This project envisions a pencil tower ‘autonomous district’ in Hong Kong, stitching together existing context through a permeable, terraced, forest podium.

Through cultural injection of density and civic programmes along the elevated oblique arteries, autonomous vehicles and amenities inhabit the ground floor, and the upper levels will be pedestrianised.

Hong Kong’s densification through a shortage of land had resulted in the Mass Transit Railway (MTR), which merges transit with residential high-rise towers. Inspired to reform current systems that hinder horizontal sprawl through the utopic vision of intense lush forests by futurist Syd Mead, the project aims to inject nature into the epicentre of congestion. Sited in Mongkok, the vehicular congestion epicentre market strip with pedestrianised informal market streets, elevated pedestrian plains connect a network of civic spaces through inhabiting the plenum between the podium and tower.

To develop the scheme, simulations using computational fluid dynamics were conducted on traditional typologies with different diagonal insertions. Iterative development found a means to reduce wind loads by 25%. The massing tests followed strategic moves to maximise breezeways and minimise turbulent pressure within the podium typology, letting the podium grow to four floors.