Timber Residential Skyscraper Site
As I slowly transition back to working on the Timber Residential Skyscraper from my holiday vacation, I’ve decided to focus on finding a site for the project. Like many of my previous projects, I decided that the Timber Residential Skyscraper should be located in New York City where there are many other skyscrapers. Here’s how I found on a site for this theoretical project.
Start with a broad location and refine
Once I decided that the project would be located in NYC, I brainstormed several possible landmark areas that would make sense for a luxury residential skyscraper. Since the design of the building utilizes timber as its primary structure as well as the exterior façade material, I decided that the building would work well next to a park with many trees.
This parameter narrowed the search down to a location near Central Park in Manhattan, the west side of Riverdale in the Bronx, adjacent to Columbia University in Manhattan, and near Prospect Park in Brooklyn. I’m sure there are other landmark parks that I could’ve considered, however, these ones were the first that came to mind.
Once I narrowed down the search, I went into Google Earth and navigated around these parks in search of a building in bad condition or surface parking lots with enough space for a building. In most locations, it was nearly impossible to find a parcel that fit these parameters. As I was navigating around Central Park and looking at the parcels directly across the street, it was impossible to find any building in bad condition and empty parcels used as surface parking along the southern, eastern, and western sides of the park.
However, as I navigated towards the north area of Central Park I found several empty parcels directly across the street. In one location, the parcel already had a new building under construction, so I decided not to choose that particular site. Then, I had an interesting discovery, which is that the north eastern area of Central Park where a beautiful roundabout exists has a surface parking lot with a brick building adjacent to it.
When I made this discovery, I knew that this was going to be the site for the Residential Timber Skyscraper. The site will be the parking lot at 6 W 111th St, New York, NY 10026 as well as the adjacent building. What better place for a luxury residential skyscraper than the prominent corner of central park where residents can have views and simple access to an iconic park.
Next Steps
Now that the site for the Residential Timber Skyscraper has been selected, it’s time to focus on designing the lower levels of the building, which will be retail and restaurants. With about a month left in the year, I’ve got a little more designing to do on this project before I can develop graphics and close out the project. Stay tuned for more!
