Architecture Commons^™

Forensic Investigation Of Building Failure – The Harbour Cay Condominium Disaster, John Airis

Publications and Research

When a building suffers collapse, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is tasked with conducting an investigation into the cause. Often OSHA will request technical assistance from the National Institute for Standards and Technology to assist in the forensic technical aspects determining a most probable cause. This forensic effort entails many actions. The Harbour Cay Condominium disaster occurred on March 28, 1981 in Cocoa Beach, Florida. It was a total collapse of a five story reinforced concrete structure during the last stage of roof construction, resulting in 11 deaths and 24 injuries. The investigation report revealed structural design …

Mapping Urban Performance Culture: A Common Ground For Architecture And Theater, Ting Chin, Christopher B. Swift

Publications and Research

Our co-taught course focuses on theater history, with an emphasis on performance architecture. Assignments are designed to illuminate the ways in which architectural design and technology inform performance practices and audience reception. The pivotal assignment for exploring interdisciplinarity is a three-week module on mapping historical theaters in New York City. Open-source Global Information Systems (GIS) software serves as a common mechanism for students to situate theatrical productions in the context of the built urban environment, deepening their understanding of the social, economic, and artistic forces that contributed to performance culture. Mapping is a shared pedagogy for analyzing and presenting research …

Quantification Of Heat Flows Through Building Entrance Doors On A Winter Day, Daeho Kang

Publications and Research

The current methods for the prediction of the heat flow through building entrance doors have been used for years while involved with a certain degree of uncertainty. This paper describes an experimental method that accurately quantified such heat flow. The experiment monitored local environmental parameters in a college building on a cold winter day. The results of the experiment demonstrated that the experimental method is viable to accurately estimate the heat flow throughout the entrance doors and the presence of a vestibule moderated heat losses from the conditioned area. The results will be used for validating the existing methods.

Competence Of A Spray Passive Down-Draft Evaporative Cooling (Pdec) System For Space Cooling, Daeho Kang, Richard K. Strand

Publications and Research

A spray PDEC system has been relatively less considered than other passive cooling strategies as one of the viable low-energy solutions in the cooling of buildings while having a great potential in energy savings. This study is intended to evaluate the capability of a spray PDEC system for space cooling. It comprises four simulation scenarios to see the system response and influence of indoor thermal environment when a spray PDEC system is adopted as a primary cooling system in two different climates. The simulation results show that a spray PDEC system causes a substantial variation in the indoor thermal environment …

Analysis Of The System Response Of A Spray Passive Downdraft Evaporative Cooling System, Daeho Kang, Richard K. Strand

Publications and Research

A spray Passive Downdraft Evaporative Cooling (PDEC) system achieves great savings for space cooling and improves indoor environmental quality by supplying a large amount of fresh outdoor air. As previous studies heavily focused on the energy saving capability of a spray PDEC system due to lack of methods for a detailed analysis, the influence of cool humid supply air from a spray PDEC system in a space in buildings has not been comprehensively studied. This study is intended to evaluate the competence of a spray PDEC system as a primary cooling system in typical spaces in a primary school building …

Fortifying Lower Manhattan's Shoreline, Krystel Campuzano, Mathlyn Mckie

Publications and Research

Lower Manhattan comprises less than 1% of the entire city’s land area, but generates almost 10% of the city’s total economic output, as measured by Gross City Product, and is the location of over 10% of all New York City jobs. Workers in Lower Manhattan come from all parts of the city. The District’s growth is supported by excellent access to transit, with 19 out of 25 subway lines and 26 ferry lines passing through the District. Any climate impacts in the District will resonate across the city as a whole and beyond. Because Lower Manhattan is a critical economic, …

Penn Station Virtual Reality, Lenny S. Marin

Publications and Research

Penn Station, which is a local hotspot, not only to New Yorkers but for tourists from around the world, serves as a gateway to New York City. The understanding of the original Penn Station and its beauty has been lost to history with the current Penn Station design. No longer does the space welcome you into the city with its grand scale and natural light; instead you arrive at a labyrinth of window less hallways.

Through this research, we look at the possibilities 3d modeling and virtual reality offer in recreating realistic experiences of important buildings. Through the use of …

Solar Responsive Façade In An Urban Environment, Cheriyah Wilmot

Publications and Research

Due to the high energy consumption in cities like New York, I am designing a shading system to be retrofitted on an existing façade that responds to external thermal conditions. I’ve conceptualized the functions of the shading system to either block/allow sunlight and analyzed its effectiveness in terms of energy use and illuminance in comparison to the modeled office space. Materials will be explored as well as how it’ll function in the future.

Lab‐Grown Meat And Veganism: A Virtue‐Oriented Perspective, Carlo Alvaro

Publications and Research

The project of growing meat artificially represents for some the next best thing to humanity. If successful, it could be the solution to several problems, such as feed- ing a growing global population while reducing the environmental impact of raising animals for food and, of course, reducing the amount and degree of animal cruelty and suffering that is involved in animal farming. In this paper, I argue that the issue of the morality of such a project has been framed only in terms of the best conse- quences for the environment, animals, and humans, or in terms of deontic princi- …

Experimental Applications Of Virtual Reality In Design Education, Amber Bartosh, Phillip Anzalone

Publications and Research

By introducing rapid reproduction, algorithms, and complex formal configurations, the digital era of architecture began a revolution. Architects incorporated the computational capacity of the computer into the design process both as a tool and as a critical component of the theories and practice of architecture as a whole. As we move into what has been coined “the second digital turn,” a period in which digital integration is considered ubiquitous, how can we consider, prepare, and propel towards the next technological innovation to significantly inform design thinking, representation, and manifestation? What tools are available to investigate this speculative design future and …

Housing Along The Brooklyn Waterfront: A Story Of Shipping, Industry, And Immigrants, Kurt C. Schlichting

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.