BrittanyNicoleGacsy Academic Portfolio 2010-2013 by Brittany Gacsy

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

Brittany Nicole Gacsy is a recent graduate of the Masters of Architecture program at the University of Michigan, Taubman College Architecture and Urban Planning. Brittany grew up in a small town just west of Gary, Indiana. Growing up in this post-industrial detritus contributed to her adoration for the spectacle of production and the process of making. However, unable to elect a method of production to pursue as her own career, she studied Space Planning, Construction Management, and Computer Graphics all while attending Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN. Graduating with a dual degree in Space Planning and Computer Graphics in the summer of 2010 she moved into a field where all of her diverse interests could be explored through the lens of architecture. The University of Michigan provided her with the opportunity to collaborate and manage large scale installations, instruct undergraduate level courses, perform design based research, and produced/ managed multiple publications. Currently, Brittany is working as a graphics fabricator designing, detailing, and installing graphics for a multibillion dollar expansion.

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

contents Connective Tissues

dimensions24:

Lights, Cameras, Detroitâ&#x20AC;Ś

Civic Friche

Year: 2011 Location: Seoul, Korea Duration: 3 Months Collaboration with: Nick Safely Type: Mixed-Use Residential Project Role: N/A Advisor: Vivian Lee + El Hadi Jazairy

Year: 2012 Location: Indianapolis, IN + Detroit, MI Duration: 3 Months Collaboration with: N/A Type: Event + Urban Development Project Role: N/A Advisor: Dawn Gilpin

Representation: A Collection of Work

Year: 2010-2013 Location: N/A Duration: 3+ Years Collaboration with: N/A Type: Print work Project Role: N/A Advisor: Amy Kulper + Christian Unverzagt

Mixing Media

Year: 2010 Location: Chicago, IL Duration: 3 Months Collaboration with: N/A Type: Skyscraper Project Role: N/A Advisor: Anya Sirota

Year: 2010-2013 Location: N/A Duration: 3+ Years Collaboration with: N/A Type: Print work Project Role: N/A Advisor: Christian Unverzagt

Year: 2011 Location: Paris+ Amily France Duration: 3 Months Collaboration with: Melissa Bonfil , Virginia Black,

Peyton Coles, Joe Filippelli, Brittany Gacsy, Chris Reznich, Michael Sanderson, Jeeeun Ham, Jennifer Komorowoski, Kyung Jin Hong, Jordan Johnson, + Catherine Truong

Type: Study Abroad, Installation Proposal +Publication Project Role: Researcher, Installation Designer Advisor: Anya Sirota, Jean Louis Farges, Steven Christensen, Marie Combes, + Patrick Renaud

Imaging Detroit

Year: 2012 Location: Detroit, MI Duration: 9 Months Collaboration with: Allen Gillers, Missy Ablin, Christo

pher Reznich, James Chesnut, Erika Lindsay, Anthony Pins, Brittany Gacsy, Lauren Bebry, and Gorham Bird.

Type: Event + Publication Project Role: Researcher, Installation Designer, Event Manager, Product Designer, Graphic Deisgner Advisor: Anya Sirota, Jean Louis Farges, + Mireille Roddier

General Manifold

Year: 2011-2012 Location: Chelsea, MI Duration: 9 Months Collaboration with: Melissa Bonfil , VirginiaBlack, Peyton Coles, Joe Filippelli, Brittany Gacsy, Chris Reznich, Michael Sanderson, Jeeeun Ham, Jennifer Komorowoski, Kyung Jin Hong, Jordan Johnson, + Catherine Truong

Type: Event + Publication Project Role: Researcher, Installation Designer, Event Manager, Product Designer Advisor: Anya Sirota, Jean Louis Farges, + Steven Christensen

Environmental Control Systems for Artificial Extensions of Localized Micro-Climates

Year: 2012-2013 Location: DETROIT, MI Duration: 12 Months Type: Thesis Advisor: Christian Unverzagt

connective tissues Project Advisors\\ Vivian Lee + El Hadi Jazairy in collaboration with\\ Nick Safely

networks: the new age collective

Set in Seoul, Korea the project aims to provide and integrated connection between domestic inhabitants and their daily amenities. In contrast to other new developments in Seoul, the project serves as an alternative to the mass housing towers that exist in other sectors of the city. Forming a connection with the existing context the project preserves a relatively consist datum with pre established buildings. Also, looking to maximize the square footage of each unit the project operates on a 7m wide repetitious bar. The aggregations of bars are manipulated in relationship to sun exposure. In order to maximize the light conditions on the lower portions of the building the bars are vertically adjusted and split into single loaded corridors. By deploying the single loaded corridor circulation was moved to the exterior allowing for a connective tissue to exist in between bars creating a vertical, vegetal park.

Connective Tissue

collaboration with \\ nick safely

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

networks: new age collective

facade

The project’s façade maximizes light and wind penetration by deploying the use of and L-frame structural system. The system operates similarly to a tree, distributing the load to larger more trunk-like pieces near the bottom of the structure. This assists with privacy issues of an all glass building. The upper portion of the building deploys more members facilitating additional privacy while the commercial level below deploys fewer members that are larger. The lower portion of the building Exhibits more transparency and simultaneously allows more light than expected to penetrate the space because of the abundance of glass. The structures façade is constructed of glass with the L-system behind. The windows provide floor to ceiling

access. The window openings are staggered across the 7 meter spaces allowing for constant air flow that moves up, across, and out of the building. Since the space is so thin and the interior walls are made of transparent material to maximize their natural lighting conditions reducing energy costs. The joining building operates as two bars that are attached through a system of living walkways. These walkways not only provide an exterior park and necessary circulation, but they also provide a shading system for cooling and privacy purposes. These green walls or interior park walls are equipped with a misting system. This system uses a handrail integrated misters that provide water to the roots of the plants while simultaneously misting the inhabitants of the park.

Elevation From Street View with adjacent Building of exsisting context and new development

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5.00 정말 좋은사탕 가게 닉가 말한다

이 숀을 읽을 수

지옥 그래! T E L : 7 0 2 -11 4 8

노인을위한 큰 인쇄 도서

Connective Tissue

카페

비싼 레스토랑

collaboration with \\ nick safely

도넛 가게

무료 배송

서울 도서관

718-0020

서울 도서관 무료 배송

비싼 레스토랑 이 숀을 읽을 수

T: 703-1493

좋은 맥주

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

비싼 레스토랑 이 숀을 읽을 수

관서도 울서

718-0020

networks: new age collective

7m Skinny The units were designed to maximize the floor area ratio by providing a maximum 7m width for each unit. Each unit plan was flagged on both facades with glass to the East and West providing an ample amount of light in each unit. The interior wall system also provides an additional layer or transparency by deploying a translucent door/wall system allowing inhabitants to manipulate their level of privacy on the exterior. Unit plans were arrange to allow for unit extensions through the acquirement of an adjacent unit, thus providing for flexibility with the units allowing them to open to large swaths of floor space. The aggregations of units sit on a street level plinth. The plinth is design to house community amenities while also providing a second story greenscape for the inhabitants on the roof above. Each plinth is punctured with accessible light wells that allow light, air, and paths of egress to exist in the solid space below. These penetrations of the commercial spaces below increase the accessibility of the commercial spaces providing a secondary moments of access to the units above. The plinth provides access and a form of connection from the units above to the streetscape below.

Unit types 3-bedroom, 2-bedroom, or (2) 1-bedroom

UNIT C

TYPE : 3 BDRM UNIT DIMENSIONS: 7M X 13M TOTAL AREA: 91SM

Connective Tissue

collaboration with \\ nick safely

UNITBB UNIT

TYPE: 2: 2BDRM BDRMUNIT UNIT TYPE DIMENSIONS:7M 7MX X11M 11M DIMENSIONS: TOTALAREA: AREA:7777SM SM TOTAL

UNITAA UNIT

TYPE: 2: 2BDRM BDRMUNIT UNIT TYPE DIMENSIONS:7M 7MX X11M 11M DIMENSIONS: TOTALAREA: AREA:60SM 60SM TOTAL

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

networks: new age collective

Plan types

C 10

21 22 23

25 24

Connective Tissue

Ground Floor Plan Commerical / Mix-Use 7

collaboration with \\ nick safely

UP UP

13 12

11 10

18 19

19 20

UP UP

21 22 23

29 28

27 26

25 UP

First Floor Plan Residential and greenscape

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

Forth Floor Plan Residential and vertical park

networks: new age collective

Perspective Section Demonstrating thre connection between units, vertical park, plinth and street

Connective Tissue

collaboration with \\ nick safely

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

networks: new age collective

formula one

Lights... Cameras... Detroit.

0% 5%

23%

30%

INDY CAR

12%

6% 2%

4% 0%

0% 5%

23%

APPAREL AUTO OTHER COMPANIES EDUCATION ENVIROMENT FINANCIAL FOOD OIL/ GAS PACKAGING PERSONAL CARE PHONE/ TECHNOLOGY TOBACCO/LIQUOR TOOLS/ INDUSTRY UNITED STATES

30%

NASCAR

Project Advisor\\ Dawn Gilpin

THE POLITICS OF COMPRESSIONS, SUBSTRATES AND CONTROL 12%

6% 30% 6 % 4 % 0 % 5 % 6 % 2 % 3 % 0 % 12% 23% 5 % 0 %

11%

APPAREL AUTO OTHER COMPANIES EDUCATION ENVIROMENT FINANCIAL FOOD OIL/ GAS PACKAGING PERSONAL CARE PHONE/ TECHNOLOGY TOBACCO/LIQUOR TOOLS/ INDUSTRY UNITED STATES

6 % 30% 6 % 4 % 0 % 5 % 6 % 2 % 3 % 0 % 12% 23% 5 % 0 %

41%

Infographic Who watches, supports, and has invests in this multibillion dollar company?

FORMULA 1

Our banal landscapes and buildings have the ability to be transformed by what we call spectacles or eventscapes. Eventscapes connect people through a live collective experience that joins people in real time and real space, we enter as individuals and emerge as an audience (Hickey), or maybe even as actors. Within the realm of spectacles, architecture has the ability to operate as a framework for change and the potential to transform space by assembling and disassembling a network of temporary communities. The spectacle operates as a means of unification, it brings people together to transform space and inevitably the individuals who occupy it. 6%

APPAREL AUTO OTHER COMPANIES EDUCATION ENVIROMENT FINANCIAL FOOD OIL/ GAS PACKAGING PERSONAL CARE PHONE/ TECHNOLOGY TOBACCO/LIQUOR TOOLS/ INDUSTRY UNITED STATES

1% 41% 4 % 4 % 5 % 6 % 7 % 0 % 6 % 7 % 7 % 2 % 11% 0 %

40%

MOTO GP

Lights...Cameras...Detroit.

12%

APPAREL AUTO OTHER COMPANIES EDUCATION ENVIROMENT FINANCIAL FOOD OIL/ GAS PACKAGING PERSONAL CARE PHONE/ TECHNOLOGY TOBACCO/LIQUOR TOOLS/ INDUSTRY UNITED STATES

4% 40% 12% 0 % 4 % 0 % 8 % 4 % 4 % 0 % 8 % 8 % 8 % 0 %

NASCAR

FORMULA 1 RACING INDY CAR RACING

3M Auto Meter Autolite Bank of America

AGS Benetton Group Beta Tools

DHL

Eifelland Essex Petroleum

Federal Express

Featherlite Coach Featherlite Trailers

Ford Freescale Freightliner Trucks Gillette -Goodyear Growth Energy Head & Shoulders Holley JEGS K&N K&N Lincoln Electric Mahle Mars McLaren Mechanix Wear Midtronics Mobil 1 Moog Nabisco (Kraft) National Corn Growers Assoc Nationwide Insurance Ofﬁce Depot Old Spice Phyzix Safety-Kleen Schumacher

SIRIUS XM Radio Sprint

Sunoco Toyota

UCoat it Unilever Universal Technical Institute/ NASCAR Technical Institute UPS USG Visa Whelen Engineering Inc.

MOTO GP Air Asia AMG Aperol Arcese

Bosch

Boy Scouts of America British Amereican racing British American Tobacco (Lucky Strike), Brembo Brooke Bond Oxo, Candy Cenveo Ceramiche Ragno, Champion Chevrolet Coloni Citgo Compaq Coca-Cola Computer Associates, Copersucar Dallara Credit Suisse

Ferrari First National Bank Fondmetal SpA, Foster's Forti Gallaher (Benson & Hedges) Hewlett - Packard

Honda

Hong Kong & Shanghai Bank HRT Hugo Boss Imperial Tobacco (Embassy) Imperial Tobacco (Gold Leaf) Imperial Tobacco (JPS) Jaguar Japan Tobacco (Mild Seven) Larrousse

Lotus

Marlboro Martini & Rossi Master Card Orange Parmalat

Penske

PlayStation (Sony) Politoys RAM

Red Bull Red Bull Racing

Reemtsma (West) Renault Saudia Airlines SEITA (Gitanes & Gauloises) Siemens Skol Sonax Spirit Spyker STP Corporation TAG-Heuer Tissot

DHL

Discover Exact Target Firestone Fuzzy's Vodka Geico goDaddy Greenfuel Holmatro

Honda Izod Kelloggs Kymco

Lotus Lucas oil

Mazda McAfee Mountain Dew Novo Nordisk Oreo Ortsbo Peak Pennzoil

Penske

PerkinElmer Philips Racing Electronics RC cola Sheraton

SIRIUS XM Radio Skip Barber

Sunco

T mobil Target The United States National Guard Verizon Victorinox Wenger Xtrac XYQ

.VIE U.S N O LI MIL 80

IN 2 31 C OUNT RIES

Cometic Comp Cams Coors Light DIRECTV Dodge DRIVE4COPD DuPont Edelbrock Exide

IMS total acreage: 1,025 IMS inﬁeld: 253 acres Parking acreage: 750 acres 17 grandstands with a 220-acre footprint

292 MIL LIO NV IEW ERS

Chevrolet Coca-Cola

BMW Sauber Brembo

SQUARE FOOTAGE FOR INDIANAPOLIS MOTOR SPEEDWAY

TO RAC ING EAC HY EAR

BWD / Standard Camping World Canadian Tire

LARGEST SINGLE DAY EVEVT

Air Med Avis Borg Warner Turbo Systems

WE RS TUN E IN

Bosch

Featherlite

Toyota

Unipart UOP Valvoline Villiger (Tabatip) Vodafone Warsteiner Brauerei Yardley

BMW Sauber

Bridgestone Bwin Capcom Commerical Bank Dewalt Dunlop Enel ENI

Federal Express Hertz Iveco Maybank Mondo Monster Oakley Prosegur

Red Bull Roland SBP Slpinestars Stanley

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

The Politics of Compressions, substrates, and control

[Indy]cent proposal This proposal studies the potential of events and architecture, posing the question what is the role and more importantly the legacy of the built environment within these eventscapes and how can we leverage these temporary conditions to produce a set of long lasting opportunities for outside beneficiaries. Throughout the project there seemed to be various layers of investigation that added to the complexity of these temporary events; monetary exchanges, site transformation, and stakeholder investments. Through research each additional component added to the complexity of the proposal. Initially looking at a plethora of eventscapes ranging from those temporary and pop-up in nature to those who have a long standing hold on their environment and analyzing their relationship to their physical context the project stemmed from looking at these previous studies and the way in which they leveraged their environment or built structures and who was the ultimate beneficiary. After this extensive research there seemed to existing themes that produced success, among them, their ability to produce an immersive photograph, their engagement with the audience (turning the audience into the actors of the event), vivid color pallets, simultaneous multiple programs use, and usually a connection with a higher long lasting association that legitimized the event. Diving further into a singular event, the study of the Indianapolis 500 kicked started a more in-depth investigation of an annual temporary event with permanent footings thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s primary focus is on the betterment of its stakeholders. With this event typology branding played an important role in the longevity, global recognition, and physical construction of the eventspace as well as the digital image that populates the media reaching hundreds of millions of viewers in over 100 different countries.

Fast Friday Friday, the week before the face is the Fast Friday Practice date. Drivers and teams generally put forth their best effort on Fast Friday to gear up for Pole Day producing the fastest speeds on the race track.

INDY Lights Indy 100 race and practice time along with the Indianapols 500 qualiďŹ cations

INDY 500 HARD PROGRAM SPACE THAT CAN BE OCCUPIED

Lights...Cameras...Detroit.

Pole Day

Bump Day

Community Day

Saturday is the first day of qualifying for the Indianapolis 500. It will determines the first 24 grid spots available with the fastest driver awarded the pole position. Qualifying begins at 11 a.m. and concludes at 4 p.m. at 4:30 p.m. the fastest nine qualifiers will attempt to go faster than their previous time

Sunday, the week before ths race is known as Bump Day and IMS Armed Forces Day. The last qualiﬁers can be pumped from the race base on their time trials.

There will be no track activity this day and the evernt space is used for community engagment.

Carb Day

Legends Day

Race Day

Last practice for the Indy Car race drivers and concert supportting the weeks events. This is also the ﬁrst ofﬁcial day of camping at the track.

Saturday, before the race is Legends Day, honoring Roger Penske and will be presented by Shell VPower. The day is a time honored tradition which allows drivers to interact with the public.

Memmorial Day weekend race hosts 33 race teams and 500,000 spectators with over 200 million viewers that represent over 231 countries.

Diagram Program migration during event duration

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

The Politics of Compressions, substrates, and control

Fast friday (t-8 days til event)

pole day (t-7 days til event)

Lights...Cameras...Detroit.

carb day morning (t-1.5 days til event)

carb day concert (t-1 day til event)

morning before race

During race

Diagram Occupation migration over event duration

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

The Politics of Compressions, substrates, and control

Re-positioning the race in Detroit the Belle Isle Grand Prix, seemed to be a more than obvious choice with its recent poor press, insufficient track conditions, and now longer event duration. The site existed as a large event that temporary occupied the city producing only trash and a wavering image of a once thriving city. By dissecting the construction of the Indianapolis 500â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s and breaking it into its component parts the project took track construction techniques and manipulation of speed to create an all-encompassing experience. Moving the track from Belle Isle back to Downtown Detroit opened the spectacle occupation to vary in size, viewership, and investment. The track also aims to create smaller pockets of interventions that facilitate interactions between the track and city. These small scale interventions slip within the existing context to produce a stage for viewing, but also they leave behind a legacy that has the potential to be reused or leveraged by the city. These interventions appear in the form of singular occupied floors in otherwise abandoned buildings, occupiable awnings, and pedestrian walkways that serve as a space to traverse, but also as a space of occupation during the event. These interventions manifest in the

reworking of the people mover to act as a luxury box along with its infrastructure to act as a grandstand. The interventions intend to work within the existing infrastructures reconstructing them to meet the existing needs of the city and the impending needs of the event. While the proposal looks back at and existing event typologies it also looks forward to how the city can leverage the inevitable additions of technology and infrastructure imposed by the event. Track maintenance and curb upgrades would be necessary to the existing streets along with sidewalk widening for emergency vehicle access during the event. There will also be a need for heightened security advancements leaving security cameras and fences for the Detroit Police Force to use and manage after the event. It will also be necessary to update lighting and security in areas that promote overnight camping and tailgating during this two day event. Tailgating has been encouraged and designed into areas of the city that already have heightened population of people at night, the MGM Grand, Ford Field, Tiger Stadium, and Greek Town. This will upgrade existing infrastructures and technology and allow it to be redeployed by the city.

Lights...Cameras...Detroit.

Collage Track condition for proposed indycar race 2014

This proposal is not meant to be a finalized project. It should be seen as the first in many for the event, allowing it to move, change, and morph into different avenues of the city, producing a reoccurring project that can leverage the inevitable inpouring of finances to the city. The track is seen as the guiding force for these possibilities. When the track is manipulated or changed year after year it can begin to address other conditions of the city that will produce further excitement for the event, but also begin to update the necessary site conditions which allows the location of track to create a zone of city upgrades that can addressed by private investors with an entirely different set of motives. The project intents to flip the script on Indy Car stakeholders, it shows the potential of an eventscape to work within and for a context with varying stakeholders producing an event that has the potential to be a beneficiary for both the city and multinational conglomerates that pour money into this event.

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

The Politics of Compressions, substrates, and control

Lights...Cameras...Detroit.

Axon Site diagram for proposed indycar race in detroit 2014

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

The Politics of Compressions, substrates, and control

imaging detroit Project Leads\\ Anya Sirota + Jean Louis Farges in collaboration with\\ Mireille Roddier

Event Marquee Image by Brittany Nicole Gacsy

Imaging Detroit was an joyful experiment, research strategy, and situational encounter that spanned a number of concentrated months, but found public and material expression over the course of a two-day media festival in a park on Detroitâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Near East Side. The project started with two parallel, but interrelated explorations. First, we wanted to make sense of the extraordinary influx of representations and mediatized attention that Detroit has recently garnered. At the same time, we planned to lay bare the position of social networks in dispersed urban environments â&#x20AC;&#x201C; with Detroit as case study. The intersection of the research would allow us to reflect upon how images of Detroit are produced, disseminated and consumed, and to speculate about the generative power of representations in the material environment. >>http://anyasirota.com

Imaging Detroit in collaboration with: Anya Sirota + Jean Louis Farges

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

The Civic Friche- Meta Friche Continuum

concept drawing maging detroit event

Imaging Detroit in collaboration with: Anya Sirota + Jean Louis Farges

Imaging Detroit was as much an event as a research strategy that aimed to minimize subjective distanciation, to create a space of dissensus where the staged disjunction between representation, discourse and experience could be exposed. Bringing together hundreds of representations of Detroit with national and international speakers from a myriad of disciplinary perspectives, inviting neighborhood participation, engaging Detroitâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s government and cultural agencies â&#x20AC;&#x201C;we produced interactions, however uncomfortable, between radically different contingencies. The dialogue that emerged was amazing. Producing Imaging Detroit required countless decisions. And in conjunction with media analysis, the evolving mechanics of the project formed the very basis of our research. >>http://anyasirota.com

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

The Civic Friche- Meta Friche Continuum

Imaging Detroit in collaboration with: Anya Sirota + Jean Louis Farges

Photograph at event Imaging Detroit Image by Lauren Bebry

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

The Civic Friche- Meta Friche Continuum

RADIAL CITY BEAUTIFUL

100

psi

Project Advisor\\ CHRISTIAN Unverzagt

tapline:

Environmental Control Systems for Artificial Extensions of Localized Micro-Climates psi

Unrolling the Potentials Steam has the potential to all at once operate as a solid liquid and gas based on its velocity and trajectory. Looking to tap into steam allows one to image all the working potentials of this resource to be a source of energy, production, inhabitation, and eccentricity.

Architecture traditionally looks to the operations of materials as the basis for design and theorization. This proposal looks to speculate previously unimagined occupations by looking to environmental conditions, specifically steam. Uncontrolled and fleeting, this traditionally interior weather condition has the capacity to not just be an urban excess, but a driver for design. Its formlessness has the capability to territorialize areas at the urban scale rather than merely providing interior weather conditions, opening up the gamut for new speculation for occupation. The project looks to exploit Detroitâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s urban excess as a catalyst to develop innovative spatial configurations. Through a process of storyboarding and extreme speculation new microclimates are formed by artificial weathering extensions allowing one occupy previously uninhabitable spaces.

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enviromental control systems for artificial extensions of localized micro-climates

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steam network map \\ detroit, MI

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

thesis: radial city beautiful

Traditionally architecture looks to the operations of materials as the basis of design and speculation. Broadening the usual boundaries this proposal looks to speculate previously unimagined occupations and territories by looking to environmental conditions, specifically steam, as the initial premise for design. A marginally untapped resource by architects and planners steams architectural capacity has been limited to one of pure necessity. By prioritizing the capacities for the atmospheric or in this case steam, the palette of building materials broadens, opening architecture up to more dynamic, unpredictable, spaces that evolve with their environments rather than in spite of them. By opportunistically looking at the potentials of building with the atmospherics of steam this proposal looks to expose the latent potentials of the infrastructural network of Detroit’s steam lines with a developing sector of the city of Detroit. Arguably housing the largest and oldest district energy system in the country, Detroit Thermal, provides heat and electricity for almost 500,000 inhabitants in the Greater Detroit Area. With the capacity to service over 2 million city residents the energy conglomerate has expanded its services to not only produce steam for heat and electricity, but as a source for cooling the downtown area. Moving steam at over 500,000 lbs./ hr. the 30” high pressure line distributes a continuous flow 225 psi of steam under the streets of Detroit. With the longest continuous run spanning three miles from Detroit Renewable Power to Detroit Thermal down Dequindre Street, the main feeder line requires an extraordinary amount of relief to remove the pressure in that span. Core 10 and Copper geyser beds

Transformer for lighting effects

Geyser beds age from pressure, condensate, and * pooling water producing ground weathering

Lighting Box

conditions

The Network [right page] The steam network operated and run by Detroit Thermal extends for over 39 miles underground approximately ten to thirty inches below the surface. The pipe network drops to a depth of 80 feet below surface connecting underground Detroit with 4 miles of tunnel, making it possible to walk from the Detroit Athletic Club to the Cadillac Tower without seeing the light of day.

pressurized geyser head

PSI can push water 2’-4” * 1vertically

Light pressure geyser head

PSI can push water 2’-4” * 1vertically

electrical conduit

Pressurized Reservoir stores pressurized steam til * reservoir reaches 150 psi

Pressure release regulator Pressurized Reservoir pressurized steam til * stores reservoir reaches 150 psi

spring pressure regulator controls storage of steam til * pressure reaches 150 psi

Pressure release regulator

spring pressure regulator storage of steam til * controls pressure reaches 150 psi

relief valve

2'-6” Feeder Pipe Sliced off main line from * Detroit Thermal

controls and limits pressure * on the steam system

Steam trap diverts condensing steam to * secondary off gassing geysers

+ 250 Psi

+ 1 Psi + 15 Psi

Steam trap used to discharge * device condensing steam

+ 1 Psi + 15 Psi

+ 30 Psi + 150 Psi

+ 1 Psi + 5 Psi

+ 30 Psi + 150 Psi

Shoot it out. Re-pressurizing the urban access opens the potentials of eccentricity and spectacle. By collecting and compressing the off gassing from the network a steam Geyser Park has the potential to operate as an attractor along the steam line providing artificial phenomena that is traditionally foreign to a city.

enviromental control systems for artificial extensions of localized micro-climates

+ 1 Psi + 5 Psi

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10% of all solid waste used for steam generation in Detroit is imported

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Steam line serves over 145 businesses

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the system Converts 250,000 MWhrs of electricity annually

the system Converts 2.3 billion pounds of steam annually

39-mile steam network system expands under Detroit

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The system pushes over 800,000 lbs. per hour of steam though the network

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3,300 Billion tons of solid waste are delivered everyday

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37,000 Tons of metal are recycled every year from facility waste

Diverts 865,000 tons of solid waste per day

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

thesis: radial city beautiful

Mack St. and Dequindre Cut Intersection

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African American Cancer Institute Court District Community College Detroit Detroit Free Press Detroit Water and Sewage Federal Bureau of Investigation Health Sciences Harbor University University of Detroit Mercy United States Wayne County Wayne State University

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How it Works Detroit Thermal is the oldest and largest renewable energy network in the country producing heat and energy through the process of incinerating the city’s solid waste. Detroit Thermal consumes approximately 90% of the Greater Detroit Area’s waste leaving only 10% for Detroit landfills. The heat or fuel boils water that produces steam. That steam is carried through an underground network of pipes which provide energy services to 50% of the downtown market share to the city of Detroit.

Entry and exit to Phase 1 Dequindre Cut

How it can Work Providing surface or public access to the buried steam network opens up a form of development that builds with environmental factors as its primary form. By allowing the public to directly access the network new ways of working or economies have the potential to develop along this river of resource. Through the hydrant system one can regulate the flow of pressure to have a development of food trucks that run on steam and pressure cookers, develop a series of pools for a thermal bath or maybe even look to the potentials of a wood bending industry. Gratiot St. and Dequindre Cut Intersection

enviromental control systems for artificial extensions of localized micro-climates

Tap That Tapping into the existing steam network lets the project operate as an internal river within the city. By opening a feeder line allows the average inhabitant has access directly to the system in which they can leverage it for their own personal use.

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

thesis: radial city beautiful

Pressure relief takes the form of a pressure reducing valve which usually culminates in a large orange reflective flume at surface level. This landscape of orange follies inadvertently functions not only as a means to redistribute opaque street clouds but they also set unintended spatial implications with environmental and occupational effects. Using this preexisting condition as a platform for design opens up the possibilities to image what are the possibilities in designing with environmental factors as the initial premise for design. Capitalizing on the physical intersection of this urban excess and the newly developing greenway, the Dequindre Cut, the project storyboards the opportunistic potentials of tapping into this hidden resource. Deploying artificial environmental factors such as steam opens up opportunities for spatialization to the urban scale creating territories for types of movement and interactions rather than the hard lines of structures that are primarily interior. Shifting away from the known chemical process and outcomes of steam energy the project broadens the agency of atmosphere in the realm of architecture and urban planning. It sets a precedent in which we can look at artificial environments as more than purely for their technical use value and open up the possibility to image terrains of spatial occupation that were otherwise previously uninhabitable by architecture.

Mobile skating surfaces

Pressurized geyser head 1 PSI can push water 2’-4” * vertically

Steam trap condensing steam to off * Diverts gassing geysers

Pressurized Reservoir pressurized steam until * Stores reservoir reaches 150 psi

Vertical irrigation

line ungulates 0’-8”-1’-6” * Feeder below surface to radiate heat on walkways

Gate valve And pressure reducing mechanism 2'-6” Feeder Pipe off main line * Sliced Detroit Thermal

+ 30 Psi + 100 Psi

+ 0 Psi + 1 Psi

+ 1 Psi + 10 Psi

+ 10 Psi + 250 Psi

24/7/365 Leveraging the energy source of steam allows seasonal and nocturnal limitations of occupation to cease. Heating the surfaces we occupy removes the traditional notion of controlled environments from the interior of a recreation center to the entire exterior environment. Providing a connection to allow for heat to pass through our surfaces opens up opportunities to have 7/24/365 skate parks that use heat to allow winter occupation. Through other additives the surfaces can also leverage the embedded energy to provide illumination through the use of photoluminescent paint chips that are powered by the released energy.

enviromental control systems for artificial extensions of localized micro-climates

+ 10 Psi + 250 Psi

R3'

Ventilation for condensing steam

R2'

Radiant surface connection for stairs

Heated Rail

Pex tube; Flexible radiant * surface piping

Mobile skating surfaces

surface connection Flexible pVc connection to * movable skatepark structures

Radiant skate bowl

* Heat disbursement point

Gate valve valve opens steam line * Gate to next possible situation;

Pex tube

Flexible radiant surface piping

pressure reducing valve reduces pressure to usable * Valve levels for next situation

Radiating skate Bowl Radiant floor condensation * release For vertical irrigation

Glow-in-the-Dark Surfaces Gate valve And pressure reducing mechanism

treated with a * Concrete luminescent additive

from

+0 Psi + 20 Psi

+ 0 Psi + 20 Psi

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

+ 15 Psi + 20 Psi

thesis: radial city beautiful

+ 10 Psi + 15 Psi

+ 15 Psi + 20 Psi

Access steam exhaust

Disbursed Irrigation Zone

Interactive steam feature steam Limit 6'-0â&#x20AC;? Lookout opening

Heated climbing Nodules

Surface to inflatable connection 1.

Air Tight PVC connection

2. Regulating valve with dial 3. Hidden Housing

1. 4.

Gate valve

Electrical connection sender

Interactive surface

Heated climber assembly

PlayBound play surface with imbedded sensors 2. Sand substrate 3. Formed surface 1.

Penetrations for access condensation release

2. Water-repellent connection plate 3. Water repellent pliable shell 4. Air cavity for steam passage 5. Heated climbing handles 6. Ventilated steam for irrigation 7. Penetrations for access steam release

Transformer for Transferred reactions

Insulated Piping

Pressurized Reservoir

Gate valve

valve opens steam channel * Gate to next possible situation;

valve open steam channel to * Gate next possible situation

Equipped With integrated pressure reducing valve

2'-6â&#x20AC;? Feeder Pipe off main line from * Sliced Detroit Thermal

Gate valve And pressure reducing mechanism

Dial controls released pressure

+ 250 Psi

+ 25 Psi

Pressure chamber stores and build up psi

+ 1 Psi + 15 Psi

+ 15 Psi

+ 1 Psi + 25 Psi

Pressure chamber controls psi variation

+ 1 Psi + 20 Psi

+ 15 Psi

Play. Leveraging steam as a solid, liquid, and gas, allows the limitations of exterior play to cease. Playgrounds and parks have the potential to be heated, cooled, and irrigated through interactive environmental control systems. Climbers and playsets can be designed to run off of the steam system heating the play equipment in the winter and cooling in the summer. The exhausted condensate has the potential to produce lush green landscapes or icy sculptures. 1.

Vacant Land

Steam connection provided

Access valve added

enviromental control systems for artificial extensions of localized micro-climates

+ +

Radiant Heating Threshold micro-climate line produced * Undulating from the radiating structure.

Disbursed Irrigation Zone

Micro-climate weather conditions are contingent on season and activation

of irrigation zone * Distance contingent upon pressure

Radiant Heating Threshold micro- climate line * Undulating produce from the radiating structure.

asserted through user interaction

Micro-climate weather conditions are contingent on season and activation

System Activation Through compression of the * inflatable the irrigation system is activated

Water repellent pliable shell

Gate inflation valve 9. 7. 8.

1. 4.

3. 5.

Electrical connection recipient 1.

Unit Transformer

Interactive steam fixture

2. Signal triggering valve opening

Surface to inflatable connection

Responsive surface censor

2. Water-repellent connection plate

3. Steam distribution device

3. PVC gasket attachment hardware

4. Support structure

4. Flexible connection gasket

5. Support blocking

5. Adaptable threaded connection

6. Flexible PVC pipings

While a preferred embodiment of the inflatable has been described in detail, it should be apparent that modifications and variations thereto are possible, all of which fall within the true spirit and scope of the intervention. With respect to the above description then, it is to be realized that the optimum dimensional relationships for the parts of the invention, to include variations in size, materials, shape, form, function and manner of operation, assembly and use, are deemed readily apparent and obvious to one skilled in the art, and all equivalent relationships to those illustrated in the drawings and described in the specification are intended to be encompassed by the present intervention. US 6708451 B1

PVC surface attachment hardware

2. Housing attachment connection

6. Flexible PVC ribbed inflation pipe

7. Local Steam System connection

7. PVC Attachment hinge 8. Reinforced weather resistant surface opening

Connection and Pressure reducing fixture

9. Pressure releasing shell flaps

+ 15 Psi

+ 1 Psi + 20 Psi

Inflatable connected

+ 1 Psi + 20 Psi

Steam engaged

Brittany Nicole Gacsy

Activated

thesis: radial city beautiful

Irrigation

8. Micro-climate

TCAU

PORTFOLIO \\ BRITTANY NICOLE GACSY SUMMER 2014 BGACSY@GMAIL.COM PRINTED AND DESIGNED IN THE USA