Located along 9th Avenue SE at 3rd Street SE in Calgary, the 9th Avenue Parkade + Innovation Centre is a unique mixed-use building with 280,000 square feet of parking.
The dynamic facility both serves community parking needs and creates a hub for Calgary’s burgeoning innovation ecosystem. The building design by 5468796 Architecture in collaboration with Kasian Architecture, Interior Design and Planning pushes the concept of a traditional parkade, allowing for future conversion of the 510-stalls into an office, light industrial or residential building.
The project broke ground in December 2018, the result of a partnership between the Calgary Municipal Land Corp., the Calgary Parking Authority and Platform Calgary, a non-profit organization supporting and advocating for the local technology sector.
The project site – adjacent to the new Calgary Library, Calgary City Hall and the Studio Bell, (the National Music Centre) – included an unbuildable easement for an underground light rail tunnel, which cuts through the middle of the project site and represents what the city determined was a 20 per cent loss in buildable area.
The design team’s solution is a building in the form of an elliptical helix, bridging the easement and thereby recapturing much of the lost land value. Vehicles enter at grade, directly over the easement. The ellipse creates a street-wide interior courtyard and 12-metre shallow floor plates allow daylight and ventilation to pervade the interiors from multiple directions – critical features should the structure be converted to a new use. The floor plates ascend on a 1-2% gradual slope to avoid the need for vehicular ramps that would require eventual removal. Ceiling heights of 4-metres, clear spans, and universal load-bearing capacity contribute to a variety of gradual or wholesale changes with low-cost ramifications.
The vehicle entrance, with clearances that allow for maintenance of the underground tunnel, is flanked by pedestrian and bicycle entrances, and activities such as a basketball court. These activate the frontage along 9th Avenue SE and frame the southern edge of the developing East Village neighbourhood.
Spherical bollards, coloured concrete patterns under foot, and a traffic mirror ceiling ensure the central courtyard is a lively and vibrant place with a distinctive and memorable aesthetic, enriched by additional public amenities including a cafe patio and an outdoor exhibition space.
Platform occupies the first two levels of the building to animate the street frontage. Inside, Platform is imagined as a space ripe with opportunities for work and collaborative potential. Its relatively raw and generic 4,500 square meters can be adapted and appropriated by tenants at will — even for light industrial use.
The nexus connecting the two levels is a pitch stage that cuts through the second floor, connecting the principal entrance with both floors and encouraging both organized and impromptu meetings. The space is designed to enable evolution over time. An ‘Infrastructure Frame’ hangs overhead but within reach, suspended from the ceiling to a datum at 2400mm above the floor, to facilitate easy connections and reconfigurations, thereby providing ultimate flexibility for any layout. Beneath the ‘Infrastructure Frame’ are generic pods that vary in openness — from fully open to closed. Users and staff can easily access power from overhead, and arrange the portable lights and mobile furniture to meet their individual or group requirements.
Beyond providing the necessary urban infrastructure to serve the city, as well as an overarching design intention to see the structure’s use transform for the needs of the future, the design of the 9th Avenue Parkade and Innovation Centre contributes to the urban fabric of the City of Calgary in a distinct way.
Opened in 2021, the success of the project is the result of a diverse design and client team demanding more of the project brief and developing innovative, business-conscious solutions in order to integrate a long-term, iconic design into Calgary’s urban identity.
