National Information Centre of Earthquake Engineering
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur
Kanpur 208016
Workshop for
EARTHQUAKE
RESISTANT PRACTICES FOR
UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS OF ARCHITECTURE
12-17
July 2010, IIT Kanpur
NICEE is committed to
furthering earthquake safety in the built environment through empowering
stakeholders in the building delivery process by information sharing and
dissemination of the state of the art in earthquake engineering. NICEE has also
actively engaged in awareness, sensitization and training programmes for faculty
in architecture and civil engineering disciplines in colleges all over India
through the NPEEE program that was in operation from 2003 till 2007. The
National Advisory Committee of NICEE was unanimous in advising that NICEE should
also target the architecture professionals of tomorrow by offering training
modules to the students of architecture in colleges all over India. To meet this
objective, a pilot Workshop for Undergraduate students of Architecture in
Earthquake Resistant Design Practices was offered in 2008. The workshop was a
great success and it was decided to make it an annual event. The 3rd
National Workshop was held in IIT Kanpur during July 12-17, 2010. 52
undergraduate students who had completed six semesters of studies in their
respective architecture programmes, from 19 institutes representing 14 cities
from all over India participated in the 6-day workshop. The participants were
selected from around 120 applications received.
The objective of the
workshop is to sensitize the students to earthquake safety issues and in
capacity building in the basics of earthquake resistant design at a conceptual
level. It is expected that the lecture and hands-on studio sessions in tackling
a design assignment will help the students in internalizing earthquake resistant
practices as an integral part of their design decision making. The resource
faculty for this workshop was from architecture and structural engineering
disciplines in an attempt to recreate as closely as possible real life
architectural practice. The objective is to equip the participants with the
necessary expertise to arrive at architectural designs that are inherently
adequate in resisting earthquake loads at a conceptual level.
The following faculty members
were the resource persons of the workshop:
(a)
Prof. Keya Mitra,
Department of Architecture, Bengal Engineering & Science College,
Shibpur
(b)
Prof. Mahua
Mukherjee, Department of Architecture & Planning, IIT Roorkee, Roorkee
(c)
Prof. Vasudha
Gokhale, Dr. B.N. College of Architecture for Women, Pune
(d)
Prof. Meera
Shirolkar, Dr. B.N. College of Architecture for Women, Pune
(e)
Prof. Atanu Dutta,
Jorhat Engineering College, Jorhat
In addition to the above faculty, lecture was also
be delivered by Dr. CVR Murty of IIT Madras to guide the students on how best to
incorporate earthquake resistant features in their individual designs, keeping
in mind all the other requirements of the design brief.
The selected participants were
each sent a NICEE publication titled “Architectural Teaching Resource Material
on Earthquake Design Concepts” authored by Murty and Charleson. The participants
were advised to go through the book before coming for the workshop. On the first
day of the workshop a quiz with multiple choice answers was given to the
participants. Another quiz of similar difficulty level was administered to the
participants towards the end of the workshop to evaluate the progress made by
the students.
The students were given a
design assignment wherein they had to a housing project in a hypothetical 200m x
100m site in Delhi, located in Seismic Zone IV. The final designs were evaluated
by a Jury Board on the last day through presentations followed by brief
questioning by the Jury. The Jury consisted of the following members:
1.
Prof. Mahesh
Tandon, CMD, Tandon Consultants & Private Limited, New Delhi
2.
Dr. A.K. Mittal,
Retired Structural Engineer from CPWD
3.
Ar. Rajat Ray,
Principal, Sushant School of Architecture, Gurgaon
4.
Ar. Sushmita De,
Practicing Architect, Kolkatta
5.
Prof. Sudhir K.
Jain, Director, IIT Gandhinagar
After the initial scrutiny,
best eight designs were shortlisted, which were again reviewed by the Jury. The
final winners were as follows:
First
(a) Ms. Suryabala Sah, Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra, Ranchi (b) Ms. Dipti V. Bhaindarkar, R S Academy of Architecture, Mumbai
Second
(a) Ms. Apoorva V. Mahajan, BKPS College of Architecture, Pune (b) Mr. Narayanan T., SRM University, Kattankulathur
Third
(a) Ms. Prerna H. Thacker, R S Academy of Architecture, Mumbai (b) Mr. Nitin Agarwal A., SRM University, Kattankulathur
At the end of the workshop
the participants were requested to fill the feedback forms. The average rating
given to the design of workshop was 77.88%. 25% of the participants expressed a
70-80% satisfaction with the workshop, 38% expressed a satisfaction level of
80-90% and 13% expressed a satisfaction level of 90-100%. An average score of
4.19 (out of 5.0) was given by the participants in responding to the question if
they will recommend this workshop to their colleagues.
During the Valedictory
session, Chief Guest, Prof. Mahesh Tandon pointed out that the winning designs
had all adopted configurations that were better equipped to withstand earthquake
induced forces and they had also given due consideration to climatic, functional
and aesthetic issues that are the hallmark of good architecture. Prof Sudhir K.
Jain advised the participants to strike a balance in between the requirements of
earthquake resistant design and the host of design considerations that they
normally consider in their architectural design exercises. He appreciated the
overall quality of the designs and advised them to take care in their
architectural decision making to ensure a sustainable built environment.
The workshop was sponsored by:
1.
M/s UltraTech Cement, New Delhi
2.
Computers and Structures Inc (CSI)
3.
Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR), New Delhi
4.
Ministry of Earth Sciences, New Delhi and
5.
Poonam and Prabhu Goel Research Foundation Fund at IIT Kanpur.