Courtesy SMMA

Cambridge-based architects SMMA came up with a creative way to add more than 900 structured parking spaces at Charlestown’s Hood Park while preparing for a future in which cars are no longer king.

Unlike a typical parking garage with sloping levels, 100 Hood Park Drive will have flat floor plates connected by short, steep ramps. That gives the owners the option to convert the five stories of parking into leasable commercial space down the road.

“The city is advocating for this because of future fluctuations in parking requirements,” said Mark Spaulding, a principal at SMMA. “All of the parking is above everything else, and it’s flat-plated so it can transform to office or lab.”

The 912-space garage will occupy five stories within a 400,000-square-foot structure now under construction, including 75,000 square feet of office, lab and ground-floor retail space. Completion is scheduled for mid-2019.

The first phase of 100 Hood Park Drive will top out at 70 feet, but it’s designed to support up to a 5-story office and lab addition, bringing its height to 200 feet, under a proposal submitted last week to the Boston Planning and Development Agency.

Owner-developer Catamount Management is anxious to get the garage built so it can proceed with an additional 600,000 square feet of proposed development on the 20-acre property, including a 130-room hotel, 200-unit apartment complex and a 290-foot-tall office and lab building. The new structures would be built on existing surface parking areas.

The garage section of 100 Hood Park Drive will be wrapped with colorful panels that create the illusion of a moving facade, Spaulding said. The aluminum panels will be perforated to allow air to flow through the garage, eliminating the need for ventilation systems.

SMMA included features such as a rooftop solar array to qualify for Parksmart certification, which rates parking facilities based upon energy-saving features.

Designing parking garages to be eventually converted into office or lab space is gaining traction among commercial developers.

As landlord Morgan Stanley expands and repositions One Post Office Square in the Financial District, a new parking garage will include levels that can be converted to office space and connected to the existing 41-story tower.