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PHOTOS Ema Peter, unless otherwise noted
It can be a sticky business when prominent architects get overly associ-
ated with a single construction material. While he had an early career
as a design critic and polemicist, in his later role as building-oriented
architect Le Corbusier was a vocal champion of reinforced concrete,
notably through his design for the Dom-Ino system for housing construc-
tion. But Dom-Ino was never applied in its pure form in his lifetime, and
technically, Le Corbusier was not much of an innovator. The look, feel,
associations and texture of his beloved béton brut were important to his
architecture, especially the late works, but he was not personally disposed
to—or skilled in—inventing new modes of construction.
Corbu was a genius not of technique, but rather of aesthetics—
architecture students always presume more of his white villas are built
of cast concrete than is actually the case. Contrast this with the build-
ings of his former employer: behind the neo-classical façades of
Auguste Perret’s rue Franklin Apartments or the Théâtre des Champs-
Elysées, one finds true technical innovation. The same is true of Frank
Lloyd Wright, who innovated in concrete because his designs demanded
it, from the early Wisconsin warehouses to Fallingwater and the
WITH OVER A MILLION VIEWS OF HIS ONLINE
TED TALK, MICHAEL GREEN IS A LEADING—
AND INCREASINGLY VOCAL—ADVOCATE FOR
MASS TIMBER CONSTRUCTION. BUT IT’S
NOT JUST TALK. TREVOR BODDY TAKES
A LOOK INSIDE TWO RECENT BUILDINGS THAT
POINT TO A FUTURE OF LARGER, TALLER
WOOD STRUCTURES.
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CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­
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CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­
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CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­
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Guggenheim. Here in Canada, the formal repertoires and socially
minded ambitions of Bing Thom, FRAIC, and Douglas Cardinal,
FRAIC, prompted new building techniques and assemblies in wood,
concrete, glass and brick.
It is not untoward to invoke the struggle between Corbu’s polemical
writing and his built accomplishments in approaching the work and
ideas of Vancouver’s Michael Green, FRAIC. No Canadian architect
since Moshe Safdie, FRAIC, has risen into global prominence as blin-
dingly fast. Michael Green has emerged as the apostle of wood, a char-
ismatic Moses bringing forth tablets of CLT, GLT, NLT, MTP, and
LSL as the carbon-sequestering solutions to the crisis of climate
change. His powerful 2013 TED talk “Why We Should Build Wooden
Skyscrapers” has been downloaded an astonishing 1,044,911 times—
more video views, without doubt, than those from all other Canadian
architects combined. Since his status as an advocate of wood is secure,
it is now time to look at some of his firm’s key finished constructions—
as this polemicist is also very much a builder. But to better understand
both modes, a note first on his biography and early portfolio.
Michael Green was born in 1966 in Baker Lake, Nunavut, where his
Scottish-born father worked as an administrator after serving at Hud-
son’s Bay Company posts. The family relocated to Ottawa when he was
a toddler. Green’s American-born mother’s family was Ivy League-
linked: grandfather Richard Bennett was the Yale School of Architec-
ture chair who first hired Louis Kahn to teach there. Bennett’s wife
divorced him and re-married a Cornell historian; Green followed family
links to begin his architecture studies there in 1984. An indifferent stu-
dent, his undergraduate passions were mountaineering and ice-climbing;
his Cornell design thesis was an indoor climbing centre. Upon gradua-
tion in 1989 he followed his girlfriend (and future wife and mother
of his two children) to Yale for her doctoral studies.
PREVIOUS SPREAD Located in Prince George, BC, the Wood Innovation and Design Centre showcases innovative techniques for building with mass timber.
OPPOSITE Connections between columns, beams, floors and ceilings and carefully detailed to create a wood-on-wood aesthetic. ABOVE Cavities within
the CLT floor section accommodate services. Floor chases are covered with an acoustic insulated subfloor with cut-out panels to provide access.
WOOD INOVATION DESIGN CENTRE — CONSTRUCTION PROCESS DIAGRAM
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CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­
46
GROUND FLOOR PLAN
1:200
TOP LEFT The stair core walls are
built from CLT panels, contribut-
ing to the lateral load resistance
of the structure. ABOVE Through-
out the facility, thickened col-
umns and beams allow for
a degree of inherent fire resist-
ance, because large timber
elements char at a slow and
predictable rate. The charred
layer serves to insulate the
relatively cool core, allowing
each member to continue carry-
ing the required structural load
to achieve a one-hour fire
resistance rating.
  1	VESTIBULE
  2	 DEMONSTRATION AREA
  3	CAFÉ
  4	 ELEVATOR LOBBY
  5	 LECTURE THEATRE
  6	 RESEARCH LAB
  7	 TECHNICIAN’S OFFICE
  8	 ELECTRICAL ROOM
  9	 MECHANICAL ROOM
10	 GARBAGE AND RECYCLING
11	 LOADING AREA
12	 BIKE STORAGE
GROUND FLOOR PLAN
1
1
2 3
4
8 7
9
5
11
10
6
12
0 5M
EDWHITE
CA Nov 15.indd 46 15-11-12 9:18 AM
Green spent eight years working with Cesar Pelli in his then New
Haven-based firm, which included design work on the Washington
National (now Ronald Reagan) Airport main terminal, Olympia and
York’s office towers in London’s docklands, and a college building for
Grinnell, Iowa. After his wife received her first academic appointment
at Simon Fraser University, Green started work at Vancouver’s Architec-
tura, where he gained more experience with airport design, notably
as a key designer for Ottawa International Airport (produced in associa-
tion with BBB), which required moving back to his old hometown for
several years to see the first phase into construction.
Green declined to follow when that firm was sold to Stantec, and
used the proceeds of his associate’s shares to found his own practice,
joined by Architectura colleagues Steve McFarlane, FRAIC, and
Michelle Biggar. During the 10 years of McFarlane Green Biggar
(MGB), the firm grew in prominence, notably with a lauded addition
to North Vancouver City Hall and a major expansion of the Prince
George Airport (itself a set-piece in the innovative use of wood).
In 2012, Green split with his partners (who have since re-named them-
selves office of mcfarlane biggar, or omb) and formed a sole proprietor-
ship as Michael Green Architecture, or MGA.
With hip Gastown studios and a staff of 24, the MGA office reminds
me of Bjarke Ingels Group’s West Chelsea Manhattan studios—where
everyone is clever, good-looking and young. Frankly, both firms could
use a few crusty old captains of construction to take pressure off their
rock-star principals, who are currently obliged to be at the centre
of everything designed, detailed, managed, written, promoted or spoken
from their respective offices.
Michael Green’s wood construction skills began with summers
on Vermont house-building sites, then deepened with the restoration
of his own 1855 Greek Revival house in New Haven. He says, “there
was virtually no wood used in Pelli’s designs” while he worked there.
While the first phase of the Ottawa airport under Architectura had
CA Nov 15.indd 47 15-11-10 2:33 PM
CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­
48
quite limited use of wood, he convinced clients that the second phase
(produced under the direction of his own firm, in association with
J.L. Richards Architects) should include glulam structure in the main
departure hall. He also pushed for wood to surround the departure
gates for arctic destinations—a gesture to his treeless birthplace. It was
not easy, according to Green. “We couldn’t find a mill who would take
on re-planing the BC fir from an old hangar on site,” he recalls.
When Green arrived in Vancouver in 1997, there was already
an advanced wood design scene emerging around architects Bing Thom
FRAIC, Peter Busby FRAIC, Florian Maurer MRAIC, Larry McFar-
land FRAIC, John and Patricia Patkau FRAIC, engineers Paul Fast,
Gerry Epp, Robert Malczyk, Eric Karsh and manufacturers Structure-
Craft of Delta and Structurlam of Penticton. While still at MGB, Green
got intrigued with the possibilities of mass timber high-rise construc-
tion—buildings of 20 storeys and more—and formed a friendship with
trail-blazing British timber architect Andrew Waugh. MGB and con-
sultants lined up essential research and publication support funding from
some of Canada’s wood industry organizations, and in 2012 co-authored
the publication “The Case for Tall Wood Buildings” with engineer of
choice and frequent collaborator Eric Karsh of Equilibrium Consulting.
With this, the lecture invitations poured in and his career took off.
Wood Innovation Design Centre, Prince George
In 2013, the British Columbia government announced a competition
for a design-build project demonstrating high-rise wood construction
in downtown Prince George. MGA, Equilibrium as engineers and PCL
Construction as builders won the $25.1 million PPP contract. However,
the commission came with onerous conditions: rigorous testing and docu-
mentation requirements for its emerging building technologies, and
a timeframe of only 15 months for design and construction, with signifi-
cant penalties for delays. (An incoming class for the University of North-
ern British Columbia’s wood engineering program needed the space.)
If there is another Canadian building so technically innovative,
so powerful in its built arguments to the rest of our industry, achieved
with such architectural finesse, and completed in a shorter time than the
Wood Innovation and Design Centre (WIDC), I do not know it. Upon
WIDC’s primary structure is an innovative combination of post and
beam construction with built-up cross-laminated timber (CLT) floor
panels. Glulam beams frame into glulam columns using proprietary
aluminium dovetail Pitzl connectors. This allows columns to run con-
tinuously from the foundation to the roof, eliminating all cross-grain
bearing and shrinkage. Steel connectors are embedded and con-
cealed within the timber elements, which provide the required fire
resistance rating. The entire building core, including elevator shaft and
exit stairs, is constructed of CLT. The floor assembly is a staggered
panel system consisting of overlapping 3-ply upper CLT panels
on 5-ply or 7-ply lower CLT panels, joined with HSK epoxy and metal
mesh connectors to form a fully composite corrugated structural sec-
tion. Spanning six metres between the post and beam frames, this
wood-only floor system was selected to minimize the use of concrete
(and thus weight). The corrugated CLT floor system provides signifi-
cant acoustic separation while allowing services to be run in the
alternating floor and ceiling chases, while the beauty of the wood
structure remains exposed.
The primary building structural system for Vancouver’s Ronald McDon-
ald House is a tilt-up cross-laminated timber (CLT) wall panel system
with infill wood I-joists supporting plywood decking. Laminated strand
lumber (LSL) floor ledgers support the joists, decking and a two-inch
concrete topping (which accommodates radiant heating). The structural
system employs CLT wall panels in a balloon frame application, an
innovation over more typical platform construction. Used as wall ele-
ments, CLT panels provide both vertical and lateral stability in one
detail. CLT panels and connections were pre-fabricated off-site and
assembled quickly by crane, reducing construction time compared with
other methods. The dimensional stability of the CLT panels provides
a solid stable backup for the brick façade, minimizing differential move-
ment between the façade and building structure.
OPPOSITE TOP Vancouver’s Ronald McDonald House is built using tilt-up CLT wood panels. The exterior is clad with grey iron-spot brick, complementing
the residential forms and materials of the surrounding neighbourhood. OPPOSITE BOTTOM The design includes generous outdoor and indoor common
areas, composed in a mature contemporary aesthetic. Dormer assemblies for the apartments were pre-fabricated off-site and dropped in by crane.
CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­
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CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­
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topping out a year ago at 30 metres (measured from concrete foundation
to roof), WIDC was the tallest mass timber tower in the world. WIDC’s
architects and engineers designed components for functionality in a tower
at least twice that tall; the height limit was set by funding availability
and program space needs, not structural capabilities.
Taller all-wood towers are soon to be completed, but this remains one
of the most handsome office buildings Western Canada has seen in
years. WIDC’s eight storeys (officially six, plus a mezzanine and a pent-
house) required a site-specific revision of the BC Building Code for
non-residential construction. The building’s program was
an improvised and evolving one, mainly devoted to a new University
of Northern British Columbia wood engineering program, wood-ori-
ented design programs for Emily Carr University of Art and Design,
and offices related to the provincial forestry industry. By virtue of both
its program and construction, the Wood Innovation and Design Centre
is very much a demonstration project.
Being a demonstration project means that many design details exist
to show possibilities—there is a strong rhetorical dimension to this tower.
For example, Green decided against the skiff of concrete that is typical for
the upper floors of mass timber buildings “for purity and buildability rea-
sons—mainly to avoid a ‘wet trade.’” By limiting concrete forming trades
to the foundation, the design would demonstrate the rapidity of erecting
mass timber structures using drop-in dry elements, many of them milled
off-site. As well, a concrete floor was not needed for structural reasons,
and the flexibility of CLT floor plates of varying thicknesses made for
easy in-floor provision of sprinkler, electrical and network connections.
Duct space was minimized through the use of perimeter heating and
management of air movement via Jaga units with micro-fins.
MGA’s all-wood construction created significant challenges for
acoustics, especially since many of the spaces were classrooms requiring
UNBC’s high sound isolation standards—to boot, there is a noisy wood
shop off the main lobby. MGA had to work closely with engineers and
builders, developing new details and establishing their worth in testing.
A similar set of issues informed the structural connections between
columns, beams and CLT floor plates. While some high-rise wood tow-
ers use standard platform framing, MGA elected for wood-on-wood
connections, capitalizing on wood’s vertical dimensional stability.
(Horizontally, trees and columns shrink back to their cores with
extended drying—cross-laminated composites such as CLT balance
wood’s strengths and weaknesses.)
Engineer Eric Karsh dubs the metal connectors, seats and braces
often used in North American mass timber construction “pots and pans
connections.” Codes require that metal wood-to-wood connectors be
fire-separated, meaning that many of these visually interesting building
elements have to be bulked up and hidden within enclosures.
WIDC’s approach to connections takes advantage of a key virtue
of mass timber construction—the time-tested principle of “charring”
as a code-acceptable equivalent to ensure structural integrity during
fires. (The outside layer of wood burns away, but there is enough resid-
ual structural strength in the remainder to ensure stability.) The WIDC
metal connections—blades, seats, braces—are thus set within the col-
umns and beams, which remain proudly exposed.
CA Nov 15.indd 50 15-11-10 2:33 PM
CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­
51
This means a clean wood-on-wood aesthetic, with most of the struc-
tural connections hidden out of sight. The glowing all-wood clarity
of the column and beam connections is one of WIDC’s finest interior fea-
tures. “Our design solutions are driven by technical reasons, but we are
also interested in the aesthetic, the beauty that emerges out of that kind
of thinking,” says Green. Similarly, the sets of exit scissor stairs made of
exposed CLT are an unexpected delight. Here’s hoping that smart
manufacturers soon follow Green’s lead to mass produce all-wood ver-
sions of banal necessities such as exit stairs, rendering the architectural
surroundings more sensuous for those healthy extra flights.
On the exterior of the tower, MGA alternated panels of naturally
aging cedar with charred surfaces of the same. The latter employs the
traditional Japanese technique of shou sugi ban, which in theory creates
a low-maintenance surface with some flame resistance. A common-
sense strategy regarding the placement of fenestration sets the highest
ratio of glazing on the south and east elevations (for light and early-day
heat), the least on the north (to reduce radiant heat loss) and west
(where late-day heat gain is an issue). The variability of the curtain wall
glass and alternation of charred with natural wood create a crisply
dynamic presence in downtown Prince George.
WIDC should become a pilgrimage point for every Canadian archi-
tect interested in the new possibilities of wood. When it comes to a true
appreciation of the substance of architecture, one site visit is worth
1,044,911 page views. However, a bit like the most brilliant but least
known of Le Corbusier’s villas—the Maison Curutchet in La Plata,
Argentina—WIDC’s geographic isolation may keep many away.
Ronald McDonald House, Vancouver
If by the nature of its commissioning WIDC is polemical—a series
of arguments and explorations in favour of mass timber construction—
the 73 apartments of the Ronald McDonald House near Vancouver’s
Children’s and Women’s Hospital complex is equally inventive, but
understated. Here wood is a means, not an end.
Run as non-profit facilities independent of the fast food purveyor,
Ronald McDonald Houses provide lodging for the families of young
patients for periods ranging from a few days to a year and longer. Most
of the families who stay here hail from the Canadian North and B.C.
Interior, and kitchens and laundry facilities are provided so a semblance
of family life can continue while ailing children receive treatment nearby.
There are Ronald McDonald Houses all over the continent, and
many opt for a shiny happy look that does little to reduce the stress
of resident parents and siblings—more likely increasing it by forcing
them to live in comic book-coloured rooms. I have been a long-time
skeptic of the happiness industry—those books and corporate stratagems
intended to render us pleasant and positive. Nothing makes this archi-
tecture critic happier than innovative architecture of substance that
serves its clients and communities. Vancouver’s Ronald McDonald
House makes me happy.
With its Nordic-seeming grey iron-spot brick catching light in all
conditions, its boxed dormers nodding to French residential vernacular,
and its tightly honed layouts in plan and section, the first quality that
comes to mind about the MGA design is not forced happiness but “dig-
nity.” To appreciate the design accomplishment here, one must push past
OPPOSITE Fluid connections join the brick-clad exterior areas and wood-lined interiors throughout the facility. ABOVE, LEFT TO RIGHT Each grouping
of aggregated apartments includes its own kitchen and dining area; play features such as miniature wooden houses and a tube slide that can
be used in lieu of the staircase are integrated in the design.
CA Nov 15.indd 51 15-11-10 2:33 PM
CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­
52
the Ronald McDonald rubric. This is serious architecture for a serious
purpose: enriching and making more peaceful the lives of families
so they can support their sick children.
One of the cleverest aspects of the design is how it balances the icon-
ography of the wooden house as a place of refuge with the task of for-
ging a sense of community for over 200 ever-changing residents. A key
means to this balance is found in Ronald McDonald House’s section,
with shared amenities and gardens on the ground floor, topped by four
brick-clad “houses” of aggregated apartments for families. Each of the
“houses” has a communal kitchen and dining room on the first floor;
a complete ring of corridors linking them encourages intermingling.
This allows for efficiencies of operation, although it has the side effect
of creating long, unfortunately hospital corridor–­like vistas. Crucial
to the social and visual success of this public floor are the lush plant-
ings, water elements, amphitheatre and play structures of the landscape
design, with general garden layouts by MGA and detailed landscape
design by Vancouver’s PWL Partnership.
With upper-middle-class houses across the street, Green’s residen-
tial iconography is displaced through its rare-in-Vancouver use of brick
(minimal maintenance was paramount) and a strange-making use
of rare grey brick. These choices combine for a masterstroke of neigh-
bourhood accommodation without imitation. Patterned brickwork
appears on some walls; MGA is evidently as interested in experi-
menting with masonry as it is with wood. Green and team have
designed variety into the residential units, and there are television
lounges, games rooms and more intimate outside decks to complete
the rich range of social spaces in the building.
Other than the ceiling of the large, living room-like entrance hall
and a bridge at one end, the CLT construction is not visible. This
strategic decision was facilitated by Eric Karsh of Equilibrium Con-
sulting (engineers for both MGA projects reviewed here, as well as for
Perkins+Will’s UBC Earth Sciences complex and other large CLT
constructions in Vancouver). Current codes and operational needs con-
spire against seeing wooden walls and floors, explaining Green’s
need at WIDC to show how it might be done. For example, interior
wallboard could have been eliminated at Ronald McDonald House
by adding two layers of wood to the CLT wall panels (for dimensional
stability, CLT panels always need to be an odd number of layers)
on the principle of char-equivalency, but there would have been a pro-
hibitive cost in both materials and in a sacrifice of floor area.
Ronald McDonald House uses tilt-up assembly for its CLT walls;
each panel is assembled horizontally then levered up into place, exactly
like tilt-up concrete. Nonetheless, the trades bidding for the contract
had to be actively educated in how simple this unusual procedure for
wood construction could be. The boxed dormers were pre-fabricated
off-site, and then dropped into position by crane.
WIDC and Ronald McDonald House represent the leading edge
of West Coast architecture. They are much more the true inheritors
of the values of the Case Study Houses, Ron Thom, and Fred Hollings-
worth than is Canada’s cubic fungus of Neo-Modern villas growing
to fill our every wooded glen. There is something inevitable about Van-
couver being the point of confluence for fusing the multi-unit housing
and offices of a sustainable city with the most carbon-friendly construc-
tion system imaginable: wood.
As this article goes to press, the piled wooden boxes of the Herzog
and de Meuron proposal for the Vancouver Art Gallery has just been
announced. In an interview on CBC radio, Green congratulated the
high-profile choice of wood, but questioned the specific design choices.
The proposed design uses wood as a veneer on a concrete tower—a ven-
eer that may well need to be preserved under glass. It’s a far cry from
MGA’s integral use of the material.
By virtue of having already designed a city hall, airport terminal and
office building before turning 50, Michael Green is uniquely positioned
to get around Canada’s ultra-conservative commissioning practices
(you have to have already designed a building type to get to design one;
architectural styles are not to be invented but meekly imitated or im-
ported) that hamper the careers of some of our key emerging designers,
and blocks a needed generational renewal.
Those seemingly all-concrete Corbusian villas were no less enthral-
ling to my students after they came to understand their construction
is actually hybrid. Similarly, the differing approaches to mass timber
construction in WIDC and Ronald McDonald House are proof
that Michael Green is more than a polemicist with a popular TED talk,
but a widely talented architect working his way up the rock walls
of a major career.
Trevor Boddy’s exhibition Rethink: Behind San Diego’s Skyline runs all fall, and his text
for City-Builder: The Architecture of James K. M. Cheng will be published in early 2016.
PROJECT WOOD INNOVATION AND DESIGN CENTRE, PRINCE GEORGE, BC | CLIENT PROVINCE
OF BRITISH COLUMBIA—MINISTRY OF JOBS, TOURISM, AND SKILLS TRAINING | ARCHITECTS MGA—
MICHAEL GREEN ARCHITECTURE | ARCHITECT TEAM MICHAEL GREEN, MINGYUK CHEN, CARLA
SMITH, SENG TSOI, KRISTALEE BERGER, ALFONSO BONILLA, JORDAN VAN DIJK, GUADALUPE FONT,
ADRIENNE GIBBS, JACQUELINE GREEN, ASHER DEGROOT, SOO HAN, KRISTEN JAMIESON, VUK KRC-
MAR-GRKAVAC, ALEXANDER KOBALD, SINDHU MAHADEVAN, MARIA MORA | STRUCTURAL EQUILIB-
RIUM CONSULTING INC.| MECHANICAL/ELECTRICAL MMM GROUP LTD. | CONTRACTOR PCL CON-
STRUCTORS WESTCOAST INC. | FIRE CHM FIRE CONSULTANTS LTD. | ACOUSTIC AERCOUSTICS
ENGINEERING LTD. | CODE B.R. THORSON CONSULTING LTD. | AREA 4,820 M2 | BUDGET $25.1 M
(TOTAL PROJECT COST, EXCLUDING COST OF LAND) / $16.7 M (CONSTRUCTION HARD COSTS) |
COMPLETION OCTOBER 2014
PROJECT RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE BC & YUKON, VANCOUVER, BC | CLIENT RONALD MCDONALD
HOUSE BRITISH COLUMBIA & YUKON | ARCHITECTS PROJECT COMMENCED BY MCFARLANE GREEN
BIGGAR ARCHITECTURE + DESIGN, COMPLETED BY MGA—MICHAEL GREEN ARCHITECTURE | ARCHI-
TECT TEAM MICHAEL GREEN, JUSTIN BENNETT, NATALIE TELEWIAK, MINGYUK CHEN, KRISTEN
JAMIESON, ASHER DEGROOT, JORDAN VANDIJK, NICK FOSTER, ADAM JENNINGS, SENG TSOI, JING
XU, SUSAN SCOTT | STRUCTURAL EQUILIBRIUM CONSULTING INC.| MECHANICAL AME CONSULTING
GROUP LTD. | ELECTRICAL APPLIED ENGINEERING SOLUTIONS LTD. | LANDSCAPE PWL PARTNERSHIP
LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTS INC. | INTERIORS MGA—MICHAEL GREEN ARCHITECTURE | CONTRACTOR
ITC CONSTRUCTION GROUP | CIVIL APLIN & MARTIN CONSULTANTS LTD. | GEOTECHNICAL EXP SER-
VICES INC. | COST CHERITON MANAGEMENT INC. | CODE GHL CONSULTANTS LTD. | BUILDING ENVEL-
OPE RDH BUILDING ENGINEERING LTD. | ACOUSTIC BKL CONSULTANTS LTD. | SUSTAINABILITY KANE
CONSULTING PARTNERSHIP | WAYFINDING MGA | OWNER REPRESENTATIVE ANDREW WADE | AREA
8,361 M2 | BUDGET $24 M | COMPLETION JULY 2014
RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE — CONSTRUCTION PROCESS DIAGRAM
CA Nov 15.indd 52 15-11-10 2:33 PM

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ca.green.apostle.published.nov.2015

  • 1. CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­ 42 PHOTOS Ema Peter, unless otherwise noted It can be a sticky business when prominent architects get overly associ- ated with a single construction material. While he had an early career as a design critic and polemicist, in his later role as building-oriented architect Le Corbusier was a vocal champion of reinforced concrete, notably through his design for the Dom-Ino system for housing construc- tion. But Dom-Ino was never applied in its pure form in his lifetime, and technically, Le Corbusier was not much of an innovator. The look, feel, associations and texture of his beloved béton brut were important to his architecture, especially the late works, but he was not personally disposed to—or skilled in—inventing new modes of construction. Corbu was a genius not of technique, but rather of aesthetics— architecture students always presume more of his white villas are built of cast concrete than is actually the case. Contrast this with the build- ings of his former employer: behind the neo-classical façades of Auguste Perret’s rue Franklin Apartments or the Théâtre des Champs- Elysées, one finds true technical innovation. The same is true of Frank Lloyd Wright, who innovated in concrete because his designs demanded it, from the early Wisconsin warehouses to Fallingwater and the WITH OVER A MILLION VIEWS OF HIS ONLINE TED TALK, MICHAEL GREEN IS A LEADING— AND INCREASINGLY VOCAL—ADVOCATE FOR MASS TIMBER CONSTRUCTION. BUT IT’S NOT JUST TALK. TREVOR BODDY TAKES A LOOK INSIDE TWO RECENT BUILDINGS THAT POINT TO A FUTURE OF LARGER, TALLER WOOD STRUCTURES. CA Nov 15.indd 42 15-11-10 2:33 PM
  • 4. CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­ 45 Guggenheim. Here in Canada, the formal repertoires and socially minded ambitions of Bing Thom, FRAIC, and Douglas Cardinal, FRAIC, prompted new building techniques and assemblies in wood, concrete, glass and brick. It is not untoward to invoke the struggle between Corbu’s polemical writing and his built accomplishments in approaching the work and ideas of Vancouver’s Michael Green, FRAIC. No Canadian architect since Moshe Safdie, FRAIC, has risen into global prominence as blin- dingly fast. Michael Green has emerged as the apostle of wood, a char- ismatic Moses bringing forth tablets of CLT, GLT, NLT, MTP, and LSL as the carbon-sequestering solutions to the crisis of climate change. His powerful 2013 TED talk “Why We Should Build Wooden Skyscrapers” has been downloaded an astonishing 1,044,911 times— more video views, without doubt, than those from all other Canadian architects combined. Since his status as an advocate of wood is secure, it is now time to look at some of his firm’s key finished constructions— as this polemicist is also very much a builder. But to better understand both modes, a note first on his biography and early portfolio. Michael Green was born in 1966 in Baker Lake, Nunavut, where his Scottish-born father worked as an administrator after serving at Hud- son’s Bay Company posts. The family relocated to Ottawa when he was a toddler. Green’s American-born mother’s family was Ivy League- linked: grandfather Richard Bennett was the Yale School of Architec- ture chair who first hired Louis Kahn to teach there. Bennett’s wife divorced him and re-married a Cornell historian; Green followed family links to begin his architecture studies there in 1984. An indifferent stu- dent, his undergraduate passions were mountaineering and ice-climbing; his Cornell design thesis was an indoor climbing centre. Upon gradua- tion in 1989 he followed his girlfriend (and future wife and mother of his two children) to Yale for her doctoral studies. PREVIOUS SPREAD Located in Prince George, BC, the Wood Innovation and Design Centre showcases innovative techniques for building with mass timber. OPPOSITE Connections between columns, beams, floors and ceilings and carefully detailed to create a wood-on-wood aesthetic. ABOVE Cavities within the CLT floor section accommodate services. Floor chases are covered with an acoustic insulated subfloor with cut-out panels to provide access. WOOD INOVATION DESIGN CENTRE — CONSTRUCTION PROCESS DIAGRAM CA Nov 15.indd 45 15-11-10 2:33 PM
  • 5. CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­ 46 GROUND FLOOR PLAN 1:200 TOP LEFT The stair core walls are built from CLT panels, contribut- ing to the lateral load resistance of the structure. ABOVE Through- out the facility, thickened col- umns and beams allow for a degree of inherent fire resist- ance, because large timber elements char at a slow and predictable rate. The charred layer serves to insulate the relatively cool core, allowing each member to continue carry- ing the required structural load to achieve a one-hour fire resistance rating.   1 VESTIBULE   2 DEMONSTRATION AREA   3 CAFÉ   4 ELEVATOR LOBBY   5 LECTURE THEATRE   6 RESEARCH LAB   7 TECHNICIAN’S OFFICE   8 ELECTRICAL ROOM   9 MECHANICAL ROOM 10 GARBAGE AND RECYCLING 11 LOADING AREA 12 BIKE STORAGE GROUND FLOOR PLAN 1 1 2 3 4 8 7 9 5 11 10 6 12 0 5M EDWHITE CA Nov 15.indd 46 15-11-12 9:18 AM
  • 6. Green spent eight years working with Cesar Pelli in his then New Haven-based firm, which included design work on the Washington National (now Ronald Reagan) Airport main terminal, Olympia and York’s office towers in London’s docklands, and a college building for Grinnell, Iowa. After his wife received her first academic appointment at Simon Fraser University, Green started work at Vancouver’s Architec- tura, where he gained more experience with airport design, notably as a key designer for Ottawa International Airport (produced in associa- tion with BBB), which required moving back to his old hometown for several years to see the first phase into construction. Green declined to follow when that firm was sold to Stantec, and used the proceeds of his associate’s shares to found his own practice, joined by Architectura colleagues Steve McFarlane, FRAIC, and Michelle Biggar. During the 10 years of McFarlane Green Biggar (MGB), the firm grew in prominence, notably with a lauded addition to North Vancouver City Hall and a major expansion of the Prince George Airport (itself a set-piece in the innovative use of wood). In 2012, Green split with his partners (who have since re-named them- selves office of mcfarlane biggar, or omb) and formed a sole proprietor- ship as Michael Green Architecture, or MGA. With hip Gastown studios and a staff of 24, the MGA office reminds me of Bjarke Ingels Group’s West Chelsea Manhattan studios—where everyone is clever, good-looking and young. Frankly, both firms could use a few crusty old captains of construction to take pressure off their rock-star principals, who are currently obliged to be at the centre of everything designed, detailed, managed, written, promoted or spoken from their respective offices. Michael Green’s wood construction skills began with summers on Vermont house-building sites, then deepened with the restoration of his own 1855 Greek Revival house in New Haven. He says, “there was virtually no wood used in Pelli’s designs” while he worked there. While the first phase of the Ottawa airport under Architectura had CA Nov 15.indd 47 15-11-10 2:33 PM
  • 7. CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­ 48 quite limited use of wood, he convinced clients that the second phase (produced under the direction of his own firm, in association with J.L. Richards Architects) should include glulam structure in the main departure hall. He also pushed for wood to surround the departure gates for arctic destinations—a gesture to his treeless birthplace. It was not easy, according to Green. “We couldn’t find a mill who would take on re-planing the BC fir from an old hangar on site,” he recalls. When Green arrived in Vancouver in 1997, there was already an advanced wood design scene emerging around architects Bing Thom FRAIC, Peter Busby FRAIC, Florian Maurer MRAIC, Larry McFar- land FRAIC, John and Patricia Patkau FRAIC, engineers Paul Fast, Gerry Epp, Robert Malczyk, Eric Karsh and manufacturers Structure- Craft of Delta and Structurlam of Penticton. While still at MGB, Green got intrigued with the possibilities of mass timber high-rise construc- tion—buildings of 20 storeys and more—and formed a friendship with trail-blazing British timber architect Andrew Waugh. MGB and con- sultants lined up essential research and publication support funding from some of Canada’s wood industry organizations, and in 2012 co-authored the publication “The Case for Tall Wood Buildings” with engineer of choice and frequent collaborator Eric Karsh of Equilibrium Consulting. With this, the lecture invitations poured in and his career took off. Wood Innovation Design Centre, Prince George In 2013, the British Columbia government announced a competition for a design-build project demonstrating high-rise wood construction in downtown Prince George. MGA, Equilibrium as engineers and PCL Construction as builders won the $25.1 million PPP contract. However, the commission came with onerous conditions: rigorous testing and docu- mentation requirements for its emerging building technologies, and a timeframe of only 15 months for design and construction, with signifi- cant penalties for delays. (An incoming class for the University of North- ern British Columbia’s wood engineering program needed the space.) If there is another Canadian building so technically innovative, so powerful in its built arguments to the rest of our industry, achieved with such architectural finesse, and completed in a shorter time than the Wood Innovation and Design Centre (WIDC), I do not know it. Upon WIDC’s primary structure is an innovative combination of post and beam construction with built-up cross-laminated timber (CLT) floor panels. Glulam beams frame into glulam columns using proprietary aluminium dovetail Pitzl connectors. This allows columns to run con- tinuously from the foundation to the roof, eliminating all cross-grain bearing and shrinkage. Steel connectors are embedded and con- cealed within the timber elements, which provide the required fire resistance rating. The entire building core, including elevator shaft and exit stairs, is constructed of CLT. The floor assembly is a staggered panel system consisting of overlapping 3-ply upper CLT panels on 5-ply or 7-ply lower CLT panels, joined with HSK epoxy and metal mesh connectors to form a fully composite corrugated structural sec- tion. Spanning six metres between the post and beam frames, this wood-only floor system was selected to minimize the use of concrete (and thus weight). The corrugated CLT floor system provides signifi- cant acoustic separation while allowing services to be run in the alternating floor and ceiling chases, while the beauty of the wood structure remains exposed. The primary building structural system for Vancouver’s Ronald McDon- ald House is a tilt-up cross-laminated timber (CLT) wall panel system with infill wood I-joists supporting plywood decking. Laminated strand lumber (LSL) floor ledgers support the joists, decking and a two-inch concrete topping (which accommodates radiant heating). The structural system employs CLT wall panels in a balloon frame application, an innovation over more typical platform construction. Used as wall ele- ments, CLT panels provide both vertical and lateral stability in one detail. CLT panels and connections were pre-fabricated off-site and assembled quickly by crane, reducing construction time compared with other methods. The dimensional stability of the CLT panels provides a solid stable backup for the brick façade, minimizing differential move- ment between the façade and building structure. OPPOSITE TOP Vancouver’s Ronald McDonald House is built using tilt-up CLT wood panels. The exterior is clad with grey iron-spot brick, complementing the residential forms and materials of the surrounding neighbourhood. OPPOSITE BOTTOM The design includes generous outdoor and indoor common areas, composed in a mature contemporary aesthetic. Dormer assemblies for the apartments were pre-fabricated off-site and dropped in by crane.
  • 9. CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­ 50 topping out a year ago at 30 metres (measured from concrete foundation to roof), WIDC was the tallest mass timber tower in the world. WIDC’s architects and engineers designed components for functionality in a tower at least twice that tall; the height limit was set by funding availability and program space needs, not structural capabilities. Taller all-wood towers are soon to be completed, but this remains one of the most handsome office buildings Western Canada has seen in years. WIDC’s eight storeys (officially six, plus a mezzanine and a pent- house) required a site-specific revision of the BC Building Code for non-residential construction. The building’s program was an improvised and evolving one, mainly devoted to a new University of Northern British Columbia wood engineering program, wood-ori- ented design programs for Emily Carr University of Art and Design, and offices related to the provincial forestry industry. By virtue of both its program and construction, the Wood Innovation and Design Centre is very much a demonstration project. Being a demonstration project means that many design details exist to show possibilities—there is a strong rhetorical dimension to this tower. For example, Green decided against the skiff of concrete that is typical for the upper floors of mass timber buildings “for purity and buildability rea- sons—mainly to avoid a ‘wet trade.’” By limiting concrete forming trades to the foundation, the design would demonstrate the rapidity of erecting mass timber structures using drop-in dry elements, many of them milled off-site. As well, a concrete floor was not needed for structural reasons, and the flexibility of CLT floor plates of varying thicknesses made for easy in-floor provision of sprinkler, electrical and network connections. Duct space was minimized through the use of perimeter heating and management of air movement via Jaga units with micro-fins. MGA’s all-wood construction created significant challenges for acoustics, especially since many of the spaces were classrooms requiring UNBC’s high sound isolation standards—to boot, there is a noisy wood shop off the main lobby. MGA had to work closely with engineers and builders, developing new details and establishing their worth in testing. A similar set of issues informed the structural connections between columns, beams and CLT floor plates. While some high-rise wood tow- ers use standard platform framing, MGA elected for wood-on-wood connections, capitalizing on wood’s vertical dimensional stability. (Horizontally, trees and columns shrink back to their cores with extended drying—cross-laminated composites such as CLT balance wood’s strengths and weaknesses.) Engineer Eric Karsh dubs the metal connectors, seats and braces often used in North American mass timber construction “pots and pans connections.” Codes require that metal wood-to-wood connectors be fire-separated, meaning that many of these visually interesting building elements have to be bulked up and hidden within enclosures. WIDC’s approach to connections takes advantage of a key virtue of mass timber construction—the time-tested principle of “charring” as a code-acceptable equivalent to ensure structural integrity during fires. (The outside layer of wood burns away, but there is enough resid- ual structural strength in the remainder to ensure stability.) The WIDC metal connections—blades, seats, braces—are thus set within the col- umns and beams, which remain proudly exposed. CA Nov 15.indd 50 15-11-10 2:33 PM
  • 10. CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­ 51 This means a clean wood-on-wood aesthetic, with most of the struc- tural connections hidden out of sight. The glowing all-wood clarity of the column and beam connections is one of WIDC’s finest interior fea- tures. “Our design solutions are driven by technical reasons, but we are also interested in the aesthetic, the beauty that emerges out of that kind of thinking,” says Green. Similarly, the sets of exit scissor stairs made of exposed CLT are an unexpected delight. Here’s hoping that smart manufacturers soon follow Green’s lead to mass produce all-wood ver- sions of banal necessities such as exit stairs, rendering the architectural surroundings more sensuous for those healthy extra flights. On the exterior of the tower, MGA alternated panels of naturally aging cedar with charred surfaces of the same. The latter employs the traditional Japanese technique of shou sugi ban, which in theory creates a low-maintenance surface with some flame resistance. A common- sense strategy regarding the placement of fenestration sets the highest ratio of glazing on the south and east elevations (for light and early-day heat), the least on the north (to reduce radiant heat loss) and west (where late-day heat gain is an issue). The variability of the curtain wall glass and alternation of charred with natural wood create a crisply dynamic presence in downtown Prince George. WIDC should become a pilgrimage point for every Canadian archi- tect interested in the new possibilities of wood. When it comes to a true appreciation of the substance of architecture, one site visit is worth 1,044,911 page views. However, a bit like the most brilliant but least known of Le Corbusier’s villas—the Maison Curutchet in La Plata, Argentina—WIDC’s geographic isolation may keep many away. Ronald McDonald House, Vancouver If by the nature of its commissioning WIDC is polemical—a series of arguments and explorations in favour of mass timber construction— the 73 apartments of the Ronald McDonald House near Vancouver’s Children’s and Women’s Hospital complex is equally inventive, but understated. Here wood is a means, not an end. Run as non-profit facilities independent of the fast food purveyor, Ronald McDonald Houses provide lodging for the families of young patients for periods ranging from a few days to a year and longer. Most of the families who stay here hail from the Canadian North and B.C. Interior, and kitchens and laundry facilities are provided so a semblance of family life can continue while ailing children receive treatment nearby. There are Ronald McDonald Houses all over the continent, and many opt for a shiny happy look that does little to reduce the stress of resident parents and siblings—more likely increasing it by forcing them to live in comic book-coloured rooms. I have been a long-time skeptic of the happiness industry—those books and corporate stratagems intended to render us pleasant and positive. Nothing makes this archi- tecture critic happier than innovative architecture of substance that serves its clients and communities. Vancouver’s Ronald McDonald House makes me happy. With its Nordic-seeming grey iron-spot brick catching light in all conditions, its boxed dormers nodding to French residential vernacular, and its tightly honed layouts in plan and section, the first quality that comes to mind about the MGA design is not forced happiness but “dig- nity.” To appreciate the design accomplishment here, one must push past OPPOSITE Fluid connections join the brick-clad exterior areas and wood-lined interiors throughout the facility. ABOVE, LEFT TO RIGHT Each grouping of aggregated apartments includes its own kitchen and dining area; play features such as miniature wooden houses and a tube slide that can be used in lieu of the staircase are integrated in the design. CA Nov 15.indd 51 15-11-10 2:33 PM
  • 11. CANADIANARCHITECT11/15­ 52 the Ronald McDonald rubric. This is serious architecture for a serious purpose: enriching and making more peaceful the lives of families so they can support their sick children. One of the cleverest aspects of the design is how it balances the icon- ography of the wooden house as a place of refuge with the task of for- ging a sense of community for over 200 ever-changing residents. A key means to this balance is found in Ronald McDonald House’s section, with shared amenities and gardens on the ground floor, topped by four brick-clad “houses” of aggregated apartments for families. Each of the “houses” has a communal kitchen and dining room on the first floor; a complete ring of corridors linking them encourages intermingling. This allows for efficiencies of operation, although it has the side effect of creating long, unfortunately hospital corridor–­like vistas. Crucial to the social and visual success of this public floor are the lush plant- ings, water elements, amphitheatre and play structures of the landscape design, with general garden layouts by MGA and detailed landscape design by Vancouver’s PWL Partnership. With upper-middle-class houses across the street, Green’s residen- tial iconography is displaced through its rare-in-Vancouver use of brick (minimal maintenance was paramount) and a strange-making use of rare grey brick. These choices combine for a masterstroke of neigh- bourhood accommodation without imitation. Patterned brickwork appears on some walls; MGA is evidently as interested in experi- menting with masonry as it is with wood. Green and team have designed variety into the residential units, and there are television lounges, games rooms and more intimate outside decks to complete the rich range of social spaces in the building. Other than the ceiling of the large, living room-like entrance hall and a bridge at one end, the CLT construction is not visible. This strategic decision was facilitated by Eric Karsh of Equilibrium Con- sulting (engineers for both MGA projects reviewed here, as well as for Perkins+Will’s UBC Earth Sciences complex and other large CLT constructions in Vancouver). Current codes and operational needs con- spire against seeing wooden walls and floors, explaining Green’s need at WIDC to show how it might be done. For example, interior wallboard could have been eliminated at Ronald McDonald House by adding two layers of wood to the CLT wall panels (for dimensional stability, CLT panels always need to be an odd number of layers) on the principle of char-equivalency, but there would have been a pro- hibitive cost in both materials and in a sacrifice of floor area. Ronald McDonald House uses tilt-up assembly for its CLT walls; each panel is assembled horizontally then levered up into place, exactly like tilt-up concrete. Nonetheless, the trades bidding for the contract had to be actively educated in how simple this unusual procedure for wood construction could be. The boxed dormers were pre-fabricated off-site, and then dropped into position by crane. WIDC and Ronald McDonald House represent the leading edge of West Coast architecture. They are much more the true inheritors of the values of the Case Study Houses, Ron Thom, and Fred Hollings- worth than is Canada’s cubic fungus of Neo-Modern villas growing to fill our every wooded glen. There is something inevitable about Van- couver being the point of confluence for fusing the multi-unit housing and offices of a sustainable city with the most carbon-friendly construc- tion system imaginable: wood. As this article goes to press, the piled wooden boxes of the Herzog and de Meuron proposal for the Vancouver Art Gallery has just been announced. In an interview on CBC radio, Green congratulated the high-profile choice of wood, but questioned the specific design choices. The proposed design uses wood as a veneer on a concrete tower—a ven- eer that may well need to be preserved under glass. It’s a far cry from MGA’s integral use of the material. By virtue of having already designed a city hall, airport terminal and office building before turning 50, Michael Green is uniquely positioned to get around Canada’s ultra-conservative commissioning practices (you have to have already designed a building type to get to design one; architectural styles are not to be invented but meekly imitated or im- ported) that hamper the careers of some of our key emerging designers, and blocks a needed generational renewal. Those seemingly all-concrete Corbusian villas were no less enthral- ling to my students after they came to understand their construction is actually hybrid. Similarly, the differing approaches to mass timber construction in WIDC and Ronald McDonald House are proof that Michael Green is more than a polemicist with a popular TED talk, but a widely talented architect working his way up the rock walls of a major career. Trevor Boddy’s exhibition Rethink: Behind San Diego’s Skyline runs all fall, and his text for City-Builder: The Architecture of James K. M. Cheng will be published in early 2016. PROJECT WOOD INNOVATION AND DESIGN CENTRE, PRINCE GEORGE, BC | CLIENT PROVINCE OF BRITISH COLUMBIA—MINISTRY OF JOBS, TOURISM, AND SKILLS TRAINING | ARCHITECTS MGA— MICHAEL GREEN ARCHITECTURE | ARCHITECT TEAM MICHAEL GREEN, MINGYUK CHEN, CARLA SMITH, SENG TSOI, KRISTALEE BERGER, ALFONSO BONILLA, JORDAN VAN DIJK, GUADALUPE FONT, ADRIENNE GIBBS, JACQUELINE GREEN, ASHER DEGROOT, SOO HAN, KRISTEN JAMIESON, VUK KRC- MAR-GRKAVAC, ALEXANDER KOBALD, SINDHU MAHADEVAN, MARIA MORA | STRUCTURAL EQUILIB- RIUM CONSULTING INC.| MECHANICAL/ELECTRICAL MMM GROUP LTD. | CONTRACTOR PCL CON- STRUCTORS WESTCOAST INC. | FIRE CHM FIRE CONSULTANTS LTD. | ACOUSTIC AERCOUSTICS ENGINEERING LTD. | CODE B.R. THORSON CONSULTING LTD. | AREA 4,820 M2 | BUDGET $25.1 M (TOTAL PROJECT COST, EXCLUDING COST OF LAND) / $16.7 M (CONSTRUCTION HARD COSTS) | COMPLETION OCTOBER 2014 PROJECT RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE BC & YUKON, VANCOUVER, BC | CLIENT RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE BRITISH COLUMBIA & YUKON | ARCHITECTS PROJECT COMMENCED BY MCFARLANE GREEN BIGGAR ARCHITECTURE + DESIGN, COMPLETED BY MGA—MICHAEL GREEN ARCHITECTURE | ARCHI- TECT TEAM MICHAEL GREEN, JUSTIN BENNETT, NATALIE TELEWIAK, MINGYUK CHEN, KRISTEN JAMIESON, ASHER DEGROOT, JORDAN VANDIJK, NICK FOSTER, ADAM JENNINGS, SENG TSOI, JING XU, SUSAN SCOTT | STRUCTURAL EQUILIBRIUM CONSULTING INC.| MECHANICAL AME CONSULTING GROUP LTD. | ELECTRICAL APPLIED ENGINEERING SOLUTIONS LTD. | LANDSCAPE PWL PARTNERSHIP LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTS INC. | INTERIORS MGA—MICHAEL GREEN ARCHITECTURE | CONTRACTOR ITC CONSTRUCTION GROUP | CIVIL APLIN & MARTIN CONSULTANTS LTD. | GEOTECHNICAL EXP SER- VICES INC. | COST CHERITON MANAGEMENT INC. | CODE GHL CONSULTANTS LTD. | BUILDING ENVEL- OPE RDH BUILDING ENGINEERING LTD. | ACOUSTIC BKL CONSULTANTS LTD. | SUSTAINABILITY KANE CONSULTING PARTNERSHIP | WAYFINDING MGA | OWNER REPRESENTATIVE ANDREW WADE | AREA 8,361 M2 | BUDGET $24 M | COMPLETION JULY 2014 RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE — CONSTRUCTION PROCESS DIAGRAM CA Nov 15.indd 52 15-11-10 2:33 PM