The Superbow Project, designed by Supermachine Studio, is a proposal for a sustainable city of its own. Using Nakornsawan, Thailand as a location to implement their vision of a giant hydraulic tool in the network, they place a new ‘Water’ city in between the two rivers to slowly generate a new way of living for Nakornsawan’s people. The city, located by 2 rivers Ping and Nan, is usually flooded every year, but in 2011 the water broke the protecting levee into the city’s center. The whole town of Nakornsawan sank into one meter plus deep water. Therefore, this project aims to build a massive hydraulic tool that is habitable as an extension of the city or as a new city itself that all of people in the old city can move into. More images and architects’ description after the break.
Thailand is a country at risk of water disaster both draught and flood. Considering its size, the country has a great length of rivers in its water network, specially the central delta. Together with monsoon behavior around the region, Thailand has always been worried about more than less water to use. But delirious sprawl of cities and irresponsible agriculture lands trigger huge imbalance of water flow; insufficient to use during dry season and larger scale flood during rainy season.
We have to change the way we live with water, but more than that, we need far larger and more efficient tools to manage it. We need network of hydraulic device big enough to manage 6,000-10,000 million cubic meter of water that spill out of the rivers every year. “Dams won’t work.. They are managed by politics.” We need new tools that are more human related. The people’s tools. The tools that make us more responsible and enable us to live with water in the new way all together.
4 factors that Cause Calamity
1. Water released from Bhumipol dam running down to the city from Ping River with high-speed because of mountainous topography in the North-West. 2. Nan River from the North-East has combined Yom River which has no dam to manage water flow. Water mass coming from this direction is less-controlable. 3. Boraped lake has not been used as hydrolic tool that help the city managing water. The lake has been shut off from natural water system and intruded by farmlands. It is now shallow and inefficient as a water managing tool. 4. Water flowing down Chaopraya River is blocked by full capacity of the river below caused by unusual behavior of rain and conflicts of land-use that bring about confusing watergates management.
We propose to build a 20 km. long soil hill in closed shape in between 2 rivers in the east of the city of Nakornsawan. The 150 meter high hill will form a giant water reservoir capable of managing 1,500 million m3 (15% of Bhumipol dam) water. The massive water device will work together with other devices in the network like a kingkong sucking in water from the rivers during monsoon season with 3 giant pumps at 180million m3/day. It will slowly release the water out during dry season keeping the part of the water for 5.85 million m2 agriculture on the inner surface of the reservoir itself.
The outer surface will be 40% covered with forest of diverse species. In time, people will populate and urbanize the outer surface of the hill in specific area without harming the fully grown forest. The new city will be thin but continuous one running up and down the surface of the hill allowing the residents to be close to the forest. In our vision, the city is one continuous architecture netting on the giant water device. Its structure will be standing on the soil to strengthen the reservoir as a whole. The new architecture is a vast 28.3 million m2 of mix-use programs (from house to school, cinema, market to government facilities) able to inhabit half a million people, the size of downtown Nakornsawan itself.
Superbowl project is a sustainable city of its own as it has power sources from wind turbine, water, hydro-generator, bio-gas and dye-synthesized solar cell installed on all of its surface. Hydroponic planting system is also a built-in element on the whole building skin. People will plant their own consuming vegetable while traditional terrace rice planting will be allowed one crop a year inside the reservoir. In this city, farmers still exist but in much more organized and water-efficient way.
Less cars are allowed in the new city, parking is distributed along the band in nodes. The residents use cars just to travel to other cities. In Superbowl Project, they will use 3 lines of in ground Metros. 3 levels of public transportation connect people in the city via 3 interchange stations on each side of the peripheries. On top level, which is the water level, people will travel with boats. Public facilities like parks or sport stadiums are floating elements on water including airport.
Architects: Supermachine Studio Location: Nakornsawan, Thailand Design Team: Pitupong Chaowakul, Nuntawat Tassanasangsoon, Wattikon Kosolkit, Yupadee Suthvisith, Suchart Ouypornchaisakul, Peechaya Mekasuvanroj, Sthapat Soichampa , Supanna Chanpensri Supported by: The Association of Siamese Architects Under Royal Patronage
