Environmental Design Commons^™

The Current State Of Practice Of Building Information Modeling, Kevin P. Brooks

Masters Theses

Building Information Modeling (BIM) has become extremely prominent in the construction industry in the past twenty years. It serves as a digital repository that can, when used to its fullest potential, combine all aspects of designing, building, and managing a structure in one place, alongside all the data produced in those processes. The construction industry has to date struggled to increase productivity alongside similar fields, such as the manufacturing industry, though the construction industry generally has far more stakeholders on one project than the manufacturing industry. Further, building designs are becoming more complex while project schedules are becoming tighter. As …

Multimodal Transit And A New Civic Architecture, Samuel Bruce Hill

Masters Theses

We live in an age defined by the automobile and its infrastructure. This paradigm of movement has shaped how we live our lives, and the urban frameworks we inhabit. Cars as a form of transportation damage the environment and engender unsustainable lifestyles. They also create anti-social spaces with the infrastructure they require, and therefore their success is inverse to that of the pedestrian experience.

I seek to adapt this transit paradigm with a more flexible and resilient multimodal system. My work focuses on reinvigorating a rail line in central Massachusetts and designing a modular station system that can serve as …

Intermodal Transit Terminal: Integrating The Future Of Transit Into The Urban Fabric, Guy Vigneau

Masters Theses

The very foundation of transportation relies on its ability to efficiently move people and goods through a transitional space. Transportation hubs are key to achieving this goal. However, many transit terminals are outdated or poorly designed to fit the needs of the modern world. At the core of this thesis are two overarching questions. First, how do we design intermodal transit terminals so that they successfully integrate into an existing urban fabric? Second, how do we design for innovative modes of transportation, such as hyperloop technology? This thesis explores how architectural design can recover existing transit connections within an urban …