Taiwan’s southern port city of Kaohsiung has announced a plan to build a library using a cable suspension structure and green architecture technologies.
“This marks the city’s largest investment so far in the cultural sector,” city mayor Chen Chu said May 27. “It will help upgrade Kaohsiung’s status as an international city.”
The NT$1.18 billion (US$41 million) project will see the city’s public library headquarters rebuilt into a seven-story building facing the city’s main harbor, to house some 500,000 books, according to the city government.
“It will become the world’s first library using a steel-cable suspension structure, with its weight supported by four main columns,” said Ricky Liu, the project’s lead architect.
After the four columns are built, Liu added, the floors of the building will be hung from the columns using a complex suspension system.
The library will also become an example of energy saving architecture, featuring patches of greenery to block external heat, a rainwater recycle and reuse system, a special ventilation system that directs wind into the building and numerous glass windows that let in ample daylight, he said.
Thanks to its cable structure, the building will use 70 percent less cement as compared to a regular building of similar magnitude, he added. “It fulfills its mission as a green building by cutting carbon emissions.”
Construction is expected to begin July 2012 and will take less than two years to complete, Liu said. (HZW)
Write to Kwangyin Liu at kwangyin.liu@mail.gio.gov.tw