Industrial Heritage Habitat
Manchester-Chateau, Pittsburgh
Introduction
We imagine an alternative, habitable future in Chateau, an underutilized industrial neighborhood filled with warehouses and parking lots. We’re proposing to restore the urban vitality that existed before large parts of neighborhood, which were demolished for Route 65. Bringing back a human-scale street grid that supports smaller building footprints can accommodate makerspaces, local business, community culture, and green innovation programs. We also implement green infrastructures and carbon-free routes along the waterfront that connect the people from Manchester as well as the rest of Pittsburgh. We preserve and upgrade existing buildings to make this place be welcoming to a new population and long-time residents alike.
Ohio River Region
Iron-steel Mills and Chemical Terminals Caused Pollution
Pittsburgh, as a typical industrial city in the Ohio River Basin, shares some issues with other cities standing along the Ohio river. Heavy industries brought pollution, abandoned mills and deteriorating warehouses.
Ohio River Region
Waterway-Highway Dependent Post-industrial Area
Those post-industrial areas were facing another historical issue that its isolation caused by waterway and highway transportation during the heavy industrial period. Same as other cities in the Ohio river basin, Pittsburgh has lots of post-industrial areas by the waterfront. Chateau is one of them.
In the 1950s, Pittsburgh was an industrial city with factories everywhere. The environment and air were seriously polluted by industry. However In the 21st century, Pittsburgh began its transformation from an industrial city to a smart city. A large number of industrial legacy have been demolished to make way for modern commercial complexes. In our project, we want to preserve these industrial legacy in Chateau, retain the original urban texture of Pittsburgh, and integrate it into modern life. We define this as the new industrial age.
Site: Disconnection
Looking to the north shore of the Ohio River segment, we focused on specifically the Manchester-Chateau Neighborhood, which is a post-industrial district that was physically dissected by the route 65. On the west side of the route there’s Chateau, which is the majority of industrial zones with large plots of empty parcels, warehouses, and parking lots. On the east side, there’s Manchester, currently with mostly residential units and some commercial and civic programs.
Site: Analysis
Survey
The site is currently filled with numerous light industrial box buildings with plots of parking lots, vacant parcels, and most importantly, the highway wall that separates the two neighborhoods.
Fabric: Historical Grid
But Chateau wasn’t born like this. When we overlay the historical maps of the area back in the first half of the 20th century, it was mostly occupied by smaller scale residential units, with larger footprints closer to the riverfront.
Fabric: Route 65
And this happened in the 1950-1960s. A concrete aorta plunged across the neighborhood, got rid of the whole array of blocks, and separated the area into two pieces.
Fabric: Reevaluation
And since then, the part closer to water had adopted a much bigger fabric in light of the advancement of petrochemical transportation for its industrial land uses, which is a stark contrast to the east side of the highway, with reminiscent of finer grain fabrics.
Fabric: Fragmentation
Our approach is simple, bringing the once human scale urban experience back to the west side of the highway, by creating fragmenting grains that shake up the existing large blocks. The fragmentation process decreased the capacity of the highway to release new parcels. and cut through many of the existing masses that created smaller building footprints.
Waterfront
The fabric evolution will also bring a new environmental presence.
The existing warehouses, coupled with the highway and parking lots, cause poor air quality throughout the region and specifically in Manchester-Chateau, and pose the risk of health issues, and segregate the whole neighborhood.
Access
Based on our new fabric, we are proposing a new walking-friendly Manchester-Chateau. The implementation of Green infrastructures, new walkways along the riverside, and public open spaces will provide a welcoming, environmentally friendly Chateau to connect two neighborhoods.
Vision
In fact, the two separated neighborhoods already have some thriving and diversified education, culture, and community resources, which are great assets to be shared and guide the future prospect of Chateau. Thus, we’re proposing a comprehensive infrastructure network to connect Manchester to Chateau with four promenades, namely the Neighbors’, Wellness, craftspeople and Night’s.
Programs
Neighbor’s promenade
This promenade is developed for the low-income neighbor to provide amenities, local supplies with markets, skill training services for future employment and also affordable housing located in both two areas.
Farmer Market is a community anchorpoint in Neighbor’s promenade. Previous giant warehouse has been preserved and turned into a place for the exchange of local goods and produce. The market extends to the open space and provides extra real estate for the neighbors.
Wellness promenade
This promenade serves the whole community, there is a ferry complex as a gateway from the waterway to the neighborhood. Bike Heaven, preserved from the existing bicycle museum, act as a typical core of a carbon free route system, There’s also the expanded greenhouse for orchid farming and local produce, and Bidwell center also plays an important role for the community’s occupational training.
We have optimized the facilities and environment of the waterfront space. Our proposed trails support bicycle and other micro mobility options. Below the trail is the ferry pier, which is also a public space. We hope that the clean energy ferry will be an important part of low carbon transportation in the future that connects our site to many other riverfronts in Pittsburgh.
Craftspeople’s promenade
This promenade provides arts and cultural space and offices for local’s creative activities, it’s also the expansion site for the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild as venues for cultural exhibitions and performances.
In the Arts and Culture Axis, we can see musicians performing live concerts in the square. Painters and artists work on the exterior walls of the warehouse. The industrial building will be renovated for studio spaces.The proposal is designed to preserve the culture of Manchester and Chateau and provide them with space for new development.
Night’s Promenade
This promenade manifested on the underdeveloped parcels, could be the vital commercial core that echoes with the local business on Western Avenue.
As its name suggests, a rich and vibrant afterwork life happens here
Business Incubation
The new fabric in our neighborhoods brings fresh and retrofitted programs developed from the existing condition. Welcome to the new Chateau, where we propose the future programs for each of the promenades.
As the capacity of Route 65 will decrease, space will be released for commercial and office buildings at the restored parcels, which create opportunities for local startups, employment, and extra capacities for the existing participants.
Transition Process
We first did a survey of the existing parcels and evaluated the potential for future developments. They would be either preserved, upgraded, or completely rebuilt.
The parcels are acquired with the Green New Deal Urban Redevelopment Grant after the evaluation. We then proposed to decrease the capacity of the highway to 50 percent, and determine the thread of the promenade that goes across the connection, and let the way find itself towards the river. This process also dissects the existing massings.
The main artery creates street level renovations, which radiates towards the adjacent blocks.
As the new fabric comes in place, the new programs would emerge along with a smaller and more human scale presence, which also has more connections to the public space.
Finally, our fabric reached to the waterfront and back to the highway, which creates unique experiences of the connection and the terminal.
