Home Building Curiosities: The Bridge
I think I am honestly in love. And William is right there with me. No, I am not talking about our marriage. It’s still going great, though! Thanks for asking. I am talking about our seventh Home Building Curiosity, The Bridge. The Bridge is highly unique in comparison to the curiosities who preceded it. This building curiosity is also relatively very new, and very local (well, to us at least). The Bridge is currently gathering the funds, resources, and momentum to tackle their first project: renovating the long-abandoned Bishop McDevitt Catholic school in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania into apartments, community development spaces, and educational centers. They want to turn the old school into what they are calling, an ‘eco-village.’
Much like William and I, The Bridge has five main principles that they would like to adhere to. Very unlike us, they are renovating an already standing, old, rather large, structure…a 1930’s, 115,000 square foot building resting on an eight and a half acre property, to be exact. They are also attempting to keep the building as true to its original form as possible, and only modifying the interior. We, on the other hand, are doing a small, new build.
Understandably, the five main principles are therefore different. As you may be well aware at this point, William and I’s five main principles that we want our home to follow are: meet Passive House standards, have prefabrication in mind, be net zero or even net positive, have a small footprint, and provide and enable healthy living. The Bridge’s five main principles are: Work- provide a place on-site (a makerspace, an office…) where entrepreneurs can gather together to share resources, ideas, and create, Eat- closed loop agriculture will be practiced, allowing fresh food to be available to inhabitants year round, Live- apartments will be available for rent, including affordable housing options, Learn- job training, personal development, and tutoring will be made available to inhabitants on-site, Play- arcades, concert venues, gyms, will all be on-site for inhabitants. Because this is a Home Building Curiosity, we believe that it is relevant to present The Bridge according to our five main principles. However, their five main principles will not be neglected, as you can see in the contexts of ‘net zero,’ ‘small footprint,’ and ‘healthy living.’