Fire Engineering Design

Research established the new discipline of fire science and fire safety engineering (Bickerdike Allen, 1996). At the present time there exists a solid stock of knowledge on fire in and around buildings and the design principles to ensure safety. This includes knowledge of internal and external growth and spread of fire and smoke, requirements concerning the means of escape in case of fire and access and facilities for the fire service.

The essence of fire safety engineering lies in the knowledge of the movement of fire including gases and smoke created by fire. This was helped by progress in fluid dynamics and advances in the mathematics of complicated computational problems. Much of the theoretical analysis of fire behaviour has been represented by zone modelling, which incorporates modelling of heat transfer and fluid flow in different zones in premises and buildings. It is now possible to compute in advance what could happen in a fire and by using the results of the analysis, to design buildings with a predetermined safety. This must also comprise a sufficient number of safe escape routes that are accessible, clearly recognizable and usable when needed.

Fire catastrophes have often been caused by incorrect management methods, e.g. unauthorized closing of exits. Management and foresight deficiencies were the underlying causes of a major recent fire in Volendam, Netherlands with attendant high mortality. Clothing has also been the subject of intensive study to clarify the differences in ignitability of different textiles and flame spread.

The extreme importance of fire safety obliges architects thoroughly to master matters of fire safety and to allocate adequate attention to it in the architectural design of buildings.

Sebestyen, Gyula. 2003. New Architecture and Technology.

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Ambience and Services

The ambience around and in buildings is the result of natural and of man-made causes: the climate, HVAC, lighting, etc. Whatever the nature of the cause, the responsibility falls squarely on the architect to reckon with it (Flynn et al., 1992). The extent and contents of the requirements concerning the ambience in buildings has grown ever more complex in recent times and embraces, for example, heat, moisture, mould, corrosion, water supply, energy control, fire, smoke, pure air and odour, natural and artificial illumination, sound, protection against lightning, vibration, security, electromagnetic radiation and various telecommunication services. Technical services cater for performance to satisfy the various requirements: HVAC equipment, water supply, telephone and telecommunications services, elevators, security and anti-fire equipment, etc. Each service may be and often is designed as a system and such systems increasingly are complex embracing two or more systems together with their interaction (Aspinall, 2001). For example, lighting may be combined with ventilation or may be incorporated in furniture. As a consequence, comprehensive environmental systems may be applied and the building as a whole may be considered as a comprehensive environmental system. When the architect designs a building, he/she must decide whether a new system or systems will be applied or whether existing systems will be incorporated in the design. Specialized firms develop their own (lighting, heating, etc.) system and system developers may develop complex systems to be applied by various designers (Flynn et al., 1992). Architects do not themselves design energy systems and services but have to be active partners with those who do design them since the dialogue must end up with comprehensive architectural-engineering solutions and the interrelation of services and structures results in specific aesthetic consequences.

Sebestyen, Gyula. 2003. New Architecture and Technology.

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Function and Form

In the following some specific characteristics of new architecture design are identified. The architectural design and form of buildings is influenced by the type of the building and by its function. Buildings such as residential, commercial, industrial, transport, educational, health-care, leisure and agricultural buildings are designed with features characteristic for the individual building type. Structural systems also have an interrelation with the type and function of the buildings. As a consequence there exist school-building, residentialbuilding and other systems. Technical progress (prefabrication, mechanization, etc.) resulted in the industrialization of building and, as a specific form of this, ‘system building’. Early on, the various deficiencies inherent in system building (such as inadequate architectural quality and others) brought system building into discredit. Consequently it has ceased to be considered as the basic panacea for the problems of building. Nevertheless, the system concept may contribute to the combination of upto- date technology and good architecture.

Basically we can differentiate two types of megasystem. The first of these is the technical system of buildings (Ahuja, 1997), which consists of:

• the structural system
• the architectural system
• the services and equipment (lighting, HVAC, power, security, elevators, telecommunications, functional equipment, etc.).

It was frequently claimed that ideally the form of a structure should correspond to the type of a structure and that the function of a building should harmonize with the structure form. Many realized examples seem to confirm this assumption; exceptions, however, already existed in historical architecture (e.g. hanging stucco ceilings in the form of vaults). In modern and post-modern architecture the use of steel and of reinforced concrete made it easy to design structures whose form did not really correspond to the type of the structure. The principle of the harmony of form and structure was in fact undermined by this development.

The second mega-system is composed of:

• the process of architectural, structural and engineering design and their documents
• economic analysis, data and results including quantity surveying, feasibility studies, risk analysis
• management of design, construction and use of buildings and structures (facility management) including cooperation of various organizations and persons involved in the construction process.

The architectural profession may rely on systems for buildings that are typical and occur with restricted variations in great numbers, but for any major commission individual approaches are favoured.

Sebestyen, Gyula. 2003. New Architecture and Technology.

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