PEDESTRIAN BRIDGE

PEDESTRIAN BRIDGE

Amsterdam, NL

International Architectural Competition Entry

RESEARCH

The concept is derived from Amstelredamme indicative of the city’s name origin: a dam in the river Amstel. Due to several flood disasters Holland is strongly associated with retaining structures.

The legibility of form of a natural/sustainable dam such as a beaver’s dam challenges the brief. The morphological flexibility of the two, bridge and dam are combined to produce a design harmoniously linked to context.

DESIGN

A bridge is conceptualized as a connection between point A and B or more and is usually materialized as a route, to overcome obstacles, gaps, natural and artificial barriers and elements.

A dam offers a connection between two or more points to act as a threshold, a barrier – to obstruct, oppose, regulate the flow (of mass?), to slow down. It offers a temporal “solidification” of moving elements.

The project focuses on issues involving the relationship between the type of bridge and dam(natural) within terms of geometry and functionality. It blends the architecture of a dam and a bridge negotiating a potential “violent” formal conflict. The flowing line of the bridge instructed by the movement of the people in a formal conflict/dialogue/opposition to the ambiguous yet rigid geometry of a natural dam.

The self-referential autonomous types are combined and implemented with a new architectural program to address fragments of Amsterdam’s history and give them a sense of reappearance and continuity and in extent to imply a direct connection between the proposal and the city, and its urban context.

  • STRUCTURE

    The primary structural system of the bridge consists of a singular cell prototype, which spans over the canal to connect the two sides.

    A series of operations is then performed to test the flex of the system. Finally the system is informed/implemented both by structural (material thickness) and environmental (natural light) factors and key views to result in a prototype steel spaceframe/lattice. The flowing form of the lattice follows the curvilinear form of beaver dams always curled against the stream’s current and satisfy their inherent need to shape the landscape.

    A skin made of arbitrary timber slats is then added to resemble the natural appearance of beaver dams. The deliberately formed “pockets” between the skin and the primary structure serve to adjust/introduce/fit/implement the architectural program of the brief in the form of “lodges” (the beaver’s homes or “lodges” are formed of the same material as the rest of the dam with little order or regularity of structure). The café if lowered to water level to re enforce the connection with the sound of flowing water  (which is the main stimulus for beaver behaviour to build) and the rest of the bridge sits reasonably allowing for a clearance of 2.6m under it.