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Posted Sep 16, 2008, 8:59 PM
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Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Gateway (NE Portland)
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Portland | SMART Tower | 650 feet | Proposed
Link to Portland forum thread:
http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=157447
Quote:
Portland Spaces: Burnside Blog
http://www.portlandspaces.net/blog/t...14/smart-tower
Reaching for Heaven
15 Comments
Posted By Randy Gragg on 09/14/2008
Late last year, Portland Parks & Recreation released a “request for proposals” – or RFP – for the old Portland Visitors Information Center, aka McCall’s Restaurant. Who would have expected that one of the applicants would imagine the tallest, most radical addition to the city’s skyline in history: a 650-foot spire festooned with more than 250 wind turbines.
Don’t worry, at least yet. The commission to rehabilitate the old Visitor’s Center, completed in 1947, designed by one of the region’s great architects, John Yeon , and once one of the city’s two most important Modernist landmarks, was won by Bicycle Republic who is planning to transform the building into a bicycle waystation. But local developer Derek Hanna took the parks bureau’s call for sustainable money-making proposal seriously, working with MulvannyG2 Architects to propose a project that would generate enough power to light all of Waterfront Park, make the city around over $1 million/year, plus be a tourist magnet with an observation deck restaurant and an OMSI outpost devoted to sustainability. The catch? It would rise taller than Council Crest.
The so-called “SMART Tower” didn’t win the commission. (The Bike Republic’s proposal for a “bicycle waystation”: http://bikeportland.org/2008/08/13/i...bike-republic/ did.) But the tower – and it’s developer, Derek Hanna – set tongues a waggin’: Could he really do that to the skyline? Would he?
Hanna has reached for the heavens before. Last year he proposed the tallest building to be ever built on the east side, a mechanical parking/storage garage, that would rise next to the Ross Island Bridge. Nothing in the city’s regulations prevented him from building it. But financing reduced it to 100 feet tall. It’s set to begin construction by the end of the year.
So how serious is he about the SMART Tower? How serious should we be? Here’s an interview with Hanna and MulvannyG2’s lead designer on the project, Eric Cugnart. Weigh in on what you think of the design so far and where it should or should not go.
Portland Spaces: So Why should Portlanders want a 650-foot tower in Waterfront Park?
Derek Hanna: People get stuck on the height. We could design it taller or shorter. The request for proposals (RFP) called for a sustainable tourist attraction for people all year around. We originally had a solar roof over park. We just didn’t see that it really met the criteria or, as a native Portlander, what met the needs of our central park, Waterfront Park. So we got together, had two or three brainstorm sessions: What could we do there that would really be an attraction and showcase the city’s sustainable efforts and make Portland proud? So we thought let’s be the first energy-producing attraction. When we really started looking at it, we realized, hey, it’s on the river. It’s not blocked or shaded by any other buildings, so we started looking at the positives of the location. That’s what created the SMART Tower.
PS: So it began with the RFP for the old Portland Visitors Information Center rather than looking for a place for a tower?
DH: It began by trying to satisfy the sustainability requirements of the RFP and an effort to really create an attraction. It was matching the positive attributes of Portland—and of that site.
PS: Wouldn’t it better to start with the idea: We want to create a tower that produces up to three megawatts of power and would be an icon for the city. Then ask the question: Where should we put it? Seems to me it could go anywhere: Centennial Mills, South Waterfront, Linnton, Council Crest…
DH: It needs to be in the city’s heart, by the river and on a transportation hub. This was a direct reflection of the RFP for Waterfront Park. But we believe that’s the best place. It fits in all the city plans: the Waterfront Park Master Plan, the “Central City 2020 Parks Vision,”: http://www.portlandonline.com/parks/index.cfm?c=40182/ the city’s comprehensive plan, the Portland Development Commission’s strategic plan. We looked at all of these plans to see the long term vision of the city. We’ve met with urban naturalist Mike Houck, planning director Gil Kelly, Commissioner Dan Saltzman, and the PDC. It also has to be close to the river to get the wind currents and can’t be shaded from the south for the 30,000-square-foot solar array. We could get the same effect somewhere else by going higher. But the real heart of the SMART Tower is the wind turbines. It really needs to be in an open corridor. With my other project, Portland City Storage, we brought this concept from The Netherlands—the Turby, the most advanced urban wind turbine. It can go on top of or on the side of buildings; it can take updrafts and sidedrafts and winds from all different directions. I’m part of the company that is the North American distributor.
PS: Are there any Turbys installed in the United States?
DH: The first two will be installed in Sacramento next month. They’ve been in [Research & Development] in The Netherlands for six years. It’s the most proven vertical axle turbine. Each one is rated for 3,000 kilowatts/year. The standard single-family house uses about 10 kilowatts. So three of these could take care of an entire house. The current concept features 230 [turbines]. Our goal is 300.
PS: Have you done any energy modeling?
DH: It’s still a concept. According to the manufacturer, in our design we have them placed at the optimal distance from one another. At the height we’re talking about, there’s an average 9 mph wind. The higher you go, the higher the wind speed. Our projection of 3,000 kilowatts per turbine is based on a 9 mph wind 60 percent of the time at 150 feet high.
PS: Your scheme features 600 units of parking. What proportion of the income model comes from storing cars?
DK: Fifteen percent of the gross. We looked at $13.6 million total yearly revenue. That’s from parking, the solar array, the turbines, the visitors’ center restaurant, and recreation equipment rental—everything from bikes to lawn chairs—to service the park.
PS: Is there any internal contradiction in a SMART Tower, a net-zero energy facility with 600 units of parking?
DH: This would be the cleanest way to handle cars. It’s a mechanical parking system from Germany called Palace. It would be one of the cleanest in the nation. One of the biggest problems with Waterfront Park is the lack of parking.
EC: Cars won’t disappear. So you want to ask: What is the best way to deal with them for the next 50 years? We think it’s automated parking.
DH: As more electric cars come on line, the electrical utilities can draw on their power at peak periods. The carbon savings of the automated parking is TK.
PS: So Bicycle Republic beat you out for the site with a proposal for a big bike station.
DH: We’re the last of three finalists. But we’re supposed to wait on the side. And if they can’t work something out, they’ll come back to us.
PS: It’s hard to imagine there wouldn’t be some objections to the tower. What’s your best argument for the public to accept such a huge change to a place frequently referred to as the city’s front yard?
DH: It’s really easy to jump on the height, but the structure’s whole diameter is only 90 feet wide. We designed it to be a see-through tower. The turbines are constantly moving. We designed it as an ellipse so it is at its narrowest from west to east. So everyone in the West Hills sees it at its narrowest: 50 feet, up to 550 feet. The restaurant and viewing tower are above the West Hills.
PS: Does it stand within any of the city’s established view corridor?
DH: The closest is Vista Bridge, but we moved it further away and also away from Salmon Springs Fountain. We’ve tucked it near the Hawthorne Bridge.
Eric Cugnart: So the question really is, what are we giving back? We are providing 30,000 square feet of covered public area.
DH: In the winter, there’s no covered area in Waterfront Park. This would be a public space covered with photovoltaic panels. Plus we’re going to put in 10 public restrooms that we’ll maintain. And we’re going to light the park for the city. So we would be the first park to have its power produced on site. We could power all the lights: They only use one megawatt/year. We’ll produce three megawatts. The rest would go to the city’s 2020 plan to achieve 20 percent sustainable energy by 2020. The reason to have it in the heart of the city is that you don’t give up the 20 to 40 percent of the power transmission lost from remote generation. We want a two-year outreach effort. We want to talk to all elected officials and all neighbors before we even design it. It has to be a transparent process. This would be truly net zero, generating all its power, harvesting all its water, dealing with all its waste on site. If we meet the criteria and do our outreach, people will get behind it, because it would be the vision of what Portland is.
PS: What was the inspiration for the shape of the SMART Tower?
EC: It begins with the circular shape of the parking system. So a solid piece at the bottom and a solid piece at the top with nothing in between. But a circle is so static. We wanted it to relate to the power produced. So we began playing with the minimum square footage we needed for the parking and the restaurant—90 feet in diameter. So then there’s the minimum you can rotate the verticals without it collapsing. How much can we twist it? Then it relates to the wind, like a propeller. So the shape is somewhere between a propeller turning and the shape of a propeller itself. The concrete core takes the vertical load; the exoskeleton takes the lateral [load].
PS: What would the skeleton be made of?
EC: Painted steel.
PS: Sounds like a maintenance disaster! Just look at the paint peeling off the steel structures around town.
EC: Come on. The Eiffel Tower is painted steel. It’s still there.
PS: Why “SMART Tower”?
DH: It stands for “Sustainable Modern Art Tower.” The criteria was to make it look different to all different parts of the city. The elevators would be glass, so as you rise you pass the wind turbines. It would give you a view of Portland you’ve never seen before.
PS: It reminds me of Vladimir Tatlin’s “Monument to the Third International.”
EC: That was one of the inspirations.
PS: So the SMART Tower is part of a much larger agenda, no?
DH: The Turby will change the way energy is produced in urban areas. It’s the first truly proven device. We’re partners with Turby in the Netherlands. In the heart of the city we can start taking that load. The SMART Tower would be the first major power-generating plant in the heart of any city that is an attraction. It will be so successful that we’ll joint venture with a major developer to put this throughout the country to produce power in cities. We’re working with the government and the utilities to put the Turby atop electrical transmission towers. The Turby’s design doesn’t put any lateral stress on a structure, so you don’t need to beef it up.
PS: Couldn’t the SMART Tower just be viewed as a big billboard for Turby wind turbines?
DH: It’s a big billboard for sustainability. It’s wind, solar. It’s dealing with our waste, harvesting water, even the cleanest way to park cars and harvest their energy when those cars are electric. OMSI and Ecotrust understand what we’re trying to do. They suggested it could be a testing ground for turbines and a certification facility.
PS: You’ve studied the engineering?
DH: There’s newer transmission and older towers. It might require guy wires. It would be the first generation device that could use existing towers and lines. This isn’t T-Bone Pickens proposing a huge new energy infrastructure. The two biggest hurdles are structure and the fact that all the lines are high voltage. So we would have to run a low-voltage line to each tower with a transformer. It’s a long-range plan, but it’s the only one that makes sense. We can put up windfarms out in the gorge or on the ocean. Or we can utilize existing infrastructure, land and lines—things the government and utility companies already have.
PS: Are you looking for R&D money from the city?
DH: No, it’s on our dime. The business plan makes sense. It doesn’t need subsidy.
PS: So if you build it, what will the city get in rent?
DH: Five percent of our gross: $500,000 to $1.5 million per year. That would be the most revenue the city gets from any property. Plus we’ll light the park, put in 10 restrooms, and provide a beautiful 30,000-square-foot canopy in Waterfront Park!
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