Thursday, March 5, 2009

Work, Work, Work





My concept for the Biker Townhome for DIRTY SOUTH Boulevard here in Charlotte. I want to change the fact that I never post much of my personal work online. I submitted parts of this design for Neighboring Concepts' entry for the Crosland Sustainability Challenge for the Scaleybark TOD site on South Boulevard (we placed in the five finalists). I don't mind if you completely steal my ideas...Just send me photos when you are done. (Although you might want to check if Crosland minds.) This is an idea whose time has come, and all power to those who run with it. :)





Biker Green Court Community

3 comments:

Daniel Nairn said...

This is really cool.

I've said many times that if I'm ever able to own a home, I would definitely find a way to make a bicycle garage - or at least a port for it. The stable concept makes complete sense. It provides enough protection from the elements, and in my opinion is far aesthetically superior to the standard garage door.

I love the permeable streets with rut pavers running through the center, too.

Do you know of anyone who has explicitly built a bicycle storage unit like this into a house. Maybe in the Netherlands or Denmark?

Eric Orozco said...

Thanks Daniel...I'm not aware of anyone building one of these directly into a residence. But I am aware of detatched/semi-detached designs in Europe, which double as storage areas: http://flickr.com/photos/oshokim/2471948001/

This design was actually inspired by the parking problems on my street of townhomes, and the fact that most people don't use their garages to park vehicles, but just use them for storage. Brainstorming, it seemed wise to induce folks to buy two-wheel alternatives by actually having the architecture encourage it. Cars really clutter the public realm. What if the garage built into units could serve instead as a studio or workshop (for bike detailers and the like)?...This would free up the ground floor space to become an auxillary use or part of a larger living area. If folks really wanted to actually use this space for a car, then the barn door would allow this, creating a true "flex space". We argued that the ground floor flex space was a "mixed use" component of the residential district, allowing for small scale commercial industry that TOD zoning should give latitude to allow.

Daniel Nairn said...

yeah, I could imagine small woodworking shops and the like dotting neighborhoods. As long as they obeyed noise ordinances, I don't see how they would pose any problem at all.