ECONOMY OF RESOURCES

ENERGY CONSERVATION

The entrance of the Bacoor City Hall is oriented on the east along with offices
and spaces with high occupancy such as the express payment and application center
(meralco, bayad center, etc.), canteen, registration and action center, located at the
lower ground, where there is minimal ventilation and natural light. On the ground floor,
low occupancy spaces such as private offices are located near the entrance or at the
western part of the structure, while most of the departments are located on the eastern
part. On the third floor of Bacoor City Hall, offices, conference rooms, and departmental
offices are located on the east while the western part has three function halls and a
chapel.

The site planning of the Bacoor City Hall oriented the building to the west, while
placing structures such as a gymnasium, DepEd division office, NBI office, and
commercial spaces which serve as sun buffers to the city hall’s surroundings. Trees and
landscaping are also present around the site which helps improve air quality and
comfort in the area.

The structure uses reinforced concrete as the main building material. Concrete
has a high thermal capacity to absorb energy (heat) but is slow to lose energy and gives
a time lag where the concrete does not release all the heat gain at night and then gains
heat again at daytime. Bacoor city hall does not have a well designed and insulated
passive solar building, which is essential to the structure especially during the summer
season in which the large amounts of the thermal mass of concrete can significantly
reduce cooling and heating needs. The structure also doesn’t have alternative sources
of energy and its power supply is directly distributed by meralco.

There are also some contributions to passive heating and cooling embodied in
the design of Bacoor City Hall, such as having corridors that lead to open spaces, but
some high occupancy spaces are located on areas where there is direct sunlight or
solar heat gain. The façade of the structure has many curtain walls and windows which
is oriented on the west, but has small repetitive windows on the other sides of the
structure. The minimal glazing on the south side reduces heat loss but the glazing and
curtain walls must be located on the north and not on the west to optimize daylight and
solar gain. There is also minimal shading on the structure which is required especially
during the summer season to control natural light and solar heat gain on certain areas
of the structure.
WATER CONSERVATION

There is no water collection or reuse system on the design of Bacoor City Hall
such as rainwater collection and graywater collection system, which is recommended to
the structure to minimize the use of water from the local water supply and to be used on
the flushing of toilets and watering of the landscaping located on the façade of the
structure.

MATERIAL CONSERVATION

The design of Bacoor City Hall did not use reclaimed or recycled materials for its
building material. The materials used in the construction of the city hall are mainly a
mixture of reinforced concrete and glass, and also the structure did not use non-
conventional building materials.
LIFE CYCLE DESIGN
PRE BUILDING DESIGN PHASE

In September 29. 2015, The Bacoor City hall was inaugurated. Located at Molina Boulevard,
Brgy. San Nicolas II, the city hall was erected on a 2 hectares of land donated by Senator Manny
Villar and Addas Development Corporation. Designed as a one-stop government center, the city
hall houses government offices such as satellite branches of National statistics office, Bureau of
Investigation, Department of trade and Industry, Housing and Land Use Regulatory Board and
Overseas Workers Welfare Administration; as a part of the city’s urban development program into
to their vision of a progressive city according to Mayor Strike Revilla.

Previously housed at the old municipal hall of

Bacoor in Barangay Tabing Dagat, the plan OLD MUNICIPAL
commenced for the building could no longer HALL
accommodate the needs of the local government
Units.
NEW CITY
The previous site suffers from accessibility issues- HALL
being located at the northmost portion of the city,
and cramps at a very small space surrounded by
residential areas. Site Selection-wise, the new site
offers much better strategic planning and
accessibility-being much closer from the center.
The new site allowed a 11,200 sqm of Floor Area -
design for the planned one-stop center. BACOOR CITY

ARCHITECTURE

The City hall is facing west, It’s

N
front side is enveloped by huge
curtain walls of glass and circular
columns. This means those areas
will receive and gain heat and solar
radiation everyday the most. The
building footprint is designed about
the East-West Axis, with its longer W E
sides facing those directions and
no forms of mitigations make the
situation a lot more unfortunately
horrible. The glass wall spans from

S
the upper ground floor up to the
third floor and should only
encourage more heat gain.

SPACES RECEIVING THE MOST
SOLAR RADIATION DUE TO
ORIENTATION
 Office of the City Assessor
 Business Permit & Licensing Office
 Main Lobby / Information
 Office of the City Registrar
 Registry of Deeds
 Office of the Building Official
 CSWD
 Housing and Development Office
 Urban Poor Section
 CENRO
 Zoning and Land Dev’t Department
 Office of the City Engineer
 BIDS Award and Committee
 City Planning and Dev’t Council
 Lani Conference Room
 LMR Conference Room
 SBR Conference Room
 Mayors Office
 City Admin Office
 STRIKE SA SERBISYO Visitors
Lounge
 City Cooperative Development
Office
 COMELEC
Bacoor City Hall Front Façade, @ Google Earth
The following list are the summary of all spaces
receiving the most solar radiation due to ineffective
orientation based from the city hall floor plans. Upon
inspection, we can see that most of the affected spaces
ranges from low to mid occupancy mostly.
Landscaping
The City Hall complex showcases minimal landscaping
throughout the site. Its sole landscaping is situated at
the front façade and purely for aesthetic purposes. It is
misses the design opportunity to proactively respond
against the intense heat coming from those directions
thus relying too much on mechanical interventions to
achieve thermal comfort inside and prevent urban heat
island effect from the heat emitted by the building itself.
The Architecture misses another opportunity again, this
time to use trees as a natural shading device for
pedestrians and absorb the reflected heat by the
building. Without trees, there’s no chance to purify the
air outside the building and cool the area; because a
single tree is nowhere to be found. All that is there, are
just shrubs and plants that does very little to no
contribution at all.
BUILDING PHASE

CONSTRUCTION & OPERATION

There’s no information about the city hall’s structural design known to public. The researchers,
unfortunately, are unable to secure any information on this matter even after series of week-long
inquiries to the city hall. Having no public information and any news at all, logically means that
there wasn’t anything special on its structural design let alone during its construction. From these
bases, it is safe to assume that all of its construction are conventionally done.

In the context of Sustainable Architecture, conventional construction means failing to consider

that sustainable practice extends way earlier and much further than the structure’s main function.
There is going to be a high amount of embodied energy produced from the manufacturing of the
construction processes-which is a bad thing.

POST BUILDING/ CONSTRUCTION PHASE

In the context of Sustainable Architecture, conventional construction means failure to look into
the structure's life cycle as an important consideration. Concrete, being the city hall’s primary
construction material, has the inopportune inability to be recycled when the building’s at the end
of its life. Steel construction is a different story. Structural steel relies on mechanical connections,
because of that, disassembly and deconstruction during the structure’s end of life is
uncomplicated and undemanding. Concrete relies on chemical process for it to form and is
irreversible, therefore no extended use when the building is to be demolished. That is why steel
structures are phenomenally more sustainable in comparison-they can be disassembled and
reshaped again into different sections without any compromise to its strength.

The Bacoor City hall offers little potential to its end-of-life stage. However, the structure has
average potential for future retrofitting. Symmetrical in plan, is the building’s main strength—
flexible and versatile enough for future redevelopment. Standing at 4 floors with over 11,200 sqm
of floor area is another positive feature of the building—lots of room to on. Meanwhile, its
inefficient orientation can be an issue. The weaknesses however, can be addressed by
redesigning the building envelope and proper sustainable cladding.
HUMANE DESIGN

Humane design is the most significant principle when it comes to sustainable

design. While economy of resources and life cycle design deal with efficiency and
conservation, humane design is concerned with the livability of all the elements of the
global ecosystem concerning the parameter of the structure, and when you say all the
elements, I don’t only pertain to humans but including the plants and wildlife as well.
This principle arises from the benevolent and humane goal of respecting the life of
fellow living organisms.

PRESERVING NATURAL CONDITIONS

Carbon Footprints

Energy efficiency and conservation while maintaining comfort is one thing to

consider when designing sustainably. Maximizing the minimal consumption of energy
leads to lesser carbon footprints furthermore lessening the impact of a structure when it
comes to climate change and other consequences. Lessening or avoiding carbon
footprints may be one of the most challenging elements in sustainable design as you
need to weigh human comfort and up to what extent can you compromise it while
achieving the goal of lessening or eliminating carbon footprints.

Bacoor City Hall uses split type air-conditioning units on most of its rooms. You
can easily tell with one glance because of the existence of split type air-conditioning
outdoor units on its building faces. This may result to huge counts of carbon emission.
The main building does have a lightwell that is approximately 2% of the floor area of the
building. This element greatly helps illuminate the building interior specifically the lobby
of the City Hall.
 Contrary to that, the surrounding structures namely the DEPED division office,
the gymnasium, the Bulwagan ng Liga ng mga Barangay, the City Health Center, and
the Bacoor Command Center have generous number of windows but mostly are closed
because they use air-conditioning units as well. The building thus has a generous
amount of natural illumination. The Bacemco Building, which stands for Bacoor City
Employees Multipurpose Cooperative building in contrary with the rest of the buildings
do have a passive cooling design. It is a two-storey commercial building that has open
hallways and a hallow multipurpose hall in the middle which is open and therefore
promotes passive cooling. The commercial establishments are also open and thus
require less use of artificial lighting and ventilation. Though, there are some commercial
stores on the second floor that are enclosed with curtain walls that do need air-
conditioning units to attain the thermal comfort.

Therefore, in conclusion, there are a lot of things to improve in the Bacoor City
Hall when it comes to attaining sustainability under preserving natural conditions.
Lessening or eliminating carbon footprints and incorporating it with building design is
essential to lessen the building’s impact on the environment.

URBAN DESIGN and SITE PLANNING CONSIDERATIONS

The access to information is limited so

my team cannot concretely determine if there
are any plants or wildlife that are disrupted
prior to the construction of the building. The
building is surrounded by a huge field of
crops and a generous number of trees. My
hypothesis would be a fraction of the filed
was obviously mowed to make way for the
building. As for the trees, the tree patterns of
the surrounding site suggest that there could
also be trees that are cut down prior to the
construction of the building. The present site
was generously planted with trees and
vegetation, but we cannot determine if the
species that are cut down are the same as
those that are used to replace it.
HUMAN COMFORT

WALKABILITY AND ACCESSIBILITY

The building complies well with the BP344 when it comes to accessibility. The
ramps are evident from the exterior, granting access for the persons with disabilities.
There are not enough sun-shading devices present on the site perimeter. There are no
covered pathwalks from the main road to the building site rendering the site to be weak
when it terms to walkability.

The building do have a direct access from a main road which is the Molino
Boulevard, but this is approximately around 100 meters in length so we can tell that it
will be straining to enter the site without a car especially for the elderlies looking for
medical assistance or asking for a document. The building are spaced closely to each
other so there is no problem when it comes to hopping from one building to another at
bare minimum, but still sun shading devices should be installed like covered pathways
and louvers.

THERMAL COMFORT

The building is fully equipped with air-conditioning units which might fulfill the
thermal comfort of the people inside the building envelope. Passive cooling is almost
completely neglected on most parts of the building because they rely merely on air-
conditioning units.