Auditorium: graphic standard recommendations

The interior graphic standards book provided some initial stage designs and adjacency diagrams. I searched on the web for some more helpful, detailed books but everything costs $60+. I can't spend that money right now(I still owe Eric money for the hotel in Atlanta). 

The good news is the UNCG library had a fantastical stash of auditorium and theater design books. Floor plans, sections, elevations, details, acoustics, adjacencies, lighting, program elements, the list goes on, its all there in my 100 pound stack of books. If anyone else is designing an auditorium let me know and I might let you look at my stash. Maybe. There are plenty of others that I didn't pick up, basically because I had reached the weight capacity of my arms with the 4 I had acquired. 

This is going to be pretty exciting...

Thesis Proposal – Refueling Station of the Future

1) What is the project?

Quoted from the competition flyer
"Gas stations have always been part of American car culture by providing fuel, maintenance, service, directions for lost drivers, restrooms, food, and convenience store items. This relationship between the automobile and the gas station is about to change as new fuel options including electricity, hydrogen, and biofuels come to market. These new fuel options will transform the gas station into a "refueling station." These refueling stations have the opportunity to look and operate in a way that is vastly different from the current gas stations, both on the outside at the pumps as well as inside the convenience store. RDI invites you to develop a new concept that will address these changes and create a new store concept that will provide a better experience for the customers, be friendlier to the environment, and redefine how we view the gas station."

2) Who does it affect?
The gas guzzling citizens of the United States are the primary audience but perhaps we can extend the scope to everyone on the planet. More specifically, the site(s) will be strategically picked in Greensboro, North Carolina (my hometown!). The stratagem will be created through a program analysis.

3) Why is it necessary? What is the significance of this project?
We've made our mistakes as a country. We've allowed corporations and similar entities (U.S. government, American car industry) to control our appetites for oil for too long. We certainly can't place all of the blame on them either, we have to accept responsibility for our daily lives and actions as well. We must change, evolve our way of life in order to survive. With a new president that believes the U.S. can be petroleum free, whom has taken the initiative to fund various projects and give incentives to those who want to make the U.S. a greener, more sustainable country, it will be necessary to provide the infrastructure for this tsunami that cannot and will not be stopped. This refueling station will be a huge part of this infrastructure, just as gas stations today are vital to our ability to travel.

4) What will your design response entail? What do you intend to do?
I will be addressing the criteria listed in the answer to question #1. I will also attempt to simultaneously develop a business model for the refueling station through the design process. Before I am able to start the design process though, a rigorous programming analysis will have to be conducted in order to achieve optimal design. This analysis is still yet to be finalized but it will involve researching the following information:

*note* each major area will include statistical data in the form of graphs and diagrams associated with the research in order to facilitate the scientific part of the design process

*gas station's historical context and development
*oil crisis in the 1970's and its effects on the public
*development of alternative fuel (ethanol, algae, etc)
*development of alternative vehicular travel (hybrids, hydrogen fuel cells, electric, etc)
*existing alternative fuel infrastructure (what around that is similar or can be incorporated?)
*existing gas stations through the acquisition of plans from the city of Greensboro (this will help to establish a traditional program that can be manipulated into the refueling station of the future)
*potential use of GIS software to aid in spatial analysis

If someone killed the electric car, then its rising from the dead and so are some of its buddies...

Campus Building Analysis: Building Heights & Footprints

There is much deliberation in the studio about how to approach building height and footprint size regarding the design opportunity we have ahead of ourselves. UNCG has its own guidelines for new buildings as well as the city of Greensboro but perhaps its not a question of how big or how tall we can go in our designs.

The library is the tallest building on campus, standing at 11 stories tall located in the center of campus. Connected to the EUC, it also has the largest footprint. It is easy to infer from these numbers and the relative location that this is the heart of UNCG’s campus. Not to mention, the services, activities, and knowledge this “heart” has to offer further enforce its character as a landmark. One must ask the question: What can our designs offer to deserve such honor and visibility as another potential landmark on campus? This information will be helpful to the design teams in comparing the tallest (and largest) buildings on campus along with what they have to offer and their locations within the context of UNCG’s campus.

Campus Building Analysis: Parking Decks

Sufficient parking capacity is an important factor and necessary evil in the campus master plan. Surface lots don’t have much to offer other than a place to park a car. Parking decks offer a higher density but they are expensive and most are probably considered a visual and physical obstruction to pedestrians. UNCG has over 3000 deck spaces with plans to expand that number by 1700 spaces in the future through two separate expansion projects. The parking decks are included on the list of tallest/largest buildings on UNCG’s campus. Note that the Oakland deck expansion will include a pedestrian bridge across the NC train tracks, an apparent attempt to cross the boundaries of the southern part of campus.

The location of a future deck seems to be a difficult decision to make. If you’re building over an existing surface lot, where do all of those people who used to park there, park now? In this case, it seems UNCG has partially developed our Lee street site into an overflow parking lot for that exact reason (as far as the design phase is concerned, everything on the site is open to our decision). Integrating parking as a mixed-use option in the program makes for interesting design opportunities since it has the potential to serve the university and the city. Perhaps taking that one step further and integrating a transportation hub into the program could be an even more complex design experience. The hub could include light rail, a bus station, or just serve as major node (or district if it became concentrated enough) for high density parking on campus.

Campus Building Analysis: Residential

Much of UNC Greensboro’s residential halls are located in North Central campus with the exception of both the Spring Garden Apartments and Tower Village. The concentration of residential halls has been classified as a residential district due to their relative proximity to each other (some of them are quite secluded). According to the current UNCG master plan, there are future plans for two residential halls on the parcel of land currently used for freshman parking, adjacent to Tower Village and across from a student recreation field. The proposed residential hall closest to Spring Garden is planned to have approximately 96,000 square feet with 1 occupant for every 325 gross square feet (about 295 students). The second is much larger at 130,000 square feet with the same occupant per gross square footage mentioned above (400 students).


With the possible addition of these residential halls, UNCG increases the potential for a secondary residential district on the southern edge of campus. Unfortunately this opportunity for increased density also creates a problem for parking. In adding these halls, UNCG loses a substantial number of surface parking spaces. If the new building designs follow a similar, seemingly successful, solution to that of the Spring Garden Apartments (mixed use with sub-level parking) then there should be minimal impact on commuters.

It should also be mentioned that the Spring Garden/Aycock intersection is a major gateway into campus. With increased student housing, there is opportunity for increased student activity and economic development around that newly developed district. Should one of the design teams choose the part of our studio’s Lee Street site adjacent to this gateway (Lee/Aycock intersection and corner parcel), integrating student activities or housing into the optional mixed-use part of the program would be something to consider for this location.
The residential halls on campus come in a variety of shapes and sizes. The older halls average about 200 net square feet per student occupant. While opinions vary on the subject of whether to live on campus or not from student to student, a majority of upperclassmen (and women) choose to live off campus because of the desire for more personal space. It is UNCG’s goal to attract more students to live on campus, regardless of their year classification. With that in mind, UNCG has recently taken the intiative in that realm by redeveloping the Spring Garden Street Apartments, offering over twice the average net square footage per student occupant (457) as well as offering sub-level parking. With larger housing options available, upperclassmen will be more likely to reconsider on campus living as opposed to comperable off-campus options.

Apologies for not posting earlier...my intro for the studio program document

On a narrow parcel of land, bordered on the North and South by the NCRR tracks/Oakland avenue and Lee street, and on the East and West by South Aycock street and Tate street, exists our opportunity. It is here that our 4th year studio has focused its attention, investigating and analyzing the context of the site through the study and understanding of the master plans proposed by both the City of Greensboro and the University of North Carolina – Greensboro. We see the railroad tracks and Lee street, not as social, physical, or economic boundaries, but as a immeasurable prospects for design and for improving the quality of life in the area beyond what it is and what it represents to citizens today. While working inward from the urban scale, we’ve also been working out-word by programming a mixed-use architectural building to be placed strategically as the face of UNCG on the southern entrance to campus. Our simultaneous studies draw inspiration for each other and for our eventual proposals for the new architecture building.

This document is a culmination of several areas of focus. As mentioned before, this book is first and foremost a programming document to aid our design teams challenge the status quo of an institutional architecture building. The Gatewood Studio Arts building, our current building, was the first item investigated. Having experienced the building ourselves, we were able to identify both the positive and negative aspects regarding offices, classrooms, studios, etc. Using this information in conjunction with construction drawings and the program document compiled for the building as an example to work from, we were able to set our own guidelines (listed further in this book) for the design team proposals.

The Gatewood building was not the only building we studied. To help the studio understand what other architecture schools had or hadn’t done before us, we performed several precedent studies. These studies served as real comparisons to our own building and to what we think an architecture building should be. From the adjacency of program spaces and the general aesthetic of the building in relation to the campus in which it exists, to the size of the student body served by the building, the information gathered not only helped us add and subtract program spaces, but also made the studio look into the varying ways in which previous architects had approached the design of. These studies will also fortify the foundation of this book for which the design teams plan to use to formulate their own solutions for a new architecture building on campus.

Our site serves as crossroad for several governing entities, more specifically the city of Greensboro and UNC Greensboro, among others. After disseminating the city’s Lee Street corridor plan and the University’s master campus plan, the studio was able to draw it’s own conclusions about land usage for our purposes with regards to the new architecture building proposals. The site will be a part of both the city and the university, serving the community on many different levels and layers. The site analysis included in this book will aid design teams in not only meeting the minimum expectations set forth in the plans laid out by the city and university, but also potentially exceeding them.

We are excited with the challenge presented before us and are looking forward to soaring into the design process. Perhaps we might be able to turn a few heads with our ideas….

Lee Street Studio

(1950's signage and aesthetic, inside and out. The UNCG physical plant is in the background along with train passing by.)

On Friday afternoon around lunch time, Matt (site), Eric (precedent), and myself (programming) went to the Beef Burger on Lee street to refresh our memories (and taste buds) of the fine cuisine they have to offer. I made the mistake of thinking they took debit cards, which they don't. Eric made the mistake of believing me. Matt was the only one with cash so he payed for all of us. We all got the special which was a hamburger, fries and a drink for $3.99 (add 25 cents for cheese or 65 cents for bacon). There were other exciting fried items on the menu but the funds were limited so we went with what was cheap. The place is almost a half century old (if not older) and still running strong. We got there around 1 pm right before a rush of about 15-20 people from all walks of life got in line behind us.

The Beef Burger is part of a strip of land our studio is focusing on this semester between the Tate street and Aycock street intersections on Lee street. While most other places along the strip are for sale and/or are abandoned, the Beef Burger and a few other sites still maintain business (specialty rims, recycled batteries, gas station/auto body shop, army/navy surplus and various other strip stores).

I've always been aware of UNC Greensboro's master plans to acquire parcels to expand the university since there is no more space to build new buildings. This strip is included in that plan and they've already been successful in demolishing a lot and developing it into an overflow parking lot for the park & ride near the coliseum (fenced and gated of course). I've only recently become more aware of the city of Greensboro's Lee Street/High Point Road corridor plan through our initial studio meetings (first heard about it in an urban planning class last semester). I haven't thoroughly read into the information but I wonder how the two separate entities, the city and the university, are going to work with each other on this project.

And what will happen to the Beef Burger? Yum Yum's has been a staple in many students' daily meal rituals (you can only survive for so long off of $1 pink hotdogs). It is my hope that the university develops around Beef Burger so that it becomes part of campus life as Yum Yum's has. It stays open later which makes it a perfect match for a nearby architecture building with students working long days and nights.

If anything, we have a strong case to include Beef Burger in our program for the new studio.