Architecture Commons^™

Flows Of Sound “Harnessing Sound As Critical Urban Resources”, Zuan Lin

Masters Theses

Transportation infrastructure serves as a vital component essential for the efficient functioning of any city. Originally, the design of transportation arterial systems aimed to improve communication and facilitate movement between different regions. Whether catering to passenger or freight transportation, these arterial routes were designed to efficiently transport large volumes of people and goods, utilizing the rapid movement of vehicles within designated spatial corridors. Undoubtedly, transportation plays a significant role in promoting the physical and economic growth of cities. However, it is crucial to recognize that this very infrastructure can also lead to the fragmentation and isolation of communities situated along …

We Are Gullah: A Community Approach To Preserving Gullah Geechee Historical Sites Of Significance, Peter Gaytan

All Theses

The National Register of Historic Places is an inventory established by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 that identifies architectural and archaeological sites significant to American history. The National Register was created to encourage the documentation, evaluation, and protection of America’s historic resources. Over 96,000 historic properties, sites, and structures are currently listed on the National Register. Despite the number of historic places listed on the National Register there is still an overwhelmingly low number of sites listed on the National Register relating to underrepresented communities. This thesis assessed the definition of significance laid out in the National Register …

Affordable Green: What Cause Landscape Gentrification And How We Deal With It, Siyu Pan

Masters Theses

The topic of this thesis is to figure out how landscape gentrification happened and what we can do to decelerate the process. The first phase of this thesis includes a brief introduction and definition to the term “Gentrification“, its history and the process. Discussions about how such a situation would influence communities and related people would also be mentioned in this part. The last part in this phase is the analysis of some recent research about gentrification world wide. The second phase is a transition from gentrification to landscape gentrification. This part analysis of the cause and effect of landscape …

Reviving The Hollowing Rural Village: Research On The Coastal Mountainous Region Of Kaihua, China, Rui Tao

Masters Theses

My research focuses on one county in China and the regional and local structure to understand the existing flows between urban and rural areas, including both ecological, industrial and social exchanges. Kaihua county, located in north-west Zhejiang Province, is currently the poorest county economically in this region and has more migrant workers and a more severe hollowing degree.

This thesis aims to revive the hollowing rural village and improve the village’s value as a hybrid public realm - a space encouraging reciprocal flows exchanged from both “rural ground” and urban “new comers,” strengthening the ecological and social ties among water …

What Is Rural Design? Decentralized & Community-Driven Approaches For The Green New Deal That Value Existing Rural Land And Community, Cornelia Overton

Masters Theses

In contemporary design conversations, rural areas are discussed less than urban ones, and yet rural communities are in need of good design, and a new rural pattern language could hold the keys to a healthier human relationship with our environment. If the United States were to enact a Federal Green New Deal, rural landscapes stand to see big changes. Not only would landscape architects have new funded opportunities to design in rural places, but bolstered support of ecological urbanism would have broader repercussions in the rural landscape.

By exploring the changing meaning of rurality, translating urban design theory for rural …

Centerville City Parks Master Plan, Paul Stead

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This Plan B Thesis is a comprehensive update to Centerville City’s Parks Master Plan. The document seeks to provide stability and continuity to Centerville’s open space infrastructure. Since the last update in 1993, the Parks Master Plan has been without regular updates to reflect the community’s needs and values. As a result, the Plan has largely been ignored and Centerville has lacked a unified vision regarding parks planning. The objective of this thesis project is to help promote a unique recreational identity that assists the community in positively differentiating itself from other communities on the Wasatch Front.

The Inventory and …

Hurricane Communities, Katie Masters

Bachelor of Architecture Theses - 5th Year

Hurricane Communities: An Analysis of Florida Housing is a thesis that aims to reexamine how we can, as architects, design for hurricanes more effectively at the residential scale, through investigations of lateral forces, form, structure and site. The intent is to minimize the physical and emotional damages that are left behind. The thesis examines wind uplift and changes in water level as hurricane category rise.

Community Wildfire Planning And Design: A Review And Evaluation Of Current Policies And Practices In The Western United States, Carlene C. Klein

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Wildland fire is an important and complex issue, particularly in the fire-prone ecosystems of the Western United States. At the same time that the number of catastrophic wildland fires is increasing across the United States, more people are moving in to wildland areas growing the interface between urban and wildlands. Managing wildfire in the Western United States is becoming increasingly more complex and costly as growth and development continues to push the edge of municipalities into undeveloped wildlands. Communities in this wildland urban interface are exacerbating the problem of wildfire in the West.

With more people living in wildfire prone …

How To Get School Children Access To Urban Farming By Activating Vacant Land And Rooftops, Yixin Ren

Masters Theses

The thesis topic is how to get school children access to urban farming by activating vacant land and rooftops.

Phase one focuses on research about the rooftop urban farming systems in New York. As a high density and high land value city, New York is one of the cities with the largest number of rooftop farms in the United States. People use urban rooftop farms as a medium to improve community engagement and improve environmental issues. For phase one, this thesis researched the operation and conditions of existing rooftop farms, and evaluated the advantages and disadvantages of them to figure …

The Role Of The Landscape In The Socialization Of Cohousing Communities: A Study In Western Massachusetts, Emilie Marques Jordao

Masters Theses

The cohousing movement started in the United States in the 1990’s and since then has spread to over 160 communities throughout the country. This type of community is characterized by small dwelling units, high housing density, shared facilities such as a common house, shared commons and grouped parking. These are pedestrian-oriented communities with car circulation restricted to the outskirts of the neighborhood. Cohousing settlements have the goal of promoting social interaction and sustainable living through design, programming, and shared ideals. Many design characteristics, such as house proximity, density, building height and size, the location of parking, the availability of common …

Community Renewable Energy: The Potential For Energy Generation On Public Land In Cedar City, Utah, Betsy Byrne

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

As the world's population rises and becomes increasingly more urbanized, there is a greater demand on our resources. Current energy production practices are based on resources with finite supplies and are associated with environmental impacts such as greenhouse gas and particulate emissions, water resource use, and resource extraction. In contrast, renewable energy production is based on free, continually replenished sources with relatively few environmental impacts. Distributed renewable energy generation involves producing energy close to the point of consumption. The distributed generation model increases energy autonomy at the local level.

Distributed renewable energy generation is fairly common at point of use. …

Community Identity: Place And The South Knoxville Waterfront, Nicholas Joseph Burger

Masters Theses

“With the loss of tactility and the scale and details crafted for the human body and hand, our structures become repulsively flat, sharp-edged, immaterial, and unreal” (Holl 29). Our built environment is full of constructs which are unsuccessful on a number of levels proving why it is critical to concentrate on a sense of place and identity. A great place is described as one where people gravitate towards, a place for everyone, something that is memorable, and a space which evokes a story (Placemaking Is...). South Knoxville, Tennessee, the selected site of this thesis, will test the concept of place …

The Community Cohesion Trail Of Brattleboro, Vermont, Patrick C. Kitzmiller

Masters Theses

The focus of this thesis is the creation of a series of architectural installations, bridges and gardens that link together via a pedestrian/bike path to connect the urban center of Main St. in Brattleboro, Vermont with the municipal park on the western end of town known as Memorial Park.

This thesis argues that the vast majority of community interactions take place along the sidewalks of the urban downtown, and in certain centers of activity in and around the area, such as Memorial Park. Thus, these two places have been chosen to test whether architecture can be used to bridge the …

Addressing Local Development And Local Identity: Rethinking The Chapman Highway Corridor In South Knoxville, William Edward Copeland

Masters Theses

This thesis addresses the idea of identity within the landscape. The mechanisms that form identity, the representation of identity through both tangible and intangible forms, and the growth,evolution, and erosion of identity over time are all topics that help to inform the argument being made. Moving from an abstract ideal to a specific place, I will address the needs of a local Knoxville community that has come to struggle in recent years due to a loss of their identity within a regional context. Working to translate the mechanisms that foster a sense of identity into physical changes to the landscape …

Strip Development And Community: Maintaining A Sense Of Place, Andrew Kelly Carr

Masters Theses

Abstract

Strip development eases communities’ economic troubles by providing jobs and cheap goods at the expense of a sense of place and social fabric. Four factors are critical to the dissolution of place in strip development: mobility, standardization, specialization, and technology. (Randolph Hester)

Mobility gives people the freedom to move over distances with little constraint; a consequence of this is a produced sense of rootlessness within many communities.

Standardization creates placelessness in communities by the repetition of form and function.

Specialization diminishes comprehensive knowledge of place and complex social and ecological thinking.

Technology may divorce people …

The Impact Of The Physical Environment On The Social Integration Of Individuals With Disabilities In Community, Keith M. Christensen

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Social integration in community is especially important for individuals with disabilities well-being. Although individuals with disabilities reside within the community's physical environment, they are often marginalized in the social environment. This may be the result of individuals with disabilities residing in physical environments that negatively affect opportunities for integration in the social environment. However, there has been little investigation to understand the impact of the physical environment on the social integration of individuals with disabilities in community.

The purpose of this investigation was to (a) examine the current body of evidence concerning the impact of a community's physical environment on …

Creating Identity Within A Residential Community Using Open Space, Jason W. Harr

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Popularity of suburban developments is not new to most communities of today. Many have come to the understanding that suburbia is the only way to go, and the only place to live and raise a family. What suburbanites don't understand and choose to avoid are the demanding requirements suburbia requires of our natural resources and open space.

In recent years, many have come to the understanding that our natural resources and open space are very valuable and must be preserved now and in the future. People have also noticed that implementation of basic design principles of residential communities are advantageous …

Community United Methodist Church: United Methodist Regional Ministry Campus Master Plan, Saori Endo

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

The United Methodist Church has sought for the place that members can worship, learn, social and recreate. The purchase of 24 acres of land in South Weber, Utah made its opening to the place, and they are looking for their identity that they can be proud of ultimately. The intention of this project is generating ideas to help them to find out what they are looking for, yet guide the ideas properly.

Creating Community Greenbelts Through Tdr Zoning, Tim B. Watkins

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Many cities and towns in the lntennountain West were founded on the ideals of clustered community development with surrounding greenbelts by Morn1on settlers in the mid nineteenth century. Since the twentieth-century development of the automobile, increased mobility has enabled residential and commercial development to disrupt surrounding rural lands with scattered growth. Correctly applied, TOR (Transfer of Development Right) strategies could reverse negative sprawling development trends by channeling growth towards existing communities to simulate the abandoned pioneer town and country model. A community development transfer strategy can respect private property rights, and allow fanners to keep their land in agriculture while …