Dunbar Apartments (3595 West 17th Avenue)

SECTOR

Residential

Year

2011

Location

Vancouver

Awards

LEED Gold Certified

Highlights

  • High thermal performance building envelope
  • High-performance windows with top and bottom openings for added comfort without air conditioning
  • Rooftop solar hot water collectors
  • Centralized heat recovery system extracts heat from exhaust air and uses it to pre-heat fresh air for use in the building.
  • Reduced energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions

Project Details

This project was part of the Provincial Housing Initiative with BC Housing and Coast Mental Health to provide a combination of low-income housing and support services. Designed to LEED Gold standards, the building includes 47 self-contained studio residential units of about 350 sq.ft. in size plus four 510 sq.ft. wheelchair accessible units for people with disabilities or mental health issues living in Westside Vancouver.

Amenities include a kitchen, lounge, meeting rooms, offices and other spaces designed to assist the residents’ program and needs. The project also includes approximately 4,000 sq.ft. of ground-floor retail space owned by the City of Vancouver who, in turn, leases the commercial/retail units to retail business operators.

The building’s mechanical systems focus on energy efficiency and renewable energy. Features include a roof-mounted solar panel array used to preheat domestic hot water for use by the facility. Energy recovery strategies are used to recover heat from exhaust air, reducing the overall heating requirements for the ventilation system.