IN&EDIT Architecture shared with us their proposal for the Passenger Terminal Building international competition which included four vehicular bridges across the Shenzhen River. The project aims to emulate how trees are organisms that stand by themselves, so their shape has an inherent, structural rationality. As a result, public flow through the trunk and roots will guide pedestrians from one riverside to the other. More images and architects’ description after the break.
Hong Kong & Shengzen are two leading cities growing with a common destiny. The two entities are related to one another and both incorporated under the People’s Republic of China national, with borders defining geographic boundaries of political entities and legal jurisdictions. A symbol: Two major cities growing as one, and together becoming truly “the parts of a part.” There are no symbols, without a deep and philosophical meaning attached to them, “nothing could be preserved in human memory without some outward symbol.”(Madame Blavatsky)
We will consider Hong Kong & Shengzen as two trees with roots penetrating the same soil. They thicken and form supporting pillars, indistinguishable in appearance from trunks. From the upper branches, there springs fresh roots, sometimes intertwined, expressions of the exuberant vitality. Two trees will be seen as one entity just like a banyan tree.
The axial volumes are for offices and the technical areas on two levels are closed to the public, but with a direct proximity for each function. The silhouette of the LT PTB is following the pedestrian way from on the river side to the other. The trunks are designed as floating boxes situated on the axis of the building, and 120cm thick metal structures are representing the roots along the external facades. (The structures are all based on the projected parking structures grid.)
All vertical circulations (stairs and elevators) are organized around an axial trunk zone and hidden behind the trunk’s solid wooden volumes. An additional horizontal and vertical circulation will help all the offices and technical areas to be directly connected to each other. The spaces in between the trunk and the roots are generating two continuous and large pedestrian corridors, free of columns and structures. Public circulation is organized along two strips, sliding down along a gentle slope.
Along with renewable energy generating capabilities, the building has also been designed to conserve energy:
1 – The patterned glass facades filters sunlight and creates a distinct patterned shadow into the interior of the building and allows natural light to filter through to the interiors. A passive solar design to decrease heat gain and lower energy loads. 2 – The position of all the offices and technical spaces can be naturally ventilated through operable windows. 3 – Water conservation will be managed with a grey water recycling system that will harvest water for irrigation and landscaping. The rainwater recovery system will be placed along the curved roof. 4 – A part of the electricity will be generated by solar photovoltaic panels and wind turbines. 5 – Electrical energy will also be delivered by the flow of river water and the flow into turbines placed under each bridge.
