The Huebergass
The residential project Huebergass und Stadtteilpark Holligen (Hueber Lane and district park Holligen) in the Swiss capital of Bern was developed in a collaborative process. Due to its many sustainable aspects, it has recently been showcased at the UIA Congress in Copenhagen.
The Huebergass in Bern already meets in many ways the sustainability targets set out by the UNO. These targets were also the subject of the UIA Congress in Copenhagen. The development, together with three other projects from Switzerland, was presented at the congress. As the more than one hundred apartments have been occupied for two years now, an assessment can be made as to if and how the ambitious targets were met. The concept was developed by GWJ Architektur (Bern), ORT für Landschaftsarchitektur – landscape architects – (Zurich), and the social partner Martin Beutler (Soziale Plastik, Bern), who jointly appearing as a planning team worked in a collaborative process together with the cooperative “Wir sind Stadtgarten”.
As is now common in many other cities, housing is scarce in Bern, especially if it also has to be affordable. That is why the municipality decided to provide an area of gardens from their landbank for development, along with a park. The conditions were as follows: the new project in the Holligen quarter was to be social, ecological, and economically sustainable. It was also envisaged that the new quarter should be diverse, allowing for a range of different lifestyles, and that it should promote neighbourly living. Even before the structures and their layouts went into planning, concepts for meeting these targets were being worked on. A competition was launched that established the above-mentioned team of planners, as in a comprehensive, complex participative process urban planning, open spaces and architecture had to be developed from the beginning as a whole.
Communicative and neighbourly
The result of this process is a housing estate comprising of six units, which, together with the district park, connects in terms of urban planning, architecture, and social composition with the surrounding existing environment and influences it. Three permeable linear developments to the north consolidate the urban fabric and create a link with the existing surrounding buildings. The three developments to the south, on the other hand, open up towards the park. The most significant device that joins everything together is a well-known typology: a laneway between the buildings. It is the centre and backbone of the entire concept. It is the pulsating axis, along which all communal and private areas of the project are aligned: pathways cross and meetings are held here.
It provides access to the apartments, as well as all the communal areas – such as the neighbourhood-run café, the function room, laundrette, and ateliers. The conspicuous porches that are aligned along the lane are made from timber and house a combination of stairwells and private balconies, allowing for open communication as soon as the residents leave their apartments. The defined target was to perpetuate the preexisting with a further piece of neighbourhood which would allow for thresholds, transitional areas, neighbourhoods between inside and outside, between quarter, gardens, and environment.
Compact and sufficient
The total energy use was reduced and the entire footprint of the buildings themselves dedicated to habitable spaces by placing the eleven stairwells that provide access to the 103 residential units in front of the structures themselves. All apartments are dual aspect, which has a positive effect on the indoor climate, lighting, and comfort. Most of them are two- and three-bedroom apartments, but there are also smaller units, as well as a cluster-apartment with up to six bedrooms. All rooms are equally sized, so that their use can be flexibly adapted according to needs and lifestyles. In addition, there are also guest and joker rooms, as well as communal areas available to the residents. Instead of having the more common 45 m² per person, the rooms here are calculated at 25 m². This efficient use of space makes it possible to offer the apartments at an affordable rent, even undercutting the original level of rent per square metre envisaged by the awarding local authority. The simple, clearly defined structures themselves, compact building volumes in aspect to the useable floor area, and reduced basements as well as simple and clear choice of materials, and a high degree of repetition in structural elements, such as windows and doors, all also contribute towards making this possible.
Included in the rent is the use of the communal areas and a mobility service provided by “bernmobil”. A special carsharing offer and a mobility fonds make sure that the car-free Huebergass remains decelerated and an environmentally friendly way of mobility is promoted.
Biodiversity and social diversity
The park is accessible to the public and part of the quarter – an open space providing possibilities to everyone and to all their different needs. But there are also brownfield areas, in which vegetation is allowed to spread uncontrolled, generous retention spaces and as little sealed ground as possible. The generous stock of trees and the plane tree avenue surrounding the former garden area were left standing. The final appearance of the external areas was decided on in a participative process. At first an urban gardener moderated the initiatives that came from the residents. Trials on a “pre-park” area were later incorporated into the final park design.
