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submitted 1 day ago by Salamence@lemmy.zip to c/memes@lemmy.ml

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[–] HiddenLayer555@lemmy.ml 30 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

We discussed those green skyscrapers in university environment class, and as far as I know they didn't work that well. It was hard to keep the plants alive and when they did grow, they became a breeding ground for pest insects that got into the units where people were living. It's very much prioritizing looking green over being green.

IMO it's better to just have efficient but visually boring skyscrapers, and then have dedicated green space around clusters of density (which is what China is mostly doing nowadays). Separating housing and green space make both more effective, easier to manage, and more resiliant.

Also, in case you're wondering, most Western environment profs are very impressed by what China has done, at least in the university I went to.

[–] hector@lemmy.today 3 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago) (1 children)

Skyscrapers seem a waste and vulnerability compared to the traditional 10 story style brick, or preferably stone, buildings typical in cities before skyscrapers. Some are bigger than 10 stories, and they can be built earthquake safe same as skyscrapers, the first earthquake safe designs of which that I'm aware of happened after the San Francisco area earthquake some time around the turn of the 20th century that leveled the large buildings. But I'm sure there were prior methods probably dating to antiquity in the middle east and elsewhere.

One method was to build a sort of pool over the build area, a solid container, with sand and the like inside, and building on top of that, vibrations would be absorbed by the sand. There are other methods too but they can be employed by both skyscrapers and masonary buildings.

As to size, the city hall building in philadelphia is the larges I believe, a magnificent building, with statues at levels going up with William Penn at the top. Ornate and decorative too, very unlike the brutalist architecture of today's city leaders. Compare the subway of any european capital city, from moscow to paris, to new york or DC's subway. Our leaders have no style, all the money for overinflated contrancts, and more money than any, but none for style or art built into it.

[–] HiddenLayer555@lemmy.ml 7 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (1 children)

I agree, I didn't want to change the premise too much in my original comment, but ideally you'd do some complicated math to determine the optimal height for your location, building materials, and population density.

I don't know what that calculation would look like in China because I don't live there (I'm sure the Chinese engineers are well aware of those calculations though) but in my country it would definitely be a lot closer to the 10 story range, maybe even lower.

Either way, something us in the West absolutely NEED to get used to is prefab buildings that all look the same. A bunch of prefab skyscrapers like China has is still worlds ahead of the logistical nightmare of demanding every single building be custom designed like is so common here. You call it boring, I call it efficient. Having a few reusable designs (usually different heights) to choose from and copy paste building housing, like what China does, is what we need first, IMO, and then we can talk about the optimal heights for those prefab buildings.

[–] hector@lemmy.today 3 points 14 hours ago

Yeah, functionality comes first and we've a lack of housing. But we should add some art to that functionality as we go as we are able, but a solid structure reproduced a million times comes first. Waiting on private interests to do it is a fool's errand it appears. Capital has colluded to keep the housing stock overpriced, with hedge funds and private equity buying a significant percent of all consumer housing, 15 percent just as of 2018, likely higher now.

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