Rene Cazenave Apartments

The Rene Cazenave Apartments were chosen as the case study for examination in this assignment. It is a residential structure in San Francisco, California. Leddy Maytum Stacy Architects created it. Rene Cazenave Apartments is a permanent housing development for persons who are chronically homeless and have physical and mental problems. It consists of mini-studio flats with educational, medical, and social amenities.

The building’s design took into account both energy efficiency and economics. The creators aimed to provide a healthy living environment while also maximizing seismic flexibility. For electricity innovation and minimize consumption, a solar canopy was installed and shear walls that were post-tensioned constructed.

For easy access to the building, elevators were located and an access stair deep inside the building was built. The design allows social interactions for the residents with the other people in the neighborhood including support staffs and the management. The developers also grouped the apartments to four clusters along the central corridor. It would help in further enhancing socialization as well as creating a community on the upper floors. There is a corridor and an elevator lobby as well as staircase access that helps in providing light during the day and enabling viewing to the city within. The layout of the building can be regarded as efficient that considers the good use of resources and dignified homes for many.

The Rene Cazenave Apartments has a transit and access lane for bikes. The apartment has an improved seismic resilience design. The mechanical, egress stairs and plumbing design are created in a way that allows for lateral movement. The wall system is a shear that is post-tensioned. The building plumb is left unfinished.

The building uses green roofing that introduces a new ecology to the city. Combined with new parks as well as landscape plazas, the building has good recreational and landscape features. The exterior surfaces of the building provide plant and people with water absorption and generation of renewable power. Here, a vegetated roof serves is the best source of power, a substantial insulation of the roof and a way of managing and filtering storm water.

Bioclimatic Design

The Rene Cazenave Apartments were designed to allow moderate sun and a relative fog free building. It allows breezes from the Northwest. It is exposed to solar to the South. It has a poor air quality because of its proximity to the Bay Bridge freeway at about 30 feet. The building has supportive services made of residential tower build above a ground floor that is large to reduce floor proximity. Floors at the upper part of the building are located at the North to leave the other parts f the apartment with excellent access of solar as well as protection of wind from the outdoor spaces.

The strategies to obtaining a bioclimatic design aimed at thermal mass, day lighting, solar gains and ventilation. Air conditioning was not necessary for residential cooling as there is moderate climate in the area. To respond to the air pollution from the low laying, ventilation was placed at the roof level to allow air intake. There is a central air ventilation system that provides the building with filtered as well as tempered air. Fans have been installed in the ceiling and all apartments have windows that are operable.

Light and Air

The building has tall windows placed on return walls added to the major facades. Cross ventilation is also enabled by the return wall windows. There are lobbies as well as corridors in the upper floor to give enough daylight for all the apartments. At the ground floor, day light introduced by the internal courtyards as well as the skylights of the green roofing.

Fresh air for the building is obtained from the roof which is filtered and tempered. Day lighting is also efficient through the installation of high performance windows as well as skylight glazing.

Water system

Residents in the building utilize storm water that managed by way of detention enabled by the storm and sanitary system in San Francisco. The ground floor carries a he detention tank at the courtyard suitable for managing the storm water surges. Retention of rain water is also contributed by the extensive green roof. The use of water is minimized by combining fixtures with low-flow as well as rip irrigation. Plumbing of the toilets within the building and irrigation system is done using a purple pipe connected to the reclaimed water system of the municipality.

Energy System

The energy system minimizes the use of power by continuously insulating and rain-screening the cladding that reduces unnecessary loss and gain of energy. The apartment is installed with a hydronic heating system for providing efficiency in heating the building. Cooling of the building is obtained through the fresh air that continuously flows from the fans in the ceiling and the operable windows. Down the solar canopy, there is a row of solar panels that enable heating of water. Time clocks and daylight sensors control the exterior lights as well as the common areas in the ground floor.