Building & Design Blog

In today's economy, people are trying to save money any way they can. That means cutting back on eating out, shopping, utilities, and even square footage. I know personally that, besides student loans, my apartment and the associated utilities and upkeep are the most expensive part of my budget each month. It's no surprise then that people are moving towards smaller, cheaper houses.

Weburbanist, an architectural design blog, has been featuring these tiny houses for a while now. While small houses were once a necessity due to the cost and labor of building, today, many people continue the trend for the sake of simplicity or the environment. And the design of the tiny house has adapted at a rapid rate. Many now feature smart space-saving features, leaving no space wasted. Many of these houses are also built with salvaged, natural, and recycled materials.^{Image Credit: Tiny Texas Houses.}

Now, some may have taken the concept of the tiny house a little too far. The world's smallest house (potentially) is one square meter of living space. The house tilts and folds to reveal a bed, desk and lights complete with a widow and lockable door. The plans for the house are free online, and while even the designer said this wouldn't be ideal to stay in for a length of time, it is the perfect urban get away. The world's thinnest home is in Poland and is only 4 feet wide. It was built between two existing structures and is one story off the ground. I'll admit that it looks like an IKEA display, but the white furnishings make the space seem much more spacious than it is. Still, the 4 foot wide house features a bedroom, lounge, bathroom, and office.

^{One square meter house. Image Credit: Weburbanist.com}

The trend for tiny houses is not new in many parts of the world, and many in the US are catching on. In cities such as Seattle, the zoning laws are changing to allow the smaller homes to be built on the same property as larger homes. This allows homeowners to provide affordable housing in a crowded urban area, keep family nearby, and add some regular renter income to their bank accounts.

^{The thinnest house in the world. Image Credit: Weburbanist and Archdaily.com}

I don't know if I'm going to be moving into any of these tiny houses any time soon since I don't think my closet could fit in one square meter, but I do appreciate the efficiency of the design and most of them look pretty cozy. For everyone who agrees with me, there are other solutions to being creative and efficient with furnishings. The D* Table consists of four pieces that can be swung around into various functional settings that can fit most houses, regardless of shape or size. Every inch of the table is functional with drawers or shelves on each face. The D*Table has also translated into a transforming house which will move along a track in order to maximize seasonal weather. While I do see some potential troubles, I think this house is brilliant!

^{Image Credit: weburbanist}

Do you see yourself living in a tiny house? Or in an origami style house?

There is this reoccurring theme in civil engineering of outdoing other structures. It's as if an architect who suddenly has the financing to build whatever he pleases looks around and says to himself, "Whose is the biggest?" and immediate catches a case of structure envy. So the architect carefully crafts the biggest, most opulent building that construction technology can erect. And then to show off, the architect wants to do it in world record time.

Architects are jealous and selfish lovers professionals. Want an example? Examine Dubai, who wanted to diversify its business away from oil. The way to attract that business? Have the tallest building the world. So they built the 2,722-foot high Burj Khalifa . Never mind the project took five years and cost Dubai $1.5 billion USD, so much money that they later needed a bailout from Abu Dhabi.

In this size contest for world's biggest building, the Burj Khalifa is about to see its successor rise in the province Hunan, China; in the city of Changsha, home to 7 million, will rise Sky City One. When completed in March 2013, the skyscraper will stand at 2,749 ft. Included will be a 1,000 guest hotel, a hospital, five schools, 104 high-speed elevators, 17 helipads, and apartments for 30,000 people.

It's not just the size of the building that is raising eyebrows, however; it's also the rate of construction. The designers plan on erecting Sky City One in just 90 days. Composed of 220 stories, the structure will be completed at a rate of 5 stories a day. The construction cost of Sky City One is not expected to top $700 million USD. The construction company behind the skyscraper, Broad Sustainable Building, has a recent history of extreme construction projects. In 2010 they built a completed 15-story hotel in less than 6 days, and in 2012 they constructed a 30-story hotel in just 15 days.

Furthermore, BSB claims that they are building some of the most environmentally friendly and structurally sound buildings in existence. Sky City One can withstand a 9.0 magnitude earthquake according to tests, primarily because BSB's buildings use less concrete and steel to reduce weight. Six-inch insulated walls and quadruple glazing will contribute to the building's sustainability, which will be constructed from recycled materials. Overall, Sky City One will require one-fifth of the energy needs of a similarly-sized conventional skyscraper. Finally, a unique ventilation system promises air quality 20 times more pure than outdoor air--a needed respite in smoggy China.

BSB is able to accomplish this by essentially replacing construction with manufacturing. Though skilled laborers are need to assemble the building on-site, up to 95% of the building is prefabricated and erected off-site. Completion of a BSB structure is said to resemble the completion of a LEGO or Erector set. BSB founder Zhang Yue believes that the cheapest, most efficient buildings are produced in factories, and this belief has produced 19 buildings in China and one in Mexico.

Of course, anytime an industry is 'revolutionized' by new processes or methods, skeptics and non-believers emerge (again, probably with structure envy). Many expressed doubt that even using prefab techniques a record-setting skyscraper could be built in just three months. Indeed, a BSB spokesperson admitted construction could take seven months, before retracting and promising the company would meet the 90-day threshold. Others critics have taken aim at the building's structural integrity, questioning if Sky City One would be foundationally stable, or if the building's engineers did enough to account for the high lateral forces resulting from wind. Others have questioned emergency support, saying that fire prevention, evacuation and medical emergency procedures have not been thoroughly evaluated.

While these criticisms are valid, they are not even the most crucial considerations for Sky City One's construction. Instead, profitability may be the most debilitating variable of this engineering marvel. China has an extensive history of overbuilding, as governments continue to fund money-losing endeavors to display their prosperity. There are several recent, notable examples. Beijing's National Stadium has been left largely unused since the 2008 Olympics. The largest mall in the world, the New South China Mall in Dongguan, opened in 2005 with 2,350 retail spaces for rent. In a city with 10 million residents, the mall has only leased 1% of its retail space. Kangbashi, a central district in Ordos to provide residence to 1 million Chinese, is home to only about 25,000.

And then there's the craftsmanship. In the instance of BSB's prefabricated building, the unremarkable infrastructure was intended to provide easy franchising and local prefabrication. After construction the building can be customized only to a limited degree. Essentially, the cheap building feels cheap. Personally, I'm not afraid to pay for a more finished, higher quality product, and I expect that any prefabricated building like Sky City One will feel as cheap as it costs, relatively speaking. In the one review a CR4 blogger could find online for the T30 Hotel (BSB's 30-story, 15-day project), the commenter complained of the cramped room sizes, awkward door positioning and uneven floors.

In several years' time, the novelty of Sky City One will have worn off-either because it was succeeded as the world's tallest building (do you remember the Ultima Tower?), or because it's prefab nature limited the on-site adaptability sometimes needed by construction crews and civil engineers. Personally, I'd like to see Sky City One have a successful existence. It could modernize how populations look at buildings and provide low-cost, emission-reducing housing. But I can't help but feel that some personality and workmanship skills will be lost if construction is replaced by manufacture. Though prefabricated building designs are likely to improve, I always hope that there will be a need for laborers who can add character to the buildings we inhabit. I could think of nothing worse than a cityscape that is nothing except interlocking square and rectangles.

Resources

(Image credits: Techjost; 8 Bit Future; Talk Bass; Inhabitat; Webner House; Tree Hugger; TDR Inc.)

Arch Daily - UPDATE: World's Tallest Skyscraper to...

Inhabitat: Sky City: Chinese Company BSB...

Wikipedia - Sky City; BSB

CNET - Developer Reaffirms Plan to Finish World's...

The Globe and Mail - World's tallest tower plan raises eyebrows

Time - China Plans to Build the World's Largest Skyscraper in Just 90 Days

Elevators have an unusual relationship with the macabre.

Really, stick with me here. Some of people's most irrational fears are exploited by an elevator: heights, enclosed spaces; decapitation; a terrifying free fall (see The Tower of Terror).

There's more. Have you ever seen The Shining? (Yes, of course you have.) Little Danny Torrance envisions elevators unleashing waves of blood to recolor the walls of a haunted hotel. In similar bloody remembrance, let's not forget The Departed's brutal homicides (graphic) . Heck, they made an entire B movie about a killer elevator.

In real life, many structures skip numbering the 13^th floor or designating a 13^th floor button in elevators.

I don't know about you, but elevators can be an inconvenience for me-at most. Ugh, I have to make boring small talk/listen to terrible elevator music. Elevators are an essential part of building design however and the likelihood of an elevator malfunction is rather low. Despite their customized prevalence throughout the world, and the idiosyncratic nature of their name (yes, Britons we know it's called a lift), elevator designs vary minimally and are cursed for their perceived shortcomings.

Remarkably, Italy has over 900,000 elevators installed within its buildings, meaning there is one elevator for every 67 of its citizens. By comparison, the USA has the second most, but with one elevator for every 445 of its people. It makes some sense that Italy has the most, if only because Roman scientist Vitruvius was reputed to have invented a vertical ascension mechanism in 236 B.C. Elevators appeared in variation through the rest of history until the early 19^th century when hydraulic systems began appearing in Britain and the United States. Though modernized with better safety protocols, smaller parts, and worldwide popularity, elevators designs have remained largely unchanged since the traction design was invented shortly thereafter.

Elevators are essentially limited to four types:

• traction hoists employ high strength cables, a counter weight, and an electric motor
• hydraulic pistons and their associated pumps push hydraulic elevators skyward
• a hybrid traction-hydraulic elevators has an attached counterweight, but still relies on the linear power of hydraulics
• climbing elevators are self-powered and are reserved for towers, masts, and other exceptional structures

Structures with just a handful of stories are best served by traction-hydraulic elevators, while skyscrapers and other tall buildings tend to use traction designs.

Depending upon the traffic pattern and the demographic the elevator serves, some very intuitive functions are built into the devices. In halls where multiple elevators serve riders (also called an elevator bank), cars are concentrated at lower levels in the morning, and at higher levels in the afternoon to better accommodate the flow of traffic. In Jewish communities, elevators on the Sabbath may run automatically-opening at every floor, to accommodate those who observe electrical prohibition on that day. Emergency patterns are common in nearly every lift and allow firefighters, police, and medical personnel to select the elevator's actions.

Many peculiar structures incorporate specialty elevator designs. Notably, in skyscrapers extending dozens of stories, a skylobby will be built. Here high speed elevators directly take passengers to an intermediate floor providing riders with access to a new elevator bank. Another interesting case is the Gateway Arch in St. Louis that uses a tramway with enclosed, self-leveling cars to account for the structure's unique shape, and the elevators that serve the Eiffle Tower's concave legs function similarly.

Finally, those who perceive elevators as unsafe or dangerous need to have a look at the safety record of elevators. In 1852, Elisha Otis debuted the safety elevator which would not fall if the traction cable broke. Brake pads grasp the vertical running rails, slowing the elevator if it descends faster than which it was intended. In fact, until the 9/11 attacks, the only record of a traction elevator in absolute free fall was in 1945 when a plane struck the Empire State Building, severing the cables. Hydraulic elevators are much more likely to fail, but mostly because older designs excluded a failsafe and relied upon a single cylinder to support the elevator.

So it's 5:30 p.m. on Friday. You just packed your desk and are so ready to end your workweek. You arrive at the elevator bank and hit the call button so you can take your ride from the 67^th floor to the lobby and get on your way home. Ugh, of course the elevator is going up. All the elevators are going up! Clearly there is a conspiracy to keep me here as long as possible!

A more common complaint is a bias against riders travelling downwards from high floors after work. Riders in high floors will complain that elevators servicing their floor will most often be travelling up, while riders in lower floors will receive the benefit of elevators already on their way down. The truth is that it's only the perception that some floors receive better service.

If someone were to observe an elevator's ascending and descending pattern for a long period of time, they would count an equal number of passes in each direction. However, it's more common for riders to approach elevators at need and be subjected to waiting. Assuming the elevator distributes its passengers evenly, the elevator will be more likely to be coming from the bottom of the building for riders on high floors simply because the elevator spends more time where there are more floors. The same is true for riders on low floors, who can expect to travel downwards on an elevators first pass, just because they are unlikely to encounter the elevator in the slim interval where it is below their floor and then ascends. It's called the elevator paradox. Make sense? Perhaps the graph on the above right helps.

So, not only have we debunked the ideas that elevators are unsafe, we've also eliminated the supposed rider bias the snobby executives often complain about.

What can I say? HUSH looks out for the little guys when it comes to elevators.

Resources

(Images credits: Wikipedia; Pseudo Paranormal; Time Marches On; P. Seale; Elevator Bob's; Unsuck DC Metro)

Wikipedia - Elevator; Elevator Paradox

Sometimes there really are instances where an invention comes along and it becomes near impossible to replace it. Either the invention has reached its zenith of development, or practical technology severely limits the progress of the device. For example: an airplane will always have wings because physics requires so; a wingless airplane is no longer an airplane. Wheels operate untouched, at over 3,000 years old and still going strong. An example of technology restricting development can be found in the keyboard at your very fingertips; while a more efficient means of character input is foreseeable, that doesn't mean it's imminent.

And there are objects which for some reason, be it disinterest or foulness (and in this instance literally), that have designs that remain stagnant for years, despite obvious advancements.

By now you've probably surmised I'm talking about the toilet. I'll do my best not to be indecent and in exchange I expect your absolute best playground behavior (I understand, this is CR4). In truth, sewage systems have been a major facilitator in civil engineering and refusing its consideration is uncomfortable in several ways.

So today we take a small look at toilets: their types, designs, and future.

Before toilets, urban humans repulsively disposed of waste in city streets (there was a time where an outhouse was preferable). Though the business was taken care of indoors, the waste was disposed of in alleys and gutters. Today we know such poor sanitation led to disease on epidemic levels, and the reform of handling filth has been called the "greatest medical advance[ment] since 1840."

English poet and "saucy Godson" to Queen Elizabeth I, Sir John Harington, is inventor of the first flush toilet. His invention had a flush valve to control water in the tank and a wash-down design to clear the bowl. Though he installed one in Richmond Palace and the device earned her favor, the Queen refused to use it. It would be another 290 years until Thomas Crapper (yes, that's really his name) perfected the design and was able to mass produce the flush toilet. Otherwise, flush toilets have remained principally unimproved since the early 1900s, when a vortex mechanism was invented to help keep toilet bowls clean. The only notable exception would be in 1980 when Bruce Thompson invented a dual-flush toilet for water-conscious Aussies. And the video-series Smarter Every Day invented a method to prevent 'splash back'.

Though much of the western hemisphere utilizes the flush toilet, much more of the world sticks to the squat toilet. Used somewhat differently, they still incorporate water ballasts, piping, and drainage. These toilets are particularly prominent in the Middle East, Far East, and Southern Asia. Frequent travelers debate about the comfort levels of both designs, but some medical researchers argue that sitting toilets may actually be bad for your health: sitting and reading a newspaper results in a daily dose of current events and unnecessary strain on the colon, possibly leading to diverticulosis.

Of course, Japan has added many electronic features to toilets: retractable bidets located in the bowl clean each user; seats are often electrically warmed; hot or cool air may keep an operator's toosh dry or fresh. Some Japanese companies are working on toilets that can analyze stool samples and provide medical stats, such as blood sugar and body fat.

Perhaps the area that needs the most attention is making sanitized waste removal available in third world nations without sewage protocols. The World Toilet Organization estimates that 2.5 billion (billion, with a 'B') do not have access to a clean toilet, and in some developing countries up to 40% of illnesses are directly attributed to poor waste removal. (Though it's not just poorly sanitized toilets that kill, right Elvis?) As such, a number of advocacy groups have been established to increase awareness. In 2011, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation donated $265 million to spur innovation in sanitation. Reinvent the Toilet is a science expo that awards up to $100,000 for sustainable toilet designs. 2012's top prize went to a group from the California Institute of Technology that prototyped a toilet that uses solar power to break down solid waste to hydrogen gas, treated water, and inert, organic material.

While billions of people need sewage removal in general, millions in R&D has been spent on an area of waste management where users are apathetic, and often confused. An effective female urinal has eluded manufacturers for decades. Urinals do not require any level of skin contact and are flushed with considerably less water than a toilet. American Standard produced a female urinal from 1950 to 1974, but the design required the same space and water as a typical flush toilet; it never caught on. Many designs require a woman to remove their pants and awkwardly back over the urinal. At outdoor sporting and concert events, organizers have attempted to alleviate lines by providing female urination alternatives. Devices such as the P-mate and WizBiz (yes, apparently it's required to have a punny name) have been distributed at these events, and they are essentially hygienic funnels that allow women to pee standing up. Finally, some portable female urinals have caught on in Europe, but have yet to gain acclaim in North America.

I'd say toilets are in definitive need of an engineering overhaul. It could also be that toilets are just bad luck: take a look at the list of people who have bit the big one while doing their business. Heck, toilets sunk a submarine!

Some people sit; some squat. Some women stand just like men. Yet almost 1/3 of the world does not have access to any type of sanitary sewage removal and that is by far where most of the toilet innovation should be focused. Yes, reducing urination discrimination is great, but something tells me more women would rather have the world's sewage problem solved than having the ability to pee standing up. It's an issue of business versus social issues, as it often is when innovation goes stale.

Resources

Images credits: Dave Harman blog; Wikipedia; Jane Austen; Inventor Spot; Faucet Depot; Sinba Design; Paperblog)

Bloomberg - To Seriously Improve Global Health, Reinvent the Toilet

Wikipedia - Urinal; Human defecation postures; Dual-flush toilet; John Harington; Toilets in Japan; Flush toilet; Female urination devices

Washington Post - Gates Foundation makes poop a priority, puts toilet innovation front and center

Let's take a guess at the nature of your morning commute, shall we? After stopping for coffee and maybe a doughnut, you speed through a yellow light to make it to the onramp. You promptly hit wall-to-wall traffic, put your car in park, glare menacingly at adjacent drivers, and otherwise tap your thumbs to classic rock. See? I'm all knowing.

Though a disappointing commute is the reality of millions, in 1958 Disney had a rather different vision of what the freeway of the future would look like. I encourage YouTube-enabled readers to view their animated visualization.

Some of these predictions are obvious nods to 1950s culture. Machine input via punch cards? Atom powered cars? Radiation harnessed to prevent slick roads? Airborne emergency units that rescue drivers and clear accidents at once? Yeah right.

But many predictions came true. Radar to detect forward objects, variable speed limits, reverse cameras, underwater thoroughfares, road trains, synchronized mapping (GPS), and automated driving have all become transportation benchmarks.

While Disney isn't the best authority on future transportation endeavors, let's see what actual engineers are implementing or cooking up for us impatient drivers.

The Road of Tomorrow!

In 2013, roads in Holland will be getting a stark nighttime makeover. Foremost, painted road markings will be replaced by glow in the dark versions. Roadways will also receive special temperature-activated decals that will only appear under certain conditions. The most prominent example would be snowflakes that appear when road conditions are suitable for ice patches. When an accident is ahead, red warning signs would be used to alert drivers.

Provided these improvements improve the safety and comfort of drivers, other projects will see their execution shortly after. Lights that usher vehicles and then turn off after the auto has passed will save the country on energy expenditure, and the hope is that these lights will become wind powered. Perhaps the most ambitious of Studio Roosegaarde's 'smart highway' projects would be an electromagnetic induction lane that would recharge electric vehicles as it travelled. The company believes that these benefits should not be made available to just those who can afford luxury vehicles, but to all drivers.

While these ideas are terrific for self-driven vehicles, Google is intent on providing consumers with fully autonomous vehicles. In 2011, Nevada became the first jurisdiction to legalize electronic deductive reasoning for vehicle control. While still experimental, the cars rely on smart cameras, radar sensors, lasers, and a human-compiled database for navigation. Luxury car brands like Mercedes and Audi have developed control mechanisms that allow the driver to turn auto-pilot on in low-speed, traffic-dense scenarios. As the system progresses, cars would likely need some form of communication device and RFID tags are the most likely solution. Drivers today are able to utilize their smart phones to scan license plates and send messages between vehicles, so really this is just implementing old technology.

For highways to advance to a more modern state, it needs to be done with stress on the speed, safety, and comfort of commuters. And while many of the technologies listed above require massive amounts of funding and infrastructure adjustment, a much easier and cheaper method of providing safe highway ramps has been introduced in some parts of the American Midwest.

Missouri has been one of the first states to adopt the 'diverging diamond' at freeway intersections. The result is improved traffic flow and fewer accidents, and the process is as follows.

1. Drivers approach an intersection as normal. To enter the freeway and travel northbound, they would yield right and continue on their merry way. To travel west or south, they would maintain their lane position.
2. Upon the traffic signal, westbound drivers would cross the median and travel in a left hand traffic fashion. Vehicles traveling north that wish to go east or west will not have to stop at a traffic light, but would proceed after yielding.
3. Drivers wishing to travel southward would enter the leftmost lane of traffic, and proceed with the right of way to the south-oriented freeway.
4. The occupied lane shifts right at the next divergent traffic light. Traffic travelling south that wishes to alter their direction in a latitudinal manner would only have to yield.

This traffic pattern eliminates all turns that must cross opposing traffic lanes, and also eliminates at least two traffic lights in many cases. This style is starting to become quite prevalent in the U.S. and Canada, and can be implemented in any bidirectional thoroughfare.

According to Infrastructure Report Card (an organization funded by the American Society of Civil Engineers--mind you), poor road conditions cost the average American motorist $333 per year. Another 33% of major American roads are in less than optimal condition, and 36% of urban highways are congested. It recommends that nearly one trillion dollars be allocated towards highways reform. If it's the future, "shut up and take my money."

However, outdated infrastructure needs to be replaced and the inability of our governments to facilitate these modernizations leads to tragedies such as 2007's I-35 bridge collapse in Minneapolis. And if we don't want to see any more car pile-ups like in The Blues Brothers, safety needs to be the first focus. If we can get that teenage girl from tailgating me by use of an autonomous vehicle, that'd be great too.

Overall, the best thing driving technique we can practice is patience. Patience to our destination; patience with civil engineers as they fix our roadways; and patience as future technology provides us better transportation.

Resources

Image credits: Lecaun Unplugged; Laughing Squid; Gnarld; Repair Pal; Meme Generator

Popular Mechanics - Highway of the Future: Interstate Intelligence

Smart Planet - Nevada first to approve guidelines...

NPR - 'Diverging Diamond' Traffic Flow: Way Of The Future?

Wired - Netherlands highways will glow in the dark from mid-2013

Studio Roosegaarde

Wikipedia - Autonomous cars

Pop Sci - Scan Someone's License Plate and Message Them Instantly...

ASCE - Fact Sheet - Roads

There is perhaps no more stunning example of the destructive power unleashed by a natural disaster than that of the before-and-after photos recently compiled by Google "Street View" of Japan's devastating March 2010 earthquake and its resulting tsunami. The "Street View" photography vehicle logged in more than 27,000 miles of devastated commercial and residential infrastructure, literary taking you inside the ground zero of seismic activity. The photos contain "before" images such as a perfectly intact and functioning urban center, and what moments later became "after" photos that display a wasteland of destruction.

The photos are more than just a study about the destructive forces of nature. They are evidence that commercial infrastructure constructed on or near areas of seismic activity require earthquake resistant and/or earthquake-proof engineering. The world's leading engineers will no doubt be studying these photographs for years to come. Comments?

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