AECOM has designed a preliminary study for a mixed-use transportation development in Beach, California, as part of a response for a RFP (Request for Proposal). Located near major roads and connected to railroads, the project proposal consists of a combination of retail stores and restaurants, providing transit users with leisure spaces on their travels, in addition to parking for the nearby AMTRAK train station.
AECOM’s proposal for the transit-based development uses intersecting volumes to create programmatically overlapping spaces where travelers can discover “new informal social programs and spaces.” Materiality and structure in the Solana Beach project visually separate the building into two entities: a parking garage and a retail center. Restaurants and stores housed in tube-like forms made from glass and steel rest on top of a large parking garage made of poured in place concrete and CMU block.
The shape of the volumes is a response to the architecture of the surrounding area, which contains several metal Quonset hut warehouses. Because of the length and geometric simplicity of this form, the architects are able to transform it into a unit that they can selectively modify. The architecture of this transit oriented development is imagined as a serial and repetitive structure that has been deformed and customized. The end result is should produce a set of incidental and peculiar spatial sequences and overlapping programmatic instances that will culture-jam the functional purpose of infrastructure, inserting new informal social programs and spaces.