this week i received loose boundaries and points for each of the three sites. therefore, i decided to sketch out some rough site analysis's ahead of my final site plan to help me decide which site to design for.
choosing a well connected site was important to me since my main parti revolves around the idea that a child's journey to the forest from the residential areas will have been on available paths, they will be used to following them. therefore it would be interesting to integrate the building in some way to the paths and make a child's journey throughout the building as intuitive as possible using path like design to guide them to where they need to be.
comparison : the act of evaluating two or more things.
where characteristics are different, the differences may then be evaluated to determine which thing is best suited for a particular purpose.
site one is far into the forest from either residential estate with a single path towards the back of the forest. it offers views of the moat, however this is just on the other side of the main path presenting potential safety concerns for the young children. it is also right next to the main trainline towards Cosham. this contributes to a regular noise pollution multiple times per hour, per day. although interesting for children, it does also act as a distraction which is reliable and consistent.
site two offers a good positioning within the forest. it is within reasonable walking distance of both the larger and smaller residential estates and has a really good path selection going around the site and cutting across it. this presents a really nice way for me to experiment with path integration and i feel i could really explore an idea of creating a central hub or a crossing of the paths almost like a forest clearing? the only main concerns for noise pollution would be the industrial estate although there is adequate space between it and the site as well as the densest portion of the east bastion and tree line being between the two acting as a buffer. the site also offers the best views out onto the creek and the shingles out of the three available sites to the north. this i feel will be of great benefit to the children being able to integrate with nature. towards the east is a good connection to a residential estate - from where many of the children would've come from - a connection to home. to the south is a view of the treeline and east bastion, and to the west a view of the moat surrounded by trees. i think that site two is the most connected to the nature around it, already being close to many aspects of the nature found within the forest and lending itself to a building integrated into it. there is however potential concern with the a27 being the other side of the creek with regards to noise pollution although there is a treeline on the side of the road.
site three is the closest to the eastern residential estate and therefore is next to intersecting paths which come from each side of the estate before leading into the forest. it seems to be more integrated with the bastion than the forest however as it wraps around the residential and industrial estate. as a result, it doesn't really seem to have any great views of the forest instead being butted up to the east bastion towards the north west of the site, seeing pretty far into the residential estate to the north east and south due to a fairly patchy treeline along limited portions of the estate. to the south is the industrial estate and no buffer to a car park within it. this introduces noise pollution as although there is some buffer due to the east bastion, because of the site location being at the end of the bastion, it does little to protect against the more open areas.
