Given the lack of neighbours, the studio Santiago Carroquino Arquitectos designs the new complex as a building that, beyond resolving the programmed uses, seeks to generate spaces appropriate to the scale of the users and to meet the seasonal needs of the staff of the different emergency units.
The project is developed constructively through the same envelope on the façade and roof, giving continuity and unity to spaces as antagonistic to the complex as the helicopter hangar and the rest areas for the staff. This solution allows its immateriality when the needs of ventilation or vision demand it, giving rise to spaces always adapted to the requirements of the uses and users.
Emergency base for Civil Protection and Forest Management by Santiago Carroquino Arquitectos. Photograph by Simón García/ arqfoto.
Project description by Santiago Carroquino Arquitectos
The new Emergency Base to accommodate the Health Transport, Civil Protection and Forestry Management Helicopters of the Government of Aragon is located in the Aeronautical Industrial Park of Villanueva de Gállego. It is a hybrid building in terms of the scale of its parts and use, as well as the constructive solution and the environment in which it is located.
Located in the Villanueva de Gállego aerodrome, 20 km from Zaragoza, close to both one of Amazon's data centres in Aragon and the Army's manoeuvres field in S. Gregorio, its immediate building references are the hangars of the small ultra-light aircraft at the aerodrome and the prefabricated high-security building of the IT giant. These are the only buildings currently under construction in an industrial park that is expected to expand rapidly.
Located next to the airstrip and delimited in an isolated plot that acts as a boundary between the air-land area of the complex, the base programme is defined in three different areas: Hangar for two helicopters, garages for Civil Protection and Forest Fire vehicles and an intermediate living area made up of offices and dormitories. The latter caters for both the seasonal needs of the forest fire personnel (whose presence is limited to the summer months) and the continuous annual and 24-hour stay of the Civil Protection personnel. It is also planned that the base will house the aerodrome coordinator, which adds the need to have a visual control post for the airstrip.
In the absence of neighbourhoods, the base is designed as a self-referential building in which, beyond resolving the programmed uses, it seeks to generate habitats appropriate to the scale of the users. The east-west scheme, Hangar - Living Area - Garages, is punctuated by interior courtyards, towards which the domestic rooms and offices are directed. These are organised according to their executive proximity to the airstrip or the distance from it, with the consequent acoustic improvement.
Constructively, the same façade and roof envelope has been designed in the hope that the continuity of the Europerfil panel will give unity to spaces as antagonistic as a helicopter hangar and a single-person dormitory. This dry construction solution, which has been installed in accordance with the aeronautical environment, allows its inner side to be adapted with dry partitioning to the uses of each zone, with eucalyptus joinery appearing in those rooms where warmth is demanded by the human scale. Although the envelope is continuous, it is immaterial when ventilation or vision requirements demand it. In keeping with the concreteness of the volume, the lighting of the rooms is resolved with smooth polycarbonate surfaces in the envelope of the aisles and openings, which require jambs, sills and lintels in the case of the living area.
As a nod to the study's nursery schools, in which the height of 1.20 m was set as the limit of the children's play space, a height of 2.40 m is established, within which the human sphere is developed.
