Brandon Fire and Emergency Services Building
The new 30,000 sq.ft. Brandon Fire and Emergency Services
Building replaces the outdated facility originally built for
horse and carriage in 1909. The project is divided into two
formal components, a fire hall wing and an administrative wing. The minimally detailed, non-programmed transparent volume
situated between the two wings acts as a dramatic entry into
both sections of the facility for staff and visitors, mediating
the two programs with a thin hovering glulam bridge connecting
the two sides. The public entry on the east side of this volume
engages and welcomes the community with a generous landscaped
public 'plaza' enclosed by the museum to the north, and the
apparatus floor to the south. The museum features a “Bickle”, an
80-year-old fire truck situated as if it is ready to take off to
the next call, while the apparatus floor houses all the current
emergency vehicles. The extensive glazing on both of the facades
surrounding this plaza and entry highlight the rich history of
the fire department in the City, and allow visitors a glance
into a state of the art facility. Severing the two components through the formal
gesture of a pivot, appropriately orients the fire hall wing
with the street, and aligns the administrative wing with the
creek to the northwest.The fire hall's program consists of a
five double bay apparatus floor, an SCBA facility which
maintains the breathing apparatus for the Brandon Fire
Department, a workshop, gear storage locker for 60 firefighters,
an alarm room, a 55 foot high hose tower, crew quarters for
sleeping, a dayroom and kitchen. The program of the
administration wing consists of offices for the administration
staff, including the fire chief, deputy fire chiefs and City
inspectors, a boardroom, a historical museum, a training
classroom, and the Provincial 911 call centre, which handles all
emergency calls in Manitoba outside of the City of Winnipeg.
The dramatic hose tower stands proud in the landscape and
acts as an urban marker for people entering the City along 18th
street, one of only two means of access to Brandon from the
TransCanada Highway. Through a complex series of walls and fire
separations the hose tower also acts as a training facility, and
an exit stair that connects the industrial occupancy of the
apparatus floor with the domestic occupancy of the dorms on the
second level. The dark brick pavers that begin at the visitor
parking area wrap around the building on horizontal walking
surfaces then thrust vertically from the landscape to form the
cladding for the tower. This dark brick contrasts the strip of
vertical glazing on the east face of the tower that allows the
passerby to view the drying fire hoses hanging in this high
volume. While the majority of the building is clad in a white
cement panel rain screen system, this brick harkens back to the
more traditional brick fire hall, which this facility replaces.
The white panels and dark brick are offset by the use of a
series of Ipe (Brazilian hardwood) walls and matching wood
composite panel ceilings that flow from outside the building to
within. This monochromatic scheme allows the emergency vehicles
and a long strip of red perennial plantings to provide the color
rendition for the project.
This facility validates the idea that a primarily utilitarian
program, which often times results in a prefabricated solution,
can become a sophisticated architectural project that
contributes to its surrounding community and landscape while
still fulfilling its demanding functional requirements and
modest budget.
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