Freeman's Bay Study

In this project we looked at the possible situation of increasing the density of the site bounded by Franklin Road, Wellington Street and Hepburn Street in Freeman's Bay, from the current 32 dwellings per hectare to between 70 and 120 dwellings per hectare.

The classic land-use map reveals some interesting features of the site.

Large areas of communal space were created for residents in the spaces surrounding the individual private garden spaces of the new terraced houses that were constructed round culs-de-sac in what was considered to be a slum area.

The spaces are quite beautiful, but are not used. That I was able to take this photograph shows that the communal space is in fact accessible to the public, through various narrow walkways.
This layout does not follow the principles of the perimeter block in keeping the rear open space private, and this is perhaps why nobody uses it.
The final design that our group came up with for the site followed what I think is a common pattern — low-rise (up to 6-storey) blocks of flats surrounding communal open space, in a number of smaller urban blocks than currently on site. This type of development can be seen in the various masterplans for the Viaduct Harbour and other new urbanism-type plans such as Wynyard Wharf (http://www.seacity.co.nz/design_concept_masterplan.htm). Has the perfect medium-density urban layout thus been found?

I hope not. One thing that is interesting about Freeman's Bay is the variety of typologies that were included in the 1970s redevelopment: terraced houses, 'star flats' and courtyard housing. In preparation for this project we looked at different residential typologies. The ones I liked the most were outside of the usual categories, such as maze-type projects in the United States: dwellings on various levels, of different sizes and types, stacked vertically and horizontally and with crazy elevated paths and staircases. Developments like these I think might make for exciting and interesting urban environments.