expressing the interface of multiple systems and even multiple times. Mapping character-defining elements of the OlympicVillageor Shipyardneighbourhood, the puhlic realm plan identifies the progression of shorelines from the 1889 foreshore through multiple iterations of a ship-

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building, working waterfront. On this map, the new sustainable community incarnation of tbe area witb its own shoreline alterations represents tbe latest iteration in a changing waterfront. It only requires a small leap to imagine that just as the rise and fall of shipbuilding were inscribed into the physical built cbaracter of the area, future economic changes linked to climate change and resource pressures will inscribe themselves. Given such evident physical evolution, development on the site is uniquely situated to capture and convey this sense of change unfolding overtime, not only as "history," but as an adapting, shifting future. The Salt Building, the sole industrial building retained on tbe Shipyard portion of the site, fulfills its heritage mandate through the refurbisbed cladding and exposed wood trusses wbicb recall its industrial function and time period. But this static representation of histoiy is upended hy a simple move in the ground plane. The building was raised in order to meet the new plaza level at the north end, presenting the opportuni^ to leave a gap where the plaza meets the building at tbe soutb end. Passersby on tbe south side catch a glimpse of piles and pile extensions while on the north side, those who happen to use the public wasbrooms descend from the current landscape to the historic one, coming face to face witb the original piles, a built consequence of tbe i88g shoreline. As the force of history gathers such a strong presence in this small space, it undermines tbe sense of permanence embedded in tbe current built condition, suggesting an inevitably evolving role for both the community and its inhabitants. At their best, botb tbe public realm and the public buildings reveal tbe site and its systems in nuanced, provocative ways which engage the much

A VISUAL PANORAMA OF VANCOUVER, WITH SOUTHEAST FALSE CREEK ISEFCl VISIBLE TO THE LEFT OF THE SCIENCE WORLD SPHEREAN EARLIER INTERVENTION INTO FALSE CREEK THAT WAS BUILT
FOR EXPO 8 6 . O P ST BOTTOM, IEFT TO RIGHT A V I E W O F FALSE CREEK FROM POIE

THE VANCITY BUILDING; HINGE PARK; A PEDESTRIAN WALKWAY LEADING INTO THE VILLAGE; ANOTHER VIEW OF SITETHE GREEN ROOF IS THAT OF THE SOUTHEAST FALSE CREEK COMMUNITY CENTRE.

larger issues the development sets out to address. But the residential architecture falls down in this regard, A number of practical sustainable strategies were applied across all the residential buildings. Exterior sun-sbades on the south and west sides of the buildings automatically unfurl to reduce unwanted solar gain. Daylit corridors and wide stairs have views to and from public spaces in order to encourage walking. Corner units and tbrough units are prioritized to provide cross-ventilation wherever possible. The neighbourhood energy utility captures waste beat from sewage and redirects it to a capillary mat system in the ceilingof eveiy unit. Rainwater is collected on each roof to provide water for irrigation and toilet flushing. Fifty percent of tbe roofs are green. The walls achieve an average R-value of 16. Twenty percent of the units are affordable bousing and an additional n o units are rental housing. All of this is a major improvement on conventional development in Vancouver, and if repeated, could make major inroads on the energy and water fronts. And yet, even though the huildings are low- to mid-rise, in distinction to their towering counterparts across False Creek, they look and feel remarkably the same, Squinting east from Southeast False Creek to GityGate or

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Aaovt, lop TO BonoM WALTER FRANCL ARCHIIECTURE A N D NICK MILKOVICH ARCHITECTS ARE W O R K I N G HARD TOWARDS COMPLETING THEIR SOUTHEAST FALSE CREEK COMMUNITY CENTRE; A VIEW OUT TOWARD FALSE CREEK WITH THE N E W COMMUNITY CENTRE STILL UNDER C O N STRUCTION; A C T O N OSTRY'S SALT BUILDING IS THE ONLY REMAINING HISTORICAL STRUCTURE O N THE SITE,

north and west toward the downtown core, the buildings blur together with their window-walled neighbours. The mandate lo achieve an R-value of i6 could have given rise to a distinctly different envelope, revealing the sustainable ambitions of the development, or at least provoking questions as to what drove the difference. To make heating with a single neighhourhood
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utility plant feasible, a window to solid wall ratio of 70 to 30 was applied across the site. In the market-rate buildings, this ratio was distributed uniformly through window wall systems, such that the walls are still made of glass, hut with a slight spandrel panel creep to make up that 30 percent. In order to convey that this development is qualitatively different, the 70/30 might have been deployed more inventively across all four faades, both responding to solar orientation and reimagining the irrefutable primacy of "the view" in market housing, working from the understanding that the views might he just as valuable when carefully framed. Given its prominent waterfront site, and its soon to he prominent place on the world stage, the architecture operates at more scales than most buildings. It operates at a large urhan scale, given its high degree of legibility from across False Creek or up on the Cambie Bridge. It has an impact at an intermediate urhan scale from within the site, and at a more intimate scale from within the units. An additional scale is made meaningful through the massing of the roof gardens, sitiiated a storey or two below the ultimate roof line such that these semi-private green spaces rest within the field of view of a significant portion of the occupants on an eveiyday basis. These spaces become an easily accessible part of life, a place for casual use and encounters, rather than a questionable amenity requiring a special trip or the exclusive domain of penthouse dwellers. And this is where an evolution of form can be felt, a byproduct of the mid-rise massing perhaps, but more than the introduction of mid-rise in and of itself. Four or five storeys above the street, with perhaps one storey enclosing them on one side and several on another, these spaces become a lifted ground plane with an indeterminate relationship to the city. The surrounding units frame offset, fragmented views, affording a surprising connection to the bridges and viaducts inhabiting the same strata. Where these tangible differences emerge, they really do reinforce the City's aspirations to create a more sustainahle community. Where the sustainable strategies are shaped in service of a "marketable" package, becoming either attractive amenities or invisible features, they do much less than

they could to foster the qualitatively different relationship to the urhan environment that a sustainable community would entail. CA
Hannah Teicher currently-woiits for SHAPE Architecture in Vancouver.

CLIENT '.III Lf NNIUM SOUTHEAST FAISE CREEK PROreHTlES ITO. STRUCTURAI a O T \ W M SIMPSON GaOUP O f COMPANIES MECHANICAl COBAIT ENGINEERING ASSOCIATES lTD. iUCTRICAL NEMETZ IS/A| S. ASKXIATtS IID., ACUMEN CONSUITING t ;.;(_. I N I L K L . CIVIL VCCtOR ENGINEEilNG SERVICES ITD., STANTEC GEOTECHNKAL GEOPACIfIC ENGINEERING INC LANDSCAPE DURANTE KREUK LTD . FWL PARTNESyilP lANDSCAffl ARCHITECTS INC INTERIORS COOSDINATEO HOTEl INTERIORS ITD CONTRACTOR METROCAN CONSTRUCTION LTD., ITC GROUP OF COMPANIES

ENVIRONMENT AL - iStONE ENVMONMENtAl tID., AQUA-TB SCIENTIFIC

CODE & CERTIFIED PROFESSIONAL PIONEER CONSULTANTS LTD BUILDING ENVELOPE ' N HEBSHFIEID GROUP INC TRANSPORTATION v^Ar^L. ^.>_'NSULriNG GROUP SUSTAINABILITY RECOtlECTIVE CONSUTING COMMISSIONINO KD ENGINEERING [TBCI CO COST CON5ULTAKT P."' GROUP SCHEDULING ^OJECT AND COST MANAGEM[^T LTD, AREA KUMET t.. le.ll'jW COMPLETION ^K3VEMBER 2000

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