Gateway Station | Rob Pfaffmann

PROJECT OVERVIEW The Gateway Center Station marks the extension of the city's light rail system to Pittsburgh’s Northside. The $8 million structure provides intermodal connections and dramatic views of Point State Park. Commuters are sheltered by a glazed station structure adjoining a sloped landscape plaza. The extensive use of glass introduces natural light deep into the station and at night serves as a visible gateway and easily identified landmark for all downtown workers and visitors. The Port Authority’s Goals As the regional agency charged with providing mass transit to Pittsburgh and its suburbs, THe Port Authority conducted a competitive selection process for the design of three stations for the North Shore Connector of the existing light rail system serving downtwon and the southern suburbs. The system was built to replace the existing trolley network that congested downtown Pittsburgh’s narrow 19th century streets. CHALLENGE The client had completed preliminary design with an engineering firm before opening the project to a public design competition. Though preliminary designs illustrated a traditional underground station with a solid wall headhouse, the Request for Proposals requested only ideas for “station finishes” from submitting firms. Ultimately much more than mere finishes, the station design grew from the design team’s ability to model a complex alignment of geometries of tracks headed under the Allegheny River, shallow excavation clearances with the adjacent office towers and street utilities and connections to the existing system. PROPOSAL Because the preliminary underground station design did not adequately meet the client’s stated goals, our team proposed an alternative design. The new strategy to “unbury” the station, created physical and visual connections into the station from the city and from the city into the station. The key to unburying the station was utilizing the adjacent triangular traffic island at Gateway Center as a small public park with a sloped grade exposing the western side of the station, allowing glass to be extended down along the park landscape. SOLUTION With the proposed design, pedestrians observe the coming and going of trains from the plaza and adjacent street, bringing transit into the public realm, lacing together station activity with urban street life. Rather than simply accepting the norm of burying transit under the street, the new station creates a dynamic relationship with the urban context at both platform and street level. The competition brief challenged the architects to: DAYLIGHT Introduce and maximize daylight into the station. The station’s heavily reinforced concrete “box” that accomodates the station’s interior elements that users see (stairs, escalators, waiting platforms), is very unusual for an underground station because it introduces natural light to the platform, reducing the amount of artifical light needed during daylight hours. GATEWAY EXPERIENCE Create a Gateway experience for arriving passengers, celebrating the dramatic arrival in Pittsburgh usually reserved for auto travelers through the tunnels. SENSE OF PLACE Create a strong sense of place and identity for the structure both above and below grade. TRANSPARENCY Maximize the visual connections to and from the station and relate to the heroic post-war Modernist stainless steel and glass towers of Gateway Center. WAYFINDING Translate the complex geometries of the site into clear travels paths for predestrians from a new public park into the station. SUSTAINABLE DESIGN FEATURES: Reduced regional carbon footprint: The design of public transit demands high quality to design and service to maximize ridership and reduce use of automobiles in downtown Pittsburgh. Natural daylighting utilizing low iron glass to maximize daylight penetration. Green park atop old station tunnels (essentially a green roof) High efficiency LED and T5 lighting Stormwater runoff is acomodated through a cistern on site for irrigation of planters and trees. Natural riverstone recycled from construction excavation in the region. Native plants requiring low maintenance and durable in the urban environment.