Kathleen Andrews Transit Garage
Edmonton, Alberta

Category: Recent Work
Architect: gh3*
Owner/Client: City of Edmonton
Architect: Morrison Hershfield
Interior Designer: gh3*
Landscape Architect: gh3*
Structural Engineer: Morrison Hershfield
Mechanical Engineer: Morrison Hershfield
Electrical Engineer: Morrison Hershfield
Heritage Consultant: David Murray
Contractor: Graham Construction
Photographer: Raymond Chow; gh3*

Jury Comments

This project recasts the idea of infrastructure as architecture—and art. Unlike many infrastructural buildings of the past that only received an engineer’s attention, the Kathleen Andrews Transit Garage addresses brown field site remediation, historic preservation, and environmentally responsive building systems, all while accommodating the needs of a state-of-the-art transportation facility. Named after the first female bus driver in the Edmonton transit system, the 50,000-square-metre building is wrapped with a taught and variegated stainless steel and glass skin, and punctuated with scalar elements extending into the landscape. The five striking sculpted volumes that rise above the building provide daylight to the expansive interiors and serve to establish a dialogue between geography and place—a refreshingly inventive approach to ‘critical regionalism’.