“The Offshore Towers” is a water-based, mix-use development to adopt the growing cultural, resiliency, and technological needs of Battery Park, New York.
The coast is a recursive environment for civilizations to thrive. Our ancestors sought the coast for its resource abundance, from food to transportation, presenting good trading opportunities that promoted development in strategic coastal spots. The trend of coastal development has not changed; in any case, it is accelerating. With an increasingly growing coastal population – expected to increase by 1.66 billion people in 2050 –the current built-up area of cities and the consequential anthropogenic effects, there is a niche to challenge our built environment’s standards along the shorelines.
TYPE
Mixed-Use, Logistics
LOCATION
Manhattan, New York City
IMPACT
1.63 million people
COLLABORATION
Images: Monolot
Demand Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google plan to bring and increase their office space in New York, which will increase housing demands and adjust the average household income of the area. These companies alone will occupy at least 15 locations in the city. Its presence will boost the technology startup scene in New York and the incoming population’s logistics demands. Some of these logistics are online shopping, food production and delivery, and waste management.
Residential Area New York City is working to make its neighborhoods more diverse. For example, the Financial District is increasing its residential area, especially given the outflow of people after the stock market closes to other neighborhoods such as Greenwich Village or Brooklyn Heights, leaving this district almost as a ghost town after working hours. The restoration of the One Wall Street building and the Woolworth building shows advancements in increasing the Financial District’s residential area.
Offshore Construction Land reclamation is part of New York's DNA. Since the Dutch settled on Manhattan Island, followed by the British, there have been extensive land reclamation practices. This has helped the city adapt to its growing needs. For example, in 1680, the wet lots system was implemented so the government could raise capital, allowing the buyer of the wet lot to fill the water area with new land.
This has drawn some criticism since some of these reclaimed lands were established on marshes and wetlands, crucial to the conservation of the environment. Today's technology enables the implementation of systems that promote the coexistence of the built environment with the natural environment. Attached is a map illustrating the amount of reclaimed land and the intervention area.
LAIA Observatory
Landboxes Caisson Foundation The Offshore Towers utilize the Landboxes land reclamation system to expand the built-up area of Manhattan and protect it from future storms. The Landbox serves as a prefabricated foundation for the construction of towers and other offshore buildings, while also creating new green spaces necessary for the well-being of citizens and to safeguard the area from future storms. It is integrated with projects like the Big U, which aims to shield Manhattan from storms by extending the buffer zone. Landboxes contributes to the upgrading of the city by serving as a hub for new infrastructure networks that can be installed within the hollow concrete caisson. These networks can include last-mile logistics, indoor farming facilities, waste management, transportation hubs, and many others.
Objectives a) Reduce gentrification pressures of the ever-increasing technological industry by building on newly created land. b) Improve the local coastal resiliency with a new buffer zone to protect the existing urban grid of Manhattan. c) Improve logistics to the existing grid through the introduction of an automated last-mile logistics network.
The present and future of New York City:
432 Park Avenue, Rafael Viñoli. 57 West, SHoP Architects. Hudson Yards. One Wall Street, Thomas Heatherwick.
VIA 57 West, Bjarke Ingels Group. The Vessel, Thomas Heatherwick. Amazon Warehouse. Farm.one
The Big U, Bjarke Ingels Group. Little Island, Thomas Heatherwick. The Offshore Towers, LAIA Lab.
