|
|
Urbanisation is one of the most significant
issues facing humanity today. By 2050, two thirds of the world’s
population will live in cities. Consequently, urban growth is
fast outpacing the ability to build affordable and sustainable
living space.
Cities all over the world are in dire need of new ways to house
a rapidly growing urban population. Nowhere is this more evident
than in the UK and in our capital city, where space is at a
premium and housing the ever-growing population continues to
pose a huge challenge.
London is at the heart of the housing crisis with experts
forecasting that the city will require 60,000 new homes a year (around
double the current rate) to meet new projections. Innovation in
building methods and materials is required for house building in
urban areas to hit these targets, while ensuring fast and
sustainable construction.
One obvious, yet often overlooked solution is to start building
up, and stop tearing down. Utilising new modern timber materials
enables several stories to be constructed on top of existing
structures. A building extension constructed with a timber frame
can be a fast, sustainable and inexpensive solution.
At a recent roundtable event hosted by Metsa Wood in London,
industry professionals, including architects, designers,
planners, and academics discussed the merits of modern timber
and how it could be better utilized in urban architecture.
Speaking at the event, Rory Bergin of HTA Design said: “We find
there is still a lot of anxiety and lack of knowledge,
particularly on cost. The way to further innovation is to push
at the sweet spots where the benefits are indisputable to the
client.”
These comments were echoed by Nick Milestone of B & K Structures,
“The people we need to convince are quantity surveyors. I’m
starting to see that firms are now measuring the costs of
engineered timber against traditional construction. They are
saying to developers they can now build it quicker, lighter and
cheaper. It is now a competitive solution. Reinforced Concrete
frame is becoming very expensive.”
Linda Thiel of Sweden’s White Arkitekter discussed how timber is
being used in her country for commercial and public buildings as
well as houses, where it wouldn’t have necessarily been
considered in the past. She said: “Too often engineered timber
is being used simply to replace concrete. Once designers see it
as a different material, design will flourish and create a new
architecture.”
This is particularly true in urban areas, such as London, where
space is at a premium and planners are looking to build on
existing structures to maximise every last square foot of space.
Research shows that approximately a quarter of existing
buildings are strong enough to carry additional floors made of
wood. Moreover, it is the only material light enough to build
quickly on to existing structures. This makes wood a highly
promising building material for providing living space for
billions of people – while also preserving the architectural
heritage of our cities.
One of the other main considerations for considering timber in
urban construction is energy efficiency, not only during the
construction process but also for the lifetime of the building.
This is extremely important in London as it currently has a
target of a 60% reduction in carbon emissions by 2025. With
homes and workplaces currently accounting for 78% of CO2
emissions in London and with 80% of the existing housing stock
likely to still be in place by 2025, it is essential to improve
the energy performance of new builds in order to cut costs and
carbon.
In the UK, building a million new homes by 2020 in order to meet
the demand of the UK housing crisis requires innovative thinking
and the need to explore new possibilities, such a hybrid
construction, using a range of materials including steel,
concrete, brick and timber.
Through its Plan B project, Metsä Wood has been challenging the
perception of architects, constructions engineers and builders
as to what is possible with timber construction. As part of the
project, which explores various possibilities of building with
wood, Metsä Wood offers detailed examples of how to build
recognizable, but modern versions of well known architectural
buildings, such as the Empire State Building using wood as the
main material. The models have been exhibited at trade shows
across the globe and have helped to raise awareness and spark
debate around modern timber construction.
Metsä wood also recently ran a competition, inviting architects
to design timber structure extensions to existing urban
buildings using Kerto® LVL as the main material. Entries were
submitted from 69 cities worldwide, including Sidney, Shanghai,
New York, Berlin, Paris and London.
One of the 16 entrants based on the city of London was the
impressive Chrisp Street Market project by Kalpana Gurung and
Robert Buss from Studio Hoopla.
Chrisp Street Market is a 3.6 hectare site near Canary Wharf,
built in the 1950s as part of the Festival of Britain, and
having been active as a street market since Victorian times.
There are currently plans to build 750 new homes while upgrading
the existing retail units.
According to Gurung and Buss, the proposal will “destroy most of
the site and, with it, businesses, homes and community”.
They continued: “London has a housing crisis but tackling this
should not come at the expense of quality of life and the
destruction of diverse and functioning communities. Our proposal
seeks a sustainable future: environmentally and socially, for
everyone, by building on the existing structure and community.
“The Metsä Wood Plan B competition provided an opportunity to
address the socially and environmentally unsustainable
trajectory of housing development in London.”
“Chrisp Street Market shares the qualities of many large
redevelopments around London: wholesale destruction of existing
buildings, private developers with a stranglehold on profit and
the ‘cleansing’ of the city.
“We should address the much more difficult, but responsible
challenge of augmenting the new with the old – both physical and
social.
“Laminated Veneer Lumber (LVL) is the ideal material to achieve
this; lightweight, prefabricated modules can be craned into
place with minimal disruption to the everyday life of the market.
“Existing residential blocks are extended upwards, using Kerto-Q
and Kerto-S LVL modules while new blocks sitting on the podium
itself use the same system. The timber is protected from the
elements but visible through an aluminium-glazed screen and is
exposed throughout residential interiors, providing a highly
insulated and high quality finish.
“This system could be adapted and replicated across London and
other cities, as a way to address the tide of wholesale
gentrification – a more human, slower paced and responsible
method of regeneration and change, while adding significant
density to the areas people want to live.”
The Chrisp Street Market project is just one example of how
innovative design is challenging the perception of what is
possible in urban construction. It is now becoming more widely
acknowledged that timber products have a major role to play in
building cities of the future using fast, light and green
materials.
www.ukconstructionmedia.co.uk