Toronto has more than 2400 publicly owned laneways, covering more than 250 linear kilometres of public space, but lacks policy dictating their use.
Race to Net Zero Homes
Since 2014, the U.S. Department of Energy has held an annual ‘Race to Zero’ competition where 30 teams from four countries compete to design a home so energy efficient that it uses renewable sources to offset all or most of its annual energy consumption. A Ryerson team has won the competition every year.
As our generation gets older and car ownership drops, garages are going to be used less. Our proposal is to use these spaces as opportunities for laneway housing, places for people to live downtown that meet the demands of a growing urban centre as well as creating better neighbourhoods where people want to live.
I enjoyed branching architecture with building science and creating a beautiful and functional design. The biggest challenge was creating an economic case for the building. It was about optimizing the costs to ensure maximum performance per dollar.