Morgan Hill, CA

The Morgan Hill Public Works Dept and Yard was designed and constructed in 1989. It was the first public project that Weston Miles Architects did. It involved site design of the corporation yard, programming with all workers from street maintenance to engineering and the coordination and re-design of a Pizza parlor that was moved to the site. Although this was 20 years ago, the adaptive re-use of the building and relocation were clearly years ahead of sustainable design. The reuse made sense since the building was in the way of a road extension. Part of the design was also a toxic storage area for all materials that were used through out the city. Clean out areas for trucks and storage for all road materials were also designed.

In this case, the Programming process was unique as we were working with a number of staff members that were not used to a Design process and had specific concerns about the City and their work, we used graphics with sketches and designed a complete site map showing trucks, back up areas and how access and storage would work. In 20 years no modifications have been made to the yard and toxic storage area with the secondary containment.

The project was adjacent to the main Community Park where a number of events are held so we recommended installing access for parking during the day on the park site for workers, creating a cul-de-sac with access that could then be controlled for events. This allowed for limiting the amount of parking required on the site an important outcome of the Programming process to keep workers cars out the yard.

From a design standpoint although LEED and sustainability were several years away, this was our first Public sustainable project.