School of Architecture, Planning & Preservation
Permanent URI for this communityhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/1607
The collections in this community comprise faculty research works, as well as graduate theses and dissertations.
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Item FROM STIGMA TO STRENGTH(2023) Roberts, Vasilea Christine; Curry, Daniel B; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Helping homeless LGBTQIA+ youth from a place of uncertainty to a place of security to ensure the wellbeing of future city dwellers. This thesis aims to help the ongoing issue of homelessness in Washington, D.C. This will be achieved by creating a wellness facility for LGBTQIA+ youth. This thesis is overall attempting to create a more healthy, lively, green city, starting with transforming the lives of its youth. The goal of the wellness facility is to welcome the homeless LGBTQIA+ youth population of the city and those less fortunate and help them transition to a life that focuses on their success and wellbeing. This involves rehabilitation, education, and transitional housing, in order to help the occupants begin a new chapter of life. There will also be physical necessities for the occupants like food, water, and shelter - the basic things that these people may struggle to find on a daily basis. The occupants can stay and be fully immersed into a life-rehabilitation program or use the facility until necessary. The multi-use facility will be part of a larger master plan for Howard University, integrating mixed-used commercial, residential, and retail space for more sustainable urban design that involves the community. Helping people get off the street and start a stable life will also increase the lives of all city dwellers and create a more livable and healthier city. The goal of the exterior of the wellness facility is to create a space on the street for a more enjoyable pedestrian experience. The interior exterior will also introduce local art and context in order to engage the community and embrace the passions of the wellness facility’s occupants. Overall, this thesis aims to create a city that is kind to its occupants and creates an environment of peace and success.Item Growing the Game: Soccer in America(2017) Bradshaw, Adrian Khalil; Noonan, Peter; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This thesis looks to explore the history and culture of soccer in America, relative to that of the top nations in the sport, in order to design a youth academy to bolster the cultural interest. Soccer, although one of the oldest sports in history, is relatively unpopular in America, compared to the “Big” sports: Football, Baseball and Basketball. Sports play an important part of our daily lives economically, politically and socially. As entertainment they act as a catalyst in developing close-knit communities. The objective is to integrate these pieces of architecture into the city to create a social hub, focused around developing the youth and interest in the sport.Item Integrating Infrastructure South of the Capitol(2017) Camargo de Albuquerque Sanchez, Pedro Henrique; Kelly, Brian; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This thesis looks at the role that infrastructure plays as it relates to the city. It is about taking an area of uninhabitable and divisive infrastructure and elevating it to something civic. It focuses in an area just south and west of the U.S. Capitol Building. It aims to embrace railroad and highway infrastructure as elements that serve multiple city needs, as part of the everyday, while adding artistic and monumental attributes to Washington D.C. It accepts the premises that the presence of, and the need for, the infrastructure will remain. This thesis proposes a master plan, involving the redevelopment of portions of Interstate 395, 695, and 295 highways and the railroads, to provide better use of valuable land, re connection of neighborhoods, and to create place, experienced through a series of civic spaces. Ultimately this thesis aims to set a new ideal that embraces infrastructure and elevates it to civic quality.Item Obsolescence and Renewal: Transformation of Post War Concrete Buildings(2016) Johnston, Kara Mary; Gardner, Amy; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In this thesis I investigate issues of post-war concrete buildings and how we can both add value and make adaptable what we have traditionally defined as not valuable and not adaptable. 55% of United States’ commercial building stock was built between the years of 1960 and 1980, leaving 36 billion square feet of building material to be adaptively reused or at the bottom of a landfill. Currently, our culture does not value many character defining features of these buildings making the preservation of these buildings difficult, especially at this 50 year critical moment of both the attribution of a “historic” status and time when major renovation of these buildings needs to occur. How can architects add value to a building type, sometimes called “brutalist”, that building culture currently under values and thinks is “obsolete”? I tested this hypothesis using the James Forrestal Building in Washington D.C. After close study of the obsolescence, value,history and existing conditions, I propose a design that adds value to Southwest Washington D.C. and may serve as an example for post-war renewal around the country.Item Dupont Underground(2013) Fox, Kristen Ashley; Noonan, Peter; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The construction and subsequent abandonment of the streetcar tunnels below Dupont Circle in Washington D.C. speaks volumes about our culture and how we choose to treat our resources. The current tension regarding the fate of the site is an opportunity to re-evaluate the possible uses for the structure. This thesis will explore the roles of public space, historic preservation, and civic discourse in the urban environment. Topics of focus include: overcoming barriers to reuse, analyzing abandonment and desire, and questioning existing notions of authenticity.