Hill Park Apartments, located on a former brownfield site at the corner of Southwest 1st Avenue and Arthur St. in downtown Portland, is a multifamily residential building with 39 studio and one-bedroom apartments. Owned by Central City Concern (CCC), Hill Park serves a resident population transitioning out of homelessness, addiction, or other adverse life situations into more stable, drug-free living. This project overcame the obstacles of a challenging site to provide a walkable, urban development with affordable and comfortable living spaces, renewable energy produced on-site, and a set of high-performance building systems within the confines of conventional wood-frame construction.

CCC secured the design services of Carleton Hart Architecture (CHA) with Colas Construction as contractor to tackle the challenge of designing a context-sensitive housing project and incorporating sustainable elements on a limited budget. Together with a comprehensive multidisciplinary consultant team, CHA and Colas engaged in a collaborative and rigorous process of design, coordination, construction, and oversight that resulted in numerous sustainable measures that helped this project achieve Earth Advantage Platinum. Budget constraints precluded green building measures like heat recovery ventilation or triple-glazed windows, but by focusing on sustainable techniques related to insulation, air sealing and shell design, and lighting, the team succeeded in optimizing building performance. Sustainability features include the rooftop photovoltaic system and stormwater detention.