Located on the corner of 84th Street NW and Jasper Avenue, on the northern bank of the North Saskatchewan River and just east of Edmonton’s downtown core, the W12 – Real Time Control Building building, playing a crucial role in punctuating open public space along the river’s edge. Designed by gh3, the building will be highly visible from the north, south and east, seen from a series of vantage points ranging from distant to near. The project is an opportunity to invest in the design of the plant enclosure while celebrating the importance of municipal infrastructure and recognizing the role infrastructure buildings have in shaping the built fabric of the city. More images and architects’ description after the break.
The engineering of the facility recognizes the dynamic loading of urban storm and wastewater and as such represents state-of-the-art handling and treatment of urban water for the City of Edmonton. Correspondingly, the architecture makes apparent the engineering occurring below the ground – to this end the form of the main shaft is notionally extruded to make the circular enclosure for the plant equipment and the secondary shafts and out and in flow tunnels are telegraphed to the surface- imbuing the site with an interpretive strategy and signaling that RTCsystem.
