"on the island" - a gas bar

Ubiquitous across the North American landscape is the humble gas station island. Both an urban and rural feature of everyday life, the gas station is not often associated with architecture; it is a typology overlooked by architects, and yet it forms such a consistent component of the built fabric. Whether alone beside the highway on the prairie, or subsumed within a dense urban streetscape, a primary feature of the gas station island is its physical isolation. It is a building typology that must stand alone, of physical necessity. The design challenge then lies in both the opportunity and constraint of this isolation, but potential conceptual connection with its surroundings.

A secondary feature of many gas station islands is the utilization of the cantilever as the structural solution to the programmatic requirements. Students are challenged to design a single span gas station island, possibly a cantilever, on a site of the designers’ choosing. The structure must be primarily steel, but otherwise, the material palette is open.

Close to 40 entries were received, representing schools of Architecture across Canada.