In conclusion to the week, I think my team did a good job but time management was our biggest issue. A way we could’ve have done better is by creating a plan within the group on the first day that way, we could have been more organised with individual and group tasks. That way everyone would know what to do each day and if individual tasks were set out to meet everyone’s strength, I believe we could have done a better job as everyone would have been bringing their own individual strength. 

But it was a great opportunity to work people you would not automatically put yourself in a group with; giving me some sort of world experience as, in the industry you are working in groups with all different types of personalities and being able to work efficiently within these groups is important. That is a positive I’m taking from this, that the week has helped me work within a group while voicing my opinion. 

The project also allowed me to spot my weaknesses and highlight my strengths which are; I need to further my drawing skills, and can leave the architect type of thinking of design and getting carried away with ideas and start to think of build-ability of the design I am coming up with, like looking at the materials and building regulations. One of my strengths has always been my leadership skills, which came in handy, when I was working with the college students as I worked closely with them throughout the week; when buying materials, making the model or just simply just showing them how to use the equipment. 

Even though the week was extremely stressful, I am glad I did it as it was my first time completing an AT project from start to finish and has definably solidified, that I am doing the right course. Moving forward I will be bring everything I’ve learnt from the week into my future projects. 

WE MADE IT

Friday that day we were all waiting for, the day our bridge’s fate would be sealed as we would have to present in front of the Poorang, Noel, the collage staff and Kristy.

We all got started early to start putting the final touches on the poster and model. The presentation was meant to begin at 11am and we started at 9am so it would be a pretty tight run, but we did not anticipate how tight of a squeeze it would be.

Our leader had us create levels so that we could show how the bridge would be positioned by Mithras house, car park and road as they all have different levels. We started making the nets for which we would turn into cubes as this would be easier to glue and place onto out base saving time. Once this was done the columns were meant to be stuck onto the base of the bridge model but unfortunately there wasn’t any time to do so, so we had to just place the different parts in the position.

Lucky our poster was done on time and had everyone’s input placed on.

The pictures below show the different parts of the poster.

As you can see above that shows our finished idea showcasing the; tunnel, ramps and of course our WOW factor the donut.

And of course couldn’t finish without showing our sort of finished model.

And like that it was time to do our presentation, this was nerve racking as we didn’t get proper briefing form the team leader of what we were going to say or the order. We just knew we had to talk, so we pretty much winged.  But our group is great at winging it, unfortunately as we didn’t complete the model our WOW bridge wasn’t quite wow.

On day 4 we thought we were pretty set but little did we know, that wasn’t the case, as we went for a 1:200 scale we later found out this would be too small for making the detail, which needed to be done.

So, as you can imagine everyone was feeling stressed and pressed for time, so we had to start the modelling process again.

The new chosen scale was 1:100 as this would be bigger and would allow us to make a clear detailed drawing and model, showing what the bridge is made from.

As you can see this is the final model that was created, to the right scale.

A 1:10 detail had to be made to show how the bridge would be made and held together; through research online we found a detail with all the components and from that I could start building a model.

As you can tell the bridge is made from, a 65x205mm clay paver, 20mm class 1 mortar, 60mm of dense basecourse bituminous macadam and 150mm compacted DTp1 Granular sub-base.

At the end of this day we were ready but still panicking as we had a model and poster to finish for Friday.

After concluding, the day before that we would need to change our design to make it lighter and adapt more with the existing environment; we decided to remove the two smaller dome and make those landings, we kept the big donut one in the middle as that would be our “WOW” point of the bridge making it memorable for anyone who would use it. By removing the two smaller domes, this meant that we would be using ramp and not elevators.

We had to start looking at ramp requirements, to make sure our bridge met the restrictions but we did not want the ramp to be too steep for cyclists, due to market research we found that the desired steepness was 4%.

Most of day was spent considering how we could build a bridge that would meet the ramping restrictions which we found out that for every 10m a landing is needed.

The drawing above shows the development drawing, of the bridge once we decided to go for the ramps. We also had to look at the diameter of the donut we went for 8m radius, to accommodate, for both cyclists and pedestrians.

We went for arches supporting the donut shape as this would allow vehicles to pass through under as well as not take too much space on the path, as we are trying to cause the least amount of distribution when installing the bridge. The donut would need to be 5m off the ground, as this is the recommended height for bridges. We came up with covering the path with hardened glass, as it’s transparent and durable people would be able to appreciate the surroundings, and be protected from weathering and any accidents.

Later, in the day we started making the model of our bridge we decided to make our model 1:200 thinking it could work but little did we know we would be wrong……..

The image above shows our 1:200 model.

Bridges, cyclists and footpaths.

Those were the main points I got from the briefing that was delivered this morning.

A group site inspection was carried out in order for everyone to have a better understanding of what surrounds we were working with. On this visit I took plenty pictures, that way when it came to designing we wouldn’t have to venture out into the cold again.

Once back in the warmth, sitting in our group we decided to start sketching down some ideas.

Something Noel said to us while on site struck out to me and boom I had it.
I was inspired by a spider, with it’s 8 legs, being the difference access points for the cyclists and the pedestrians.

After making a rough sketch and pitching the idea to the rest of the group they were sold on it.

And like that the day was over, our leader set us homework on doing more research on types of bridge supports, materials etc. Just to further our understanding.