January_1971 — Page 13

world news

Town on stilts for Londoners

A 'town on stilts' for 10,000 people who will live in houses 50 ft. above street level, with com- mercial and industrial premises below, has been approved in principle for a new £50 million de- velopment in the London Borough of Hammer- smith.

The lowest level will be for commercial and industrial buildings and above this will be a 'layer' housing a major shopping centre, a 600-room hotel, schools, public and commercial offices and health and entertainment centres on a 'pedestrian deck'. A car park for 4,000 cars will be built between these two levels giving access to the ground level streets.

On and above the pedestrian deck will come the houses and flats mainly of low-rise construction, but including seven 23-storey blocks. High stan- dards of construction, particularly in sound insula tion and mechanical ventilation, will be used to overcome the problem of noise and fumes from the traffic and industry beneath the housing.

London's Shepherds Bush, but will provide facili- ties that would normally occupy 120 acres - a saving in land purchase cost that will offset the costs of the higher standards of construction. The scheme will attempt to provide a balance of places to live, places to work, places to play and places to shop to meet the needs of a community living in one self-contained development within the city.

The architect's role

The accelerating rate of change in building tech- nology was clearly reflected in the organisation of any modern construction project, said Britain's Minister of Public Building & Works, Mr. Julian Amery, when he opened a recent 'Man, Method and Building' exhibition at the RIBA in London. The days were past, he said, when the architect could design the envelope and leave the engineer to add the heating and lighting installations. If the finished building was to be effective, architects and engineers had to work together as a team from the very conception of the design.

The Minister said that in his Department nearly all design work was now carried out by multi- professional groups. The process began only in 1961 but its advantages to professional men had been so apparent that multi-professional working was now almost taken for granted.

'But while teamwork is essential the need for leadership remained,' Mr. Amery pointed out. 'This is the architect's role, at least where building as distinct from civil engineering projects is concern- ed. He alone has the overall concept. He more than anyone else concerned is, or should be, trained in the art of meeting human requirements. But if the

The project will take up a 77-acre site north of architect is to be an effective leader he must know

Industrial level

Far East BUILDER, January 1971 Page 13

more about other disciplines and about techno- logical development than is sometimes the case today.'

Although the breadth of the architect's ex- perience had to be widened, his basic role remained what it had been. There was his first responsibility to meet his client's requirement, indeed to meet it creatively by opening up to the client possibilities not previously understood.

Then there was the responsibility to society as a whole, a responsibility to ensure compatibility between his client's requirement and those of the community in which the building was put up.

Building design computer trial

Field trials will begin shortly on GENESYS, Britain's Government-financed system of computer programs for building design. The system, expected to speed up and provide substantial economies in the country's building plans, will be applied to the five types of computer most commonly in use.

The exhaustive trials are expected to last several months and will be conducted by the GENESYS

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