Sports teams

By Andy Cunningham

Sports teams are major parts of most cities, but do they help the city economically? Most stadiums that are built nowadays are publicly funded and according to some people don’t really help the economy that much. When attempting to bring in a new team, or build a new stadium there is a promise of new jobs and more money but how well do these promises hold up over time. Recently there have been talks of bringing an NFL team to Los Angeles, and people are projecting that it will generate $800 million dollars a year but a lot of people are suspicious of this total. “A good rule of thumb that economists use is to take what stadium boosters are telling you and move that one decimal place to the left, and that’s usually a good estimate of what you’re going to get,” Victor Matheson, a sports economist at College of the Holy Cross, says.  Since sporting events and really any live entertainment event is getting more and more expensive, new stadiums tend to repel people away because most people do not want to spend that much money.¹ One of the biggest impact new stadiums have is creating jobs, at least for construction workers. When the Minnesota Vikings were proposing their new stadium they estimated that there would be over 7,500 construction jobs created over the three year building period, with over more than 3,000 part time and full time jobs once the stadium is completed. The analysis by the Conventions, Sports and Leisure, International estimate that there will be $26 million dollars a year in tax revenue, and over $145 million in direct spending by Vikings fans in Minnesota.²

Having a sports team nearby can be fun, but if there’s nothing around a stadium is there anything that can attract people to an area without needing to spend $50 on a ticket and then an extra $50 on food and drink once they are inside? What if there was a place near the stadium where people could get as close to the arena atmosphere without being there for less money? St. Louis has a place like this called Ball Park Village next to where the St. Louis Cardinals play baseball. Ball Park Village is a multi-use development that houses multiple restaurants and bars, as well as featuring large projection screens so that guest can watch the game surrounded by thousands of other fans like they were in the stadium. According to the economic impact report done by the Missouri Economic Research and Information Center, once Ball Park Village is complete there will be a steady increase in state gross product, as well as an increase in jobs created for the area.³ Places like this can benefit and area because this type of place can be opened year round making money instead of just being used when there is a game or a concert. A multi-use space like Ball Park Village is also capable of attracting people to the area who don’t live in the area. Forty percent of people who come to Cardinals games come from outside of Missouri, so, it's expected Ballpark Village will draw visitors who live as long as a four hour drive from here.⁴ What happens during the winter when it’s not baseball season? Baseball can’t be played year round so instead of attracting people to baseball games St. Louis has a hockey team whose home is just a couple blocks from where Ball Park Village stands, and there would be the same effect that it has on baseball games especially since hockey tickets are becoming more and more expensive.
            This project proposes building a multi-use development outside of the United Center in the Near West Side of Chicago. The United Center is the home of the Chicago Blackhawks (NHL), and Chicago Bulls (NBA), as well as multiple other concerts and events throughout the year. One Problem with the United Center is there is not much around it so most people who go to that area are just going to see whatever event they are seeing and then they leave. This project will be able to keep some of those who come to the area there longer because it gives them a place to go. This project will also give more people a reason to go there and be with friends and other fans of whatever they’re watching. The near west Side is an easily accessible place with multiple train stops throughout the area as well as bus stops. If this project is able to draw more people into the area and bring in more money to the area there will be a lot of people who can benefit people from it. This Project will basically work opposite of the way Ball Park Village does in St. Louis. Since basketball and hockey are winter sports, the majority of the business will take place between October and June, but when those sports are out of season baseball is in season and this area is a good ways away from both U.S. Cellular field where the White Sox play, and Wrigley Field, where the Cubs play, so it would be an option to go watch the games here.  

            Looking at area demographics and crime is a big thing to look at when building within a city, especially with all the violence that has been going on in Chicago over the last couple years. The near west ranks 29^th among the 77 Chicago community areas in violent crimes over the last 30 days, 3^rd in property crimes, and 28^th in quality of life crimes.⁵ While the near west side may not look to be the safest area in Chicago, it is also a very large area and some of these crimes may not take place in the area surrounding the United Center. Even then by bringing in more people, jobs and money to the area hopefully the area will start to improve.

           

Bibliography

1.      http://www.marketplace.org/topics/business/are-pro-sports-teams-economic-winners-cities

2.      http://www.vikings.com/stadium/new-stadium/economic-impact.html

3.      https://www.missourieconomy.org/community/stl-stadium/petersdj-accra02.pdf

4.      http://www.ksdk.com/story/sports/mlb/cardinals/2014/03/27/ballpark-village-economic-boost/6972977/

5.      http://crime.chicagotribune.com/chicago/community/near-west-side

Sensory Architecture

By Alicia Luthy

Hello all! For this week’s article, I decided to write about my thesis topic. I am creating an education center for the dual impaired with a strong emphasis on the senses.

Vision is often defined as a person’s dominant sense. Often, it is through the eyes that we collaborate with the body and perceive other senses. Sight is also the sense that is used first and is how someone analyzes the space. However when designing, it is important for spaces to be multi-sensory because people experience architecture with different strengths. It is said that vision suppresses the importance of the other senses but every sense is significant in creating and transforming a space’s experience. A person’s touch gives the human body perception of distance, resistance, and is what makes objects three dimensional. Touch provides humans with information on temperature, texture, weight, and also is important for their sense of space. Sound allows a person to achieve a complete perception a space. Ironically, sound is best represented through silence because it allows for the construction to become apparent.  The smell of things is often what triggers memories of spaces. The visually impaired often use smell as a way to recognize their location. There are more senses than the commonly known “Five Senses,” sight, touch, hearing, smell, and taste. The human body also registers temperature, intensity of light, aroma of the materials, and much more. Shadows are important for creating depth and distance and temperature can provoke different feelings of a space. This thesis will design a school for children who are deaf and visually impaired. Through this design process, research will be conducted how the dual impaired study, navigate space, and ways to improve their daily routines way of life.  It will help teach and rehabilitate those who have or had difficulties with daily activities. This building will emphasize the importance of multiple senses, and use these to create an architectural experience. There will be a clear understanding of the difficulties of deaf and visually impaired individuals in the design process.

“A profound design process eventually makes the patron, the architect, and the occasional visitor in the building a slightly better human being”.-Juhani Pallasmaa

Fabrication in Architecture

By Aaron Neal

Advancements in technology continually provide new opportunities for virtually every trade, from farming to the tech industry.  In building construction, new innovations have, over time, drastically cut down on-site construction time by allowing builders to prefabricate parts before bringing them to the job site.  By doing more work in a controlled environment, such as a factory, builders can produce a product that is more accurate, cost efficient, and higher quality.  Other industries – the automobile, aviation, and shipbuilding – use such practices to increase their production.  This process works by lowering the amount of parts that have to be assembled during the final phase of construction.  In the automobile industry for instance, manufacturers create parts by the millions that are then shipped to a final factory where they are assembled into the final product.  Having different factories working on different parts at the same time cuts down on the actual time of production.  Architecture firm KieranTimberlake, believes that this non-linear approach to design is a necessity for the construction industry to progress.  Many industries that have adopted this method have been improving tremendously.  Toyota for example, redeveloped their manufacturing process which brought about quicker build time, higher quality parts, and cheaper production costs. All of these factors are why this manufacturing model has become standard in many industries. Kieran and Timberlake’s Refabricating Architecture presents the firm’s research into this development and calls for a reevaluation of design and construction in the building industry.

                In the current construction industry, prefabrication is utilized to fabricate many elements of a building.  These portions may consist of wall panels, concrete flooring panels, curtain wall systems, stair cases, and many more.  Pre-built units like these, reduce the amount of overall parts that need to be assembled on site.  Many designers have invented or implemented construction systems that aim to simplify the building assembly process on the site.  Modular base construction – where large portions of the building come into the site as prebuilt boxes – has been a popular method used in the housing industry, but usually provides limited building forms.  Modular systems have also been conceived of as a steel frame that is then enclosed with panels.  This building system allows for more freedom in the design, but becomes just as hard to transport to the site due to the size of one single module.  KieranTimberlake have produced a system that uses a prefabricated aluminum frame that is assembled on-site which is then in-filled with floor and wall units.  This system has successfully worked to produce both the Loblolly House, and the Cellophane House.  Although very successful for a single family residence, the limited structural capabilities of many of the elements of this system may prevent it from being utilized effectively at much larger scales.  This thesis research will look at how to take a prefabricated structural system inspired by the one used for the Loblolly and Cellophane House, and apply it to a midrise building.  Applying this adapted construction system to a full building design will test the system to see if it can be used universally in other building designs.  The final aim of the research will be to show how prefabrication can allow for a system that reduces costs and build time while still allowing for flexible designs.

Technology in Architecture

Post 2: Adding Trees in Photoshop

           

 

Doing post processing for architectural renderings is an important aspect of finishing up a project to present to a client. This process usually involves bringing a building rendering into Photoshop or other image editing software to add certain elements and do the finishing touches. This post will be a tutorial on how to add trees into a rendering and add shadows and lighting to make them look more realistic instead of just plopping trees into an image. First a rendering will be needed in order to place the entourage on. Here is the rendering I will do a few tutorials on. First step is to decide what trees will be used throughout the image. There are tons of websites out there that have textures, trees, people, etc. that are free to download from. A few examples of these would be mrcutout.com or cgtextures.com. The best thing to do from these sites is to build up a library of images that can be used for future projects. Moving on now, for this rendering I want a row of similar trees then along the road. When copying the image multiple times throughout a render, make sure you either stretch it in either direction or flip it horizontal to make it look as though it has changed in shape. Next make sure the trees get small the further back into a perspective the tree is. 

Now that each of the trees is in place, as seen in the image on the below, along the road I will start add shadows for the trees to make them feel a little more realistic. Before adding the shadows the sun direction needs to be determined so that the shadows can stay consistent. If you bring in a model that already has shadows from the buildings make sure that those shadows are followed otherwise the rendering will look off. For my image, I am choosing to do the sun coming from the upper left corner and partially behind the camera. Now to do shadows make a copy of the tree and select the full tree in order to change the color of it. I like to use a slightly purple gradient so that the shadow has a little color to it but not too purple so that the shadow is a dark silhouette.

The image to the right shows the front 2 trees with shadows already placed while the back 2 trees have the purple gradient over them. The back tree shadows are now ready to be rotated and skewed in order to fit the perspective of the scene. Some of the shadows will take a little more work to make them look correct and match the other shadows. Once the shadow is rotated and in place lowering the opacity of that layer shadow will be nearly complete. Sometimes a few final touches are needed to make the color a little more accurate so to do this, adjust the levels or curves to get a desired color. Finally all the trees and shadows are in place for this portion of the rendering. A final step for this would be to highlight where the sun is hitting the tree with a bit of a white or yellowish overlay and then darken the underside where the sun is not hitting. There are numerous ways to do everything so the way I have shown is not the only way to go about placing trees and shadows. Below is the finished rendering at this point and I will continue to build upon this until it is completed.

Movable Spaces

By Patrick Szczecina

 With the ever growing population that in the past 100 years has increased from 1.5 – 6.1 billion¹, I noticed a drastic change in destruction of space, that being the environment.² As a population we are constantly growing, and with this growth we are destroying our nature in order for us to fit. This growth can be seen largely in cities where many people move to find opportunities. This leads to the problem of space, where we are pushing the borders of our cities and destroying the natural world. Construction of housing needs to be utilized, this be it with the use of materials, methods and environment or a combination of these. In the past fifty years advancement in technologies has led to the development of new building methods.³ Some methods consist of pre-fabricated buildings, sustainable builds or self-constructed builds. These methods focus their needs for reduced budget and sustainability, while not focusing on the users’ needs (interactions) or use of space. This in turn calls for a type of method that allows the user to interact with their building so they have control of what they wish.

Housing is difficult to find in cities, and when found they are not used efficiently in terms of layout. This issue has many aspects to it, therefore one solution is not going to fix it. However it may lend its way to creating new advancements in technologies and methods. The solution that is focused on in this thesis is that of architecture that is able to adjust to its surrounding within the city limits. A type of construction method or living area that is transformative in the idea of space customization and utilization. The focus can be headed towards transformative architecture or smart buildings, and the way they work with the sustainable and efficient use of space. This allows for humans to feel and work comfortably in the spaces they live in. The idea of the buildings being able to shift and rotate will allow for new spaces to be created. The “Methods” or “Joints” that can be utilized are that of rotations, sliding and swinging, which creats movement of spaces. The idea of sliding walls brings the aspect in which a new area is able to be created, be in indoor or out. Rotating walls can be used for their ability to open up views, close off areas or change circulation. The idea of rooms being able to rotate is a major aspect. Creation of a new space is able to come forth by having the previous area change location. This allows for a more conserved space that transform to create an area that can be utilized for different means.

  

² “Assessing Immigration, Population and Environment.” Why Files. University of Wisconsin, n.d. Web. 13 July 13, 2015.

¹ “World Population Growth.” Our World In Data. US Census Bureau, n.d. Web. 13 July 13, 2015

³  Wilson, Michael T. "Williambraham.net | Ecology, Technology, and Design." Williambraham.net » Building Technology: 'Steel as Required' N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Aug. 2015.

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Thesis Abstract: First Attempt…

By Megan N Crider

An integral part of any community, no matter how large or small, is the police station.  This facility serves as the hub of security and provides many services to its citizens.  A centralized location and uniquely catered spaces will increase the station’s accessibility and success as it strives to serve its community.  Effective operations within a police station begin with a well-designed building, adhering to the stringent programming needs of the entire police staff.  For example, the separation and distinction between secure and non-secure spaces in crucial and is addressed in the design phase, as well as the construction phase of the project with the use of different materials.1  Better space functionality as well as personal safety are achieved with careful consideration and research.  The Marion, Illinois police station recently relocated from its original location just east of the town square into the former Army Reserve Training Center building located off of the bustling Highway 13.  Although the location for the new station is much more convenient and centrally located, the building was not designed as a police station and therefore lacks in fully serving its user.  The project proposal is to redesign and relocate the Marion police station so that it will better serve the needs of the growing community.  The building will be designed to specifically house all of the facilities and space needed by the police department.  The new station will be secure, and also welcoming for the public and the police staff. 

Since 2000, Marion’s population has increased over seven percent and its projected job growth over the next ten years is 39%, higher than the national average of 36.1%.2  Growth like this will result in the need of a larger police force to accommodate the change in population.  In their current location, the Marion police will outgrow their station in a short matter of time.  The design of a new facility will provide larger spaces for day to day functions within the station, including areas for on-site training, including classrooms, gun ranges, and other spaces needed for the teaching and preparation of the officers and other staff.3 Public spaces will be welcoming to the public and will provide opportunity for the department to further engage with the community.

            A newly designed police station in a central and accessible location will enable the Marion Police Department to more effectively meet the increasing need of the community and will encourage a growing relationship with the local citizens.

[1]www.wbdg.org/ccb/AF/AFDG/securityforcefacilities.pdf

[1]www.bestplaces.net/economy/city/illinois/marion

[1]www.wbdg.org/ccb/AF/AFDG/securityforcefacilities.pdf

My Experience in SIU Carbondale

By Kristina Shrestha Hada

I joined SIUC in Summer 2015. When I first arrived at SIUC, I was new to most of the things. Despite living in Louisiana for two years before joining SIUC, I was still new to the academic environment and culture at Carbondale. I would like to express my gratitude to those who helped me to adjust here. With ambivalent feelings for this place, I some how settled after a semester. There should be a "Home" wherever you go. So, I finally settled after getting an apartment like a "Home". Good thing about SIUC is the free bus route for students. I should have know about the Rider apps before hand, it makes your life easier. Forget about brochures for bus routes, just utilize your smartphones!

Starting of summer was a roller coaster, ups and downs. I even felt as if I am one of the pop-corns in the frying pan, you never know where you will end up. First day of class, assignment, second day another assignment and so on. The roller coaster began from the very first day of my summer class. Even things that looks simple becomes tough when there is the pressure of deadline.

Adam Savage might be true as he said - "Deadlines refine the mind. They remove variables like exotic materials and processes that take tool long. The closer the deadline, the more likely you will start thinking way outside the box."

The thing I will remember about SIUC is Faner Hall. I am pretty much sure even a vagabond will remember this building if he passes near by this building. This is the place where I wandered here and there as if I got lost in a maze. If I had nothing to do with printing tabloid size paper, then I would never enter the maze and wander here and there to locate the printing facility. I am sure most of my classmates had gone through the same scenario.

"What is this life if full of care, there is no time to stand and stare?" - W. H. Davies

The summer was tough and there was no time to stand and stare the beauty of the SIUC as Davies mentioned in his poem entitled "Leisure".

From Monday to Thursday, it feels like rolling down from roller coaster and Friday through Monday, feels like going up again. There was no time to stand and stare. I missed weekends in summer because of the lack of proper scheduling.

Talking about course work, watching our design taking shape feels like a parent watching their kids growing old happily. I worked on Open Air Museum which housed unique buildings. These buildings have their forms derived from the mother nature. For the finals, we were supposed to design an exhibition piece which expresses the theme of our design. Despite ups and downs and painstaking effort, I finally realized the outcome of my research through the final exhibition piece. In short, summer was fast, tough and fruitful.

  

Starting Fall semester, I could see students coming from nowhere. It feels good to see many students after a long period of time. Fall semester is unique in its own way. Everything is same except for the length of the semester compared to Summer. Despite scorching sun in Summer, I slowly adopted the place with the change in the season.

After we started our Fall semester, there were so many people in school. You will literally see students everywhere. It feels good to see people as we do not have many people in summer and you rarely see people during the off times or in weekends. In fall semester, we have class every day except in weekends. We have to take four courses but still there is time. It felt very different from the summer semester. It was better. One day, I was walking to my apartment and I saw the falling yellow leaves. It made me realize that I had stop complaining about this place and I have started loving this place. I feel so glad to see the colors of the fall and I am looking forward to see snow. Some people would tell me that it would snow here, while others tell that it would be only ice. Well, I am looking forward for the winter as I have lived in Louisiana for past 2 years and it rarely snows. Also, I am looking forward to see the Halloween this year in Carbondale.

That’s it for today! Hope to see you next time! Bye…