University of Dayton - MyLife

Senior Design Complete

Last Thursday was Stander Symposium day, an alternate day of learning when classes are replaced by lectures and presentations throughout the UD community. In addition to doing a poster presentation for my thesis, I presented the civil engineering senior design project along with my senior civil engineering classmates. The presentation was over 3 hours long and included each of the 34 senior civil engineering students discussing their portion of the project for 3 to 5 minutes. The students were divided into project management, site/civil, transportation, structures, and environmental engineering. Additionally, we worked with visual arts students who produced a 3-D visualization of the completed project. Finally, a couple mechanical engineering students presented their contirbutions to the alternative energy aspect of the design.

The design project was a portion of a master plan for a nondenominational church in west Dayton. The project included significant site work, roads, parking lots, environmentally friendly designs, and two structures. The two structures were a Family Life Center, consisting of a gymnasium/auditorium and classrooms, and the Dome, a 3,500 seat worship center. The senior civil engineering students worked for a combined 4,100 hours on the project, and the total estimated construction cost for our design was $30 to $35 million. We produced a complete set of drawings and submitted design reports and calculations. The presentation audience included the client, faculty, students, and parents. Having the project done is a great relief, and hopefully our work will be used some day to help bring the church's vision to reality.

Apr 20, 2009 12:20 AM Permalink