This CE Center article is no longer eligible for receiving credits.
Designing for Resilience
In the context of purpose-driven design, the notion of resiliency takes on a broader meaning. It isn’t just about making stronger buildings that can withstand severe weather or natural disasters; it is about the ability of the people to not merely survive, but to thrive where they are located. True resilient design for buildings and communities focuses on the anticipation of extraordinary conditions that can create extraordinary human needs. This has been played out in far too many news reports in recent years, where a disastrous event has quickly taken its toll on buildings and infrastructure, but the impact on the people has lasted for months or, more typically, for years as cleanup, recovery, and rebuilding take place. The consequences for non-resilient design is often reported in terms of the millions or billions of dollars of damage. But the real consequence is the loss and disruption in people’s lives, sometimes causing a mass exodus out of a region as seen following hurricane Katrina or as currently being played out in refugees fleeing Africa and the Middle East.
The means to protect people, minimize disruption, and maintain long-term viability comes down to design. Each community is unique in its challenges and needs; therefore, the design response needs to be uniquely tailored to each community. Nonetheless, most of the common critical design conditions that need to be accounted for are becoming readily known such that specific design criteria for resiliency are emerging. The process includes identifying the potential of hazards from severe weather events and natural disasters, determining the relative risk and vulnerability of buildings or a community to those events, and establishing appropriate design criteria in response. For example, the wind and rain resistance of roofing, windows, and other building envelope systems may need to be increased for new and existing buildings prone to such weather events.
There are also long-term issues that need to be addressed, such as changing climatic cycles that are causing droughts in many areas. An appropriate design response here may be to incorporate water storage or water use reduction strategies in buildings or entire communities, but it may also include increased attention to fire resistance in areas that are experiencing more dramatic wildfires due to drought. Further, most buildings are served by some form of public utilities, such as drinking water, sewer, electricity, and communications. They are such a routine part of everyday life that it is easy to take them for granted until there is a lapse in that service and normal activities come to a virtual halt. This is not only disruptive from an economic and productivity standpoint, but it can also be life threatening, particularly if it extends for any period of time. Designing the infrastructure to be protected to withstand impacts is one approach to resilient design, but designing buildings to function temporarily without them is another. This isn’t an “either/or” option in most cases, but more likely a “both/and” situation, where infrastructure should be addressed and strengthened and buildings should be designed so they can live without them for an extended time.
Images courtesy of SUEP. and Vectorworks, Inc.
Resilient design involves an understanding of the larger, regional, and community scale environmental issues, as well as the performance of new and existing buildings.
As the amount of attention being paid to resilient design has grown in recent years, a number of organizations are emerging as design resources for people of many disciplines. The not-for-profit Resilient Design Institute (RDI) is one such organization, with a mission to “create solutions that enable buildings and communities to survive and thrive in the face of climate change, natural disasters, and other disruptions.” It not only sees the short-term benefits of overcoming immediate issues, but envisions a longer-term approach to design that can create a more sustainable built environment. The RDI ties resilience to climate change, recognizing the need for adaptation to the wide range of regional and localized impacts that are expected with a warming planet: more intense storms, greater precipitation, coastal and valley flooding, longer and more severe droughts in some areas, wildfires, melting permafrost, warmer temperatures, and power outages.
As a means to provide architects and others with some relevant tools, RDI has developed a list of ten Resilient Design Principles as a basis for planning. These 10 principles recognize the importance of things like scale, redundancy, durability, passive systems, natural resources, and social equity in resilient designs, as well as the limitations that need to assume interruptions will still occur and that total, absolute resilience is not realistically anticipated. They also offer a series of resilient design strategies scaled to the individual building level, the community level, and the regional level of design. Some of the strategies may seem obvious, like anticipating impacts from hazards but actually addressing them in a design is significant. Others are more focused, such as optimizing the use of on-site renewable energy or on-site harvested water. All of these concepts are discussed in more detail at www.resilientdesign.org.
The AIA has also taken on a leadership role on resilient design in several ways. First, the organization has a member-vetted, formal position statement of support that includes the following: “Buildings and communities are subjected to destructive forces from fire, storms, earthquakes, flooding, and even intentional attack. The challenges facing the built environment are evolving with climate change, environmental degradation, and population growth. Architects have a responsibility to design a resilient environment that can more successfully adapt to natural conditions and that can more readily absorb and recover from adverse events. The AIA supports policies, programs, and practices that promote adaptable and resilient buildings and communities.”
To back up this position, the AIA has also put together a set of sustainability initiatives and resources on resilience as part of the government advocacy efforts of the organization, which can be found at www.aia.org/advocacy/AIAB106185. In particular, it sees the role of the architect as valuable within four stages of a disaster cycle. Once a disaster occurs, the first step is the response, where architects can assist with building damage assessments and temporary housing design. During the recovery stage, architects can provide planning and design assistance for repairs, rebuilding, or relocation efforts. Preparedness is the next stage, where architects can help assess vulnerabilities and conduct analyses, training, and education all geared toward helping building owners and communities become prepared in a calmer, non-emergency mode. The final stage is the implementation of mitigation measures for new, renovated, or existing buildings and infrastructure with the intent that when another disaster strikes, the impact on people and property is notably lessened.
© Tsunami Design Initiative, Harvard GSD and SENSEable City Laboratory
Using structural guidelines extracted from the analysis of buildings that survive a tsunami, the Safe(r) House, coordinated by the SENSEable City Laboratory, merges low-tech construction with high-tech BIM design, producing a dwelling that is better prepared to outlast a tsunami.
In the interest of engaging a broad discussion across many stakeholders, the AIA joined with the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) and in 2014 led the effort for more than 30 design and construction organizations representing more than 750,000 professionals to sign the joint “Building Industry Statement on Resilience.” This step affirms that “As the leaders of this industry, we are committed to significantly improving the resilience of our nation’s buildings, infrastructure, public spaces, and communities.” All of the organizations have agreed to work together to promote better education, improved materials and building methods, and cooperation with government agencies at all levels to create “new practices in order to break the cycle of destruction and rebuilding.”
In October 2015, the AIA convened a Resilience Summit inviting some of the best people in the country to participate. (See “Reframing Resilience: Proceedings of the AIA 2015 Resilience Summit” at www.aia.org/aiaucmp/groups/aia/documents/pdf/aiab108004.pdf). Among the outcomes of this event, four themes emerged:
- Industry partnerships are needed to tackle complex design problems at scales of efficiency to achieve greater cost benefits.
- Experienced professionals need to continuously reeducate the profession about disaster prevention and resilience, and provide awareness and hope to the public.
- Existing policies, tools, and programs must be coordinated at the state and federal level to resolve contradictions, identify opportunities and synergies, and fill gaps.
- Greater collaboration across the building industry with the public’s participation is needed to align community performance goals and to determine design thresholds.
All of these are being addressed with new programs and initiatives by the AIA and others all in the interest of achieving greater resiliency in buildings and communities nationwide.
Image courtesy of The American Institute of Architects (AIA)
The AIA Summit on Resilience produced a report that is useful to all architects and other stakeholders involved in resilient communities.
All buildings, regardless of location, are subjected to the conditions and forces imposed upon them from the natural environment. These forces can come from common weather conditions, such as sun exposure, wind, rain, snow, hail, and the like. They can also come from other more significant phenomena, such as earthquakes, flooding, wildfires, hurricanes, tornadoes, or drought. Design professionals and building codes can readily address the typical or common concerns of most of these occurrences at least to a basic extent. However, it has become clear in recent years that buildings and entire communities are experiencing situations that aren’t all that typical. Climate changes and unusual weather patterns have created storm events that are more intense or more frequent than usual. Increased population density has meant that more people are impacted when an event does occur. Older buildings and infrastructure are not always able to deal with these increased conditions and forces. And social, economic, and political conditions in many places around the world are exacerbating the problem through disproportionate impacts on those least equipped to deal with them. Recognizing the importance of addressing these situations, organizations, government bodies, and individuals are rallying around an emerging planning and design principle—increasing the resilience of buildings and communities for all of their inhabitants.
Image courtesy of McGregor Coxall and Vectorworks, Inc.
The intersection of the natural environment with the built environment can be investigated and designed for resiliency and sustainability using tools such as building information modeling (BIM).
Design with Purpose
Resilient design goes beyond the realm of building architecture and engineering. It is necessary to involve the larger community in all of its aspects. Some of the natural local conditions that likely contributed to the creation of a community in the first place, such as climate, topography, water resources, or vegetation, can also be some of the causes for natural disasters. The political makeup of a community and the effectiveness of the elected leaders to orchestrate actions that work for the benefit of all people certainly makes a difference in terms of the smooth operation of a community, but it is also critically important in times of crises or natural disasters. The socioeconomic condition of the community plays a significant role not only in the ability of a community to withstand severe weather events, but also to recover from them.
Architects are among many professionals who have recognized the multifaceted and truly interdisciplinary nature of communities in both good times and during times of need. Some have taken it upon themselves to devote a portion, if not all, of their practice to the concept of purpose-driven design, which is focused on responding to extraordinary needs of a community. These needs could include social issues, such as poverty, overcrowding, and migration, with innovative, affordable designs for shelter and housing. Some address the scarcity of resources in a region, such as water or energy shortages, with creative ways to extract, conserve, or distribute those resources. Others have focused on helping a community recover following a natural disaster with damage assessment, master planning, and improved building designs to withstand any repeat occurrences. Regardless of the issue or focus, the design services rendered are offered for the purpose of serving the greater good of the community, whether at the level of a region, neighborhood, or building. This purpose-driven design approach has been undertaken by many American and international firms as part of the firm philosophy and culture. In some cases, the work is provided pro bono, while in other cases, some level of fees are paid depending on the circumstances of engagement. In all cases, it influences design decisions from the broadest to the most specific levels.
Beyond individual firms, there are a number of organizations that have been champions for this concept of purpose-driven design. One of the more celebrated organizations is the former Architecture for Humanity founded by Cameron Sinclair. While it conducted significant humanitarian-based design and building projects around the world, its founder left to pursue other things, and the organization closed down several years later. Nonetheless, it brought worldwide attention to the role that architects and other design professionals can play in addressing community issues. Similarly, in Tokyo Japan, the 2014 Pritzker Prize winner, Shigeru Ban, Hon. FAIA, has used his notoriety and his firm to establish an organization known as the Voluntary Architects Network (VAN). Shigeru Ban Architects began disaster relief work in 1994 in response to 2 million refugees in Rwanda being misplaced from their homes as a result of that country’s civil war. Ban made a proposal to the United Nations (UN) to use “paper-tube shelters”—a medium that he has famously used as a trademark for innovation and affordability. The UN liked the proposal enough that he became a consultant, and his Voluntary Architects Network has worked ever since in multiple countries helping thousands of people recover from natural disasters. Specific projects have included the Paper Shelter in Haiti, the Hualin Temporary Elementary School in China, and Paper Log Houses in India.
© Takanobu Sakuma
Architects like Pritzker Prize winner Shigeru Ban have included purpose-driven design, like this “paper house,” as a significant part of their practice using alternative materials and local resources to provide housing following a natural disaster.
Closer to home, the American Institute of Architects (AIA) has a long and continuing history of addressing purpose-driven design for communities. As early as 1972, the AIA formally recognized the role of architects in community issues, such as emergency response efforts. In 2004, the AIA Center for Communities by Design brought together programs not only in disaster assistance but also community planning, including the popular Regional/Urban Design Assistance Team (R/UDAT) and the Sustainable Design Assessment Team (SDAT) programs. These programs have worked across the United States and in places around the world using volunteer teams led by AIA members and staff to address planning and rebuilding efforts in a variety of communities. Some locations served include Louisiana and Alabama following hurricane Katrina, Haiti following a severe earthquake, and places in Asia that suffered tsunami damage. The national effort has led to the creation of a Disaster Assistance Program with members located in AIA chapters across the United States. This has spawned significant planning and response efforts in places like the state of Oregon to address seismic concerns and the New York City area following superstorm Sandy. Note that disaster assistance with the AIA is not about being a first responder to help individuals. Rather, it is about architects lending their expertise in assessing damage, arranging temporary relief in the short term and, more significantly, in offering design expertise to help rebuild and reshape communities. Particular emphasis is placed on design to withstand future disasters—that is designing for resilience.
Source: www.aia.org/about/initiatives/AIAS075265
The American Institute of Architects (AIA) maintains the Center for Communities by Design that provides a means for architects and other professionals to assist communities in improving their design for overall livability, disaster responsiveness, and sustainability.
Designing for Resilience
In the context of purpose-driven design, the notion of resiliency takes on a broader meaning. It isn’t just about making stronger buildings that can withstand severe weather or natural disasters; it is about the ability of the people to not merely survive, but to thrive where they are located. True resilient design for buildings and communities focuses on the anticipation of extraordinary conditions that can create extraordinary human needs. This has been played out in far too many news reports in recent years, where a disastrous event has quickly taken its toll on buildings and infrastructure, but the impact on the people has lasted for months or, more typically, for years as cleanup, recovery, and rebuilding take place. The consequences for non-resilient design is often reported in terms of the millions or billions of dollars of damage. But the real consequence is the loss and disruption in people’s lives, sometimes causing a mass exodus out of a region as seen following hurricane Katrina or as currently being played out in refugees fleeing Africa and the Middle East.
The means to protect people, minimize disruption, and maintain long-term viability comes down to design. Each community is unique in its challenges and needs; therefore, the design response needs to be uniquely tailored to each community. Nonetheless, most of the common critical design conditions that need to be accounted for are becoming readily known such that specific design criteria for resiliency are emerging. The process includes identifying the potential of hazards from severe weather events and natural disasters, determining the relative risk and vulnerability of buildings or a community to those events, and establishing appropriate design criteria in response. For example, the wind and rain resistance of roofing, windows, and other building envelope systems may need to be increased for new and existing buildings prone to such weather events.
There are also long-term issues that need to be addressed, such as changing climatic cycles that are causing droughts in many areas. An appropriate design response here may be to incorporate water storage or water use reduction strategies in buildings or entire communities, but it may also include increased attention to fire resistance in areas that are experiencing more dramatic wildfires due to drought. Further, most buildings are served by some form of public utilities, such as drinking water, sewer, electricity, and communications. They are such a routine part of everyday life that it is easy to take them for granted until there is a lapse in that service and normal activities come to a virtual halt. This is not only disruptive from an economic and productivity standpoint, but it can also be life threatening, particularly if it extends for any period of time. Designing the infrastructure to be protected to withstand impacts is one approach to resilient design, but designing buildings to function temporarily without them is another. This isn’t an “either/or” option in most cases, but more likely a “both/and” situation, where infrastructure should be addressed and strengthened and buildings should be designed so they can live without them for an extended time.
Images courtesy of SUEP. and Vectorworks, Inc.
Resilient design involves an understanding of the larger, regional, and community scale environmental issues, as well as the performance of new and existing buildings.
As the amount of attention being paid to resilient design has grown in recent years, a number of organizations are emerging as design resources for people of many disciplines. The not-for-profit Resilient Design Institute (RDI) is one such organization, with a mission to “create solutions that enable buildings and communities to survive and thrive in the face of climate change, natural disasters, and other disruptions.” It not only sees the short-term benefits of overcoming immediate issues, but envisions a longer-term approach to design that can create a more sustainable built environment. The RDI ties resilience to climate change, recognizing the need for adaptation to the wide range of regional and localized impacts that are expected with a warming planet: more intense storms, greater precipitation, coastal and valley flooding, longer and more severe droughts in some areas, wildfires, melting permafrost, warmer temperatures, and power outages.
As a means to provide architects and others with some relevant tools, RDI has developed a list of ten Resilient Design Principles as a basis for planning. These 10 principles recognize the importance of things like scale, redundancy, durability, passive systems, natural resources, and social equity in resilient designs, as well as the limitations that need to assume interruptions will still occur and that total, absolute resilience is not realistically anticipated. They also offer a series of resilient design strategies scaled to the individual building level, the community level, and the regional level of design. Some of the strategies may seem obvious, like anticipating impacts from hazards but actually addressing them in a design is significant. Others are more focused, such as optimizing the use of on-site renewable energy or on-site harvested water. All of these concepts are discussed in more detail at www.resilientdesign.org.
The AIA has also taken on a leadership role on resilient design in several ways. First, the organization has a member-vetted, formal position statement of support that includes the following: “Buildings and communities are subjected to destructive forces from fire, storms, earthquakes, flooding, and even intentional attack. The challenges facing the built environment are evolving with climate change, environmental degradation, and population growth. Architects have a responsibility to design a resilient environment that can more successfully adapt to natural conditions and that can more readily absorb and recover from adverse events. The AIA supports policies, programs, and practices that promote adaptable and resilient buildings and communities.”
To back up this position, the AIA has also put together a set of sustainability initiatives and resources on resilience as part of the government advocacy efforts of the organization, which can be found at www.aia.org/advocacy/AIAB106185. In particular, it sees the role of the architect as valuable within four stages of a disaster cycle. Once a disaster occurs, the first step is the response, where architects can assist with building damage assessments and temporary housing design. During the recovery stage, architects can provide planning and design assistance for repairs, rebuilding, or relocation efforts. Preparedness is the next stage, where architects can help assess vulnerabilities and conduct analyses, training, and education all geared toward helping building owners and communities become prepared in a calmer, non-emergency mode. The final stage is the implementation of mitigation measures for new, renovated, or existing buildings and infrastructure with the intent that when another disaster strikes, the impact on people and property is notably lessened.
© Tsunami Design Initiative, Harvard GSD and SENSEable City Laboratory
Using structural guidelines extracted from the analysis of buildings that survive a tsunami, the Safe(r) House, coordinated by the SENSEable City Laboratory, merges low-tech construction with high-tech BIM design, producing a dwelling that is better prepared to outlast a tsunami.
In the interest of engaging a broad discussion across many stakeholders, the AIA joined with the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) and in 2014 led the effort for more than 30 design and construction organizations representing more than 750,000 professionals to sign the joint “Building Industry Statement on Resilience.” This step affirms that “As the leaders of this industry, we are committed to significantly improving the resilience of our nation’s buildings, infrastructure, public spaces, and communities.” All of the organizations have agreed to work together to promote better education, improved materials and building methods, and cooperation with government agencies at all levels to create “new practices in order to break the cycle of destruction and rebuilding.”
In October 2015, the AIA convened a Resilience Summit inviting some of the best people in the country to participate. (See “Reframing Resilience: Proceedings of the AIA 2015 Resilience Summit” at www.aia.org/aiaucmp/groups/aia/documents/pdf/aiab108004.pdf). Among the outcomes of this event, four themes emerged:
- Industry partnerships are needed to tackle complex design problems at scales of efficiency to achieve greater cost benefits.
- Experienced professionals need to continuously reeducate the profession about disaster prevention and resilience, and provide awareness and hope to the public.
- Existing policies, tools, and programs must be coordinated at the state and federal level to resolve contradictions, identify opportunities and synergies, and fill gaps.
- Greater collaboration across the building industry with the public’s participation is needed to align community performance goals and to determine design thresholds.
All of these are being addressed with new programs and initiatives by the AIA and others all in the interest of achieving greater resiliency in buildings and communities nationwide.
Image courtesy of The American Institute of Architects (AIA)
The AIA Summit on Resilience produced a report that is useful to all architects and other stakeholders involved in resilient communities.
Connecting Resilience and Sustainability
Anyone who has been engaged in green or sustainable building and community design will recognize that there are many shared design strategies with resilience. At the most basic level, this starts with an understanding of the regional climate zone and other natural conditions that will affect the design and operation of the buildings in that region, whether in normal or severe times. Green building designs typically look at these regional issues as a basis for energy code compliance at a minimum or full site analysis to determine how to take advantage of the resources available. Resilient design benefits from this same analysis and approach first to understand and plan for both the normal and anticipated changes in natural conditions, weather, temperature, etc. Then, an assessment of the on-site or local resources that can be tapped into as permanent or temporary reserves for building operations can inform vulnerabilities or risk reductions based on the availability of those resources. These natural resources can be used to overcome interruptions in service by public utilities and maintain a degree of normalcy until full service is restored.
Water is a primary concern in both sustainable and resilient design on several fronts. First, a reliable drinking water supply is needed for human life, but water conservation techniques make sense in all cases to avoid the unnecessary wasting of water. If the water supply system requires a public source or the use of electricity to pump the water, then it may be compromised during times of emergency situations.
A more sustainable and resilient approach would be to use on-site collection of water, at least for non-potable uses while preserving drinking water in the process. Water drainage is similarly an issue to address, either in terms of plumbing waste or surface water drainage to prevent flooding.
From a sustainability standpoint, plumbing waste can be minimized through water-conserving fixtures and on-site treatment of grey water. From a resiliency standpoint, flooding may impact the ability of on-site groundwater absorption so conservation and waterless alternatives may be even more important. Designing on-site systems with backup or overflow capabilities can become critical in flooding situations, too.
Energy is a similarly strong concern in both sustainability and resilience. The most effective strategy in both is to reduce the need for energy in the first place. That happens through better building design, usually with a focus on the design of the building envelope or enclosure. New or existing buildings will benefit from well-insulated walls, roofs, and floors with windows, glazing, doors, and skylights that are sized and specified to suit the building’s local climate. They will also benefit from designs that allow occupied spaces to be filled with natural daylight and have the option of natural air flow or ventilation, thus not requiring electricity for either when conditions allow. Where building systems need to be run, such as HVAC or electrical systems, having the ability to control those systems so they are only running when and where needed at the highest efficiency possible will further reduce the need for energy usage in the first place.
With the energy demand under control and the efficiencies maximized, the next step of both sustainability and resilience is on-site energy. In a traditional building, diesel-powered generators are often used. In a sustainable building, on-site renewable energy is used. The beauty of the sustainable approach is that renewable energy is generally available all the time, not just during an event. To guard against being compromised, say from a lack of sun for a solar electric installation, on-site storage in batteries or a heat storage system can carry a building or a group of buildings through an event and enhance their resilience. In this way, the sustainable building is providing energy and functioning well in normal times with renewable energy and can become a welcome safe place in the event of an emergency, too.
Assessing Performance and Design Effectively
With an understanding of the issues and a group of resources to pull from, the process of creating resilient, purpose-driven designs can be enhanced by good design tools, including design software. In this case, the power of the computer isn’t limited to only creating renderings or working drawings, but rather is a powerful design tool that can help perform simulations of normal and severe conditions. It can also be used to analyze different options to maximize both sustainability and resilience.
Images courtesy of SUEP. and Vectorworks, Inc.
BIM can be used to produce accurate flood simulations that inform truly resilient design. On the left, normal land and water conditions are shown, while on the right, flooded conditions are depicted showing the buildings are not affected.
Computer design can begin with assessing conditions at the regional and community scale. At this level, a geographic information system (GIS) can be used as a means to capture, store, manipulate, analyze, manage, and present all types of spatial or geographical data. This is particularly relevant for things like natural topography, terrain, natural resources, vegetation, water resources, utilities, roadways and transportation, etc. The characteristics of each of these can be assessed for typical conditions and then looked at in terms of how they respond to extreme conditions, short term or long term. That analysis can directly inform building designs. For example, the Ninth Ward in New Orleans has famously been the recipient of Brad Pitt’s Make It Right Foundation, which has solicited well-known architects to provide pro-bono services for innovative, flood-proof houses. The computerized site analysis allowed for a number of creative designs that ranged from raised houses on a variety of “stilts” to tethered structures designed to float upward as the water level increases.
Within the building, building information modeling (BIM) workflows can be used as a tool for visual design and assessments as well as the determination of meeting performance criteria. That criteria can include structural system strength under extreme stresses from water or wind, or energy performance criteria for energy efficiency, daylighting, or ventilation. Each can be looked at independently and then assessed collectively for their interaction and the total design of the building. Shared BIM files also allow a multidisciplinary team to collaborate as a design progresses and is refined. With high-quality, three-dimensional visualizations, it makes it very easy for the outcomes to be shared within the design team so the challenges can be clearly articulated and solutions arrived at collaboratively. Similarly, high-quality visualizations and even animations can be used for communicating outside of the design team with community leaders, first responders, building owners, and the general public.
As an innovative example of this type of collaboration, Greg Henderson is a licensed architect who is using his knowledge of structural design and BIM technology to inform his work on something he has termed magnetic field architecture (MFA). Based on principles similar to trains and other vehicles that have been designed to ride along a magnetic field without touching any tracks, he envisions separating a building from its structural supports when needed in order to survive catastrophes, such as earthquakes or flooding. “The relationship between electricity and magnetism and light isn’t well understood, but I wanted to keep examining it because I think we can form a new understanding of this energy within our lifetimes and use it to do incredible things,” he says.
The premise of this life-saving technology is simple: work in harmony with Mother Nature rather than fight against her. Henderson’s patented, three-part foundation system is based on the concept of decoupling structures from the earth with a fluid or gas, allowing for the energy from natural disasters to gradually impact a building rather than strike all at once. For example, with advanced knowledge of a pending earthquake, one could activate the hover technology to lift homes up off the ground for the duration of the tremors, allowing the seismic energy to dissipate through the air. Similarly, if a hurricane threatens flooding in a coastal community, use the existing water on-site to float the buildings in the flood zone out of harm’s way, creating a liquid buffer from the violent storm surges. “With MFA technology, you could build homes in a flood zone without having to worry about the flood levees breaking or design an office near a fault line without fearing earthquake damage,” Henderson says. Using MFA as a core part of our urban infrastructure may take years of development, but it may have short-term applications that will transform our world, as well.
Photos courtesy of Arx Pax, LLC and Vectorworks, Inc.
Digital technology and BIM are helping architects apply very creative thinking to their work, such as this magnetic field architecture that may one day elevate a building out of seismic or water forces.
Conclusion
Changing environmental conditions and concerns coupled with increased awareness of their impacts on people are pushing the limits of design and construction. Architects and others involved in purpose-driven design are at the forefront of confronting social and environmental concerns head on through innovative design and construction strategies. Communities around the world are recognizing that their buildings and regions need to be more resilient in order to handle anticipated natural events. Designers who embrace the call to meet these needs can use readily available computer technology to respond with buildings and communities that are truly sustainable, more resilient, and better for all of the people who inhabit them.
Peter J. Arsenault, FAIA, NCARB, LEED AP, is a practicing architect, sustainable building consultant, continuing education presenter, and prolific author engaged nationwide in advancing better building performance through design. www.linkedin.com/in/pjaarch
|
Vectorworks, Inc. is the developer of Vectorworks software, a line of industry-specific CAD and BIM solutions that help more than half a million design visionaries transform the world. www.vectorworks.net.
|
