Design Charrette

In the Design Charrette project, we formed groups of six and took on a scenario in which we had to design a solution.  Each group member picked a stakeholder role and was responsible for presenting their ideas and constraints for the project.  Our scenario was that a bridge was needed to be built to go through a wetland area to cut out excess driving time in hopes that this would bring tourists to the location.

 Here is our preliminary plan:

Here are our notes:

Date/Time:

10/4/11 1:19-2:02 pm

Participants:

Dan: Health/Safety Engineer

Mark: Environmental Engineer

Collin: Cost Estimator

Trip: Structural Engineer

Blake: Architectural Engineer

Dan's concerns:

Everything we use is safe for the environment

Materials

Site must be safe at all times

Trip's concerns:

Has to be pleasing to the eye

Withstand tornadoes/hurricanes/earthquakes/river

Collin's concerns:

Stay within budget

Blake's concerns:

Design and construction of bridge

Mark's concerns:

Must not pollute air/water

Design Plan:

Build a bridge with a series of arches.  For the boating dock, build a simple runway to drop off boats and also create another building for people to throw away waste since the boat dock will create a lot of human traffic.

Ideas:

Possibly use steel instead of concrete for costs reasons

Use concrete so it will hold up better to weather conditions, since the bridge is going to be located in the wetlands.

Boad dock: create small for fishing and other small vessells

Make public facilities for waste and other various uses

Possible public facilities:

Rest stop

Bait Shop

McDonald's/Burger King/Wendy's

Public Restrooms - city planner says no using only McDonald's restrooms

Trip and Blake are currently working on the sketches

Here is my concept map:

Reflection:
From this project, I learned about what happens during a charrette and how civil engineers and architects come together to figure out what they want to include in the design and what constraints there are.  I liked the group work and how each person had different ideas for the project.  I disliked how at times, it was a bit unorganized.  If I were to do this project again, I would have more structure in the charrette discussions.