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result(s) for
"Megastructures."
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Megastructures : tallest, longest, biggest, deepest
\"[This book] describes how and why these structures were designed and built. It explains the physics behind the designs, which allows buildings, dams or bridges to rise to incredible heights, withstand enormous pressures, and resist collapse from environmental forces.\"--P. [4] of cover.
Book
Indeterminacy as a Framework for Sustainable Architecture: Lessons from Spens, a Socialist Megastructure
In the second half of the twentieth century, the concept of indeterminacy in architecture emerged to address the realities of chance and change, with the megastructure representing a critical point of this ambition. As the aims of indeterminate architectural approaches align with current sustainable development goals, this study hypothesises this design concept as the basis for the sustainability of structures built within its framework. Through a case study of Spens, a socialist megastructure in Novi Sad, Serbia, the paper explores the potentials of megastructures in relation to requirements for more sustainable cities. Firstly, it evaluates Spens’ current social sustainability through focus group discussions analysing sense of community, place, and wellbeing. Findings demonstrate a clear recognition of Spens’ spatial qualities among users. Secondly, the paper examines the future environmental sustainability of Spens, focusing on strategies that enhance user wellbeing and urban life as a point of overlap between social and environmental sustainability, using the Green Space Factor (GSF) and Urban Greening Factor (UFG). Results reveal the significant yet underutilised potential for greening. The paper highlights the long-term societal value of such structures and strategies for leveraging their concepts for their sustainable adaptation rather than replacement amid ongoing retrofit or replacement debates.
Journal Article
Beyond utopia : Japanese Metabolism architecture and the birth of mythopia
Megastructure proposals by the Japanese Metabolism group are commonly identified with the concept of utopia. Beyond this partial understanding, the author suggests that rather than being merely utopian, the Megastructure of Metabolism represents a uniquely amalgam genre: the myth camouflaged as utopia. Although its Megastructure seemingly describes a desirable future condition as utopia does, it also comprises certain cultural images rooted in the collective (un)conscious of Japanese people, in accordance with the general interpretation of myth. The primary narrative of the book thus follows the gradual unfolding of the myth-like characteristics of its Megastructure. Myth is dealt here as an interdisciplinary subject in line with contemporary myth theories. After expounding the mechanism underlying the growing demand for a new myth in architecture (the origin of the myth), Part I discovers the formal characteristics of the Megastructure of Metabolism to give a hint of the real intention behind it. Based on this, Part II is a reexamination of their design methods, which aims to clarify the function of the myth and to suggest the meaning behind it. Finally, Part III deals with the subject matter of the myth by disclosing the meaning unfolding in the story, and suggests a new reading of Metabolism's urban theory: as an attempt to reconsider the traditional Japanese space concept.
Book
The oldest plans to scale of humanmade mega-structures
Data on how Stone Age communities conceived domestic and utilitarian structures are limited to a few examples of schematic and non-accurate representations of various-sized built spaces. Here, we report the exceptional discovery of the up-to-now oldest realistic plans that have been engraved on stones. These engravings from Jordan and Saudi Arabia depict ‘desert kites’, humanmade archaeological mega-traps that are dated to at least 9,000 years ago for the oldest. The extreme precision of these engravings is remarkable, representing gigantic neighboring Neolithic stone structures, the whole design of which is impossible to grasp without seeing it from the air or without being their architect (or user, or builder). They reveal a widely underestimated mental mastery of space perception, hitherto never observed at this level of accuracy in such an early context. These representations shed new light on the evolution of human discernment of space, communication, and communal activities in ancient times.
Journal Article
A very high energy hadron collider on the Moon
The long-term prospect of building a hadron collider around the circumference of a great circle of the Moon is sketched. A circular collider on the Moon (CCM) of ∼11 000 km in circumference could reach a proton–proton center-of-mass collision energy of 14 PeV—a thousand times higher than the Large Hadron Collider at CERN—optimistically assuming a dipole magnetic field of 20 T. Several aspects of such a project are presented, including siting, construction, availability of necessary materials on the Moon, and powering, as well as a discussion of future studies and further information needed to determine the more concrete feasibility of each. Machine parameters and vacuum requirements are explored, and an injection scheme is delineated. Other unknowns are set down. Due to the strong interest from multiple organizations in establishing a permanent Moon presence, a CCM could be the (next-to-) next-to-next-generation discovery machine for high-energy particle physics and a natural successor to next-generation machines, such as the proposed future circular collider at CERN or a super proton–proton collider in China, and other future machines, such as a collider in the Sea, in the Gulf of Mexico. A CCM would serve as an important stepping stone toward a Planck-scale collider sited in our Solar System.
Journal Article
Orientational Metaphors of Megastructure Worship: Optimization Perspectives on Associative Cultural Landscape Methodology
In the modernization of cities and buildings around the world, megastructures represent the integration of the means of material production and advanced technology. However, there has been little discussion of the reasons for the enthusiastic phenomenon, especially the associative style between humans and megastructures. Among the methodologies for discussing the material environment and the human spiritual world, Associative Cultural Landscape methodology, based on the cultural landscape, is selected, and the “verticality” and the vertical discussion depth of the megastructure are used to optimize Associative Cultural Landscape methodology by utilizing the “orientational metaphors”. This forms Orientational Metaphors—Associative Cultural Landscape methodology for interpreting megastructure worship. Utilizing the optimized methodology, megastructure worship is interpreted from three interpretative paths: body worship, political worship, and relationship worship. Nine applied models and the matrix that meet the applied scenarios are formed. Finally, the paper presents the framework and its main theoretical contributions: (1) it generates the 16 processes from topic selection to model interpretation; (2) it differentiates the three interpretative paths of megastructure worship; (3) it evolves and optimizes Associative Cultural Landscape methodology; (4) it establishes nine applied models, based on the three interpretative paths; (5) it provides a research outlook—combining the nine existing applied models, a total of 21 interpretative potential applied models have been constructed. Using Orientational Metaphors—Associative Cultural Landscape methodology, the spiritual relationship between humans and megastructures is established with “spiritual relevance” as the core, and three interpretative paths of megastructure worship are interpreted. A comprehensive analysis of the megastructure phenomenon is proposed, providing a framework and models for human emotions that are attached to environmental psychology. The study provides an optimized methodological framework with Associative Cultural Landscape methodology and applied models for city and building scenarios involving the emotional connection between humans and megastructures. In particular, at the methodological level, it provides a new discussion paradigm for philosophical and applied megastructures that explain non-quantitative problems.
Journal Article
Brutalism, Film, and Dystopia: The Many (Cinematic) Lives of John Andrews’s Scarborough College
Since its opening to the public in 1965, John Andrews’s megastructure Scarborough College —currently University of Toronto, Scarborough— has received universal acclaim. Praised by Kenneth Frampton as “by far the most daring, comprehensive and radical”¦ of all the completed university complexes of recent years”, Scarborough has enjoyed, unlike many other brutalist structures, a peaceful and successful existence: untainted by later extensions, the Andrews Building, as it is known today, has not only survived, but become the revered core of a landmark university campus. However, adding to its prosperous history as a university facility, Scarborough has also led a prolific double life as a filming location, lending its architectural persona to an assortment of evil corporations, futuristic prisons, or government facilities. This article examines some of the many appearances of Scarborough on the screen, and the different ways in which cinema has depicted, appropriated, recontextualized, transformed, and even extended the building beyond Andrews’s original design and its as-built reality. Desde su apertura al público en 1965, el megaestructural Scarborough College de John Andrews -actualmente Universidad de Toronto, Scarborough- disfrutó del reconocimiento universal. Saludado por Kenneth Frampton como “con mucho el más atrevido, completo y radical... de todos los complejos universitarios completados en los últimos años”, Scarborough ha disfrutado, a diferencia de muchas otras estructuras brutalistas, de una existencia pacífica y exitosa: impoluto, pese a ampliaciones posteriores, el Andrews Building, como se lo conoce hoy, no solo ha sobrevivido hasta nuestros días, sino que se ha convertido en el núcleo reverenciado de un emblemático campus universitario. Sin embargo, junto con su próspera historia como instalación universitaria, Scarborough también ha disfrutado de una prolífica doble vida como localización cinematográfica, prestando sus rasgos arquitectónicos a una variedad de perversas corporaciones, prisiones futuristas o instalaciones gubernamentales. En este artículo se examinan algunas de las muchas apariciones de Scarborough en la pantalla, así como las diferentes formas en que el cine ha representado, apropiado, recontextualizado, transformado e incluso ampliado el edificio más allá del diseño construido por Andrews.
Journal Article
Experiments with Megastuctures and Building Systems. University Building in the Federal Republic of Germany in the 1960s and 1970s
This article outlines the phenomenon of West Germany’s new universities for the masses. Seldom have so many universities of such size been built so quickly as in the Federal Republic of Germany in the 1960s and 1970s. Nearly 40 new universities were established across the country.It is a known fact that, from a political point of view, the priority was to provide as much space as possible quickly and cheaply. Following the concept of the functional city and the logic of increased efficiency by concentration, the vast majority of the new university complexes were constructed as large-scale structures outside of historic city centers. Architects seized the opportunity and designed the publicly financed large-scale complexes as urban utopias on a small scale, as I am going to show drawing mainly on examples in Bochum, Marburg, Berlin, Bielefeld and Constance. A key consideration – beyond efficiency – was the issue of flexibility. Inspired by systems theory, architects developed megastructures and building systems that would allow the academic communities to modify its buildings according to their needs in the future. However, the expectations that these New Universities might, due to their size and complexity, develop the same dynamism as historic towns, that were perceived to have ‘grown organically’, were fulfilled to a very limited extent only. Nonetheless, the mass universities are impressive testimony to the political, technical and urban planning spirit of the 1960s.
Journal Article
Connection between Relationship Quality and Megaproject Success: Moderating Role of Contractual Functions
Relational governance is critical to project success. The present study on relational governance fails to elaborate on the relation between relationship quality and project success. In line with social exchange theory, this paper presents an empirical research of Chinese megaprojects to explore the effect of social exchange factors on relationship quality. Particularly, this research investigated how mianzi (face) as a factor variable affects relationship quality in megaprojects. This work also divided contract functions into control, coordination, and adaptation to investigate the impact of these functions on the relationship between social exchange factors and mianzi (face) with relationship quality. Results corroborate the following points: (1) relationship quality has a significant effect on project success; (2) relationship quality is also significantly influenced by trust, reciprocity, commitment, and mianzi; and (3) regarding the moderating effects of contractual functions, the contractual control function has a positive influence on the relationship between trust, commitment, and relationship quality and has a negative influence on the relationship between mianzi and relationship quality. However, contractual control has no apparent effect on the relationship between reciprocity and relationship quality. The contractual coordination function has a positive effect on the relationship between trust, commitment, and relationship quality. The contractual adaptation function has a significant positive effect on the relationship between trust and relationship quality. These findings provide new insights into relationship governance, and suggestions for contractual function design are provided.
Journal Article
A megastructure in Singapore: The \Asian city of tomorrow\?
The People's Park Complex is one of two megastructures built in the early 1970s as prototypes for a new \"Asian city of tomorrow\" designed to humanize the urban expansion of Singapore through the creation of affective ensembles and connections, and would serve as an alternative to the state's forcible relocation of the population to alienating, cookie-cutter high-rise new towns. While the envisioned model of an expansive, affective urbanism failed to materialize in these megastructures, I examine how the transnational migrant and working-class communities that use the complex engage in other forms of affective placemaking that disrupt the narratives and temporalities in the state's recuperation of the surrounding old city by the state as a heritage and tourist district. I illuminate how affect can serve as an analytic to reorient a unilinear notion of architectural failure toward new temporalities, imaginations, and futurities. Keywords: affect, architectural failure, Asian cities, gentrification, megastructures, migration, Singapore, urbanity
Journal Article