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Item The Shoppes on Main: Developing a Sense of Place(North Dakota State University, 2012) Osten, AlishaThis thesis researches and investigates the effect architectural space brings to a sense of place within an urban environment. Located on Main Avenue and 18th Street in Fargo, The Shoppes on Main: Developing a Sense of Place is a 90,508 sq. ft. mixed use building that the Fargo/Moorhead area community needs and will get use out of. “Cities are becoming meaningless places beyond their citizens’ grasp. We no longer know the origins of the world around us. We rarely know where the materials and products come from, who owns what, who is behind what, what was intended. We live in cities where things happen without warning and without our participation. It is an alien world for most people. It is little surprise that most withdraw from community involvement to enjoy their own private and limited worlds.” (Jacobs & Appleyard, 1987) The idea that an urban environment’s sense of place is influenced by architectural space is cause for deeper consideration; especially in light of particular cities and developments going through stages of growth and change. Through gathering both qualitative and quantitative information and analyzing it, this project’s aim is to find out if there is a way to keep up with rapidly changing technology, building construction, and architectural styles, and still give a thriving city its sense of place in its newest architecture? Can we avoid placelessness by implementing certain architecture within its respective place?Item Exchange Optimized: Utilizing Predictive Paths of Travel to Improve Circulation Efficiency and Urban Infill Patterns, as Applied to Fargo's West Acres Mall(North Dakota State University, 2019) Montoya, CarlosThe rapid expansion of American cities led to historical marketplaces morphing into ubiquitous suburban shopping malls. For the last two decade these shopping malls along with the entire retail sector has experienced a sustained decline. As an effort to revitalize these spaces and curb this declining trend, developers and designers have applied urban infill techniques to declining mall sites. In many cases these techniques have proven to be an insufficient intervention to produce lasting results. This ineffectiveness, raises the need for new archetype in the language methodology of design. The site of shopping malls are largely generic in dimensionality and building footprint, making them ideal candidate for the use of a parametric network analysis software. This thesis will take the site of an existing mall, approximately 100 acres in area, with a 1/2 mile x 1/2 mile perimeter. A parametric network analysis software will be applied on the selected site to generate an optimized circulation network. The resulting network will act as the primary guideline tool, from which the infill redesign of the selected site with be organized. The design synthesis of urban infill principles and parametric network analysis, will yield a new archetypal design model for the retrofit design of declining shopping malls.Item Retrofitting Suburban Plains: Creating a Walkable Mixed-use Neighborhood for South Fargo(2016) Gedrose, JordanThis thesis aims to retrofit existing infrastructure and future development plans for a south Fargo neighborhood in order to transform the neighborhood into a walkable mixed-use urban center. Walkability is defined by providing a diverse mix of destinations within a five to ten minute walk along well maintained transportation corridors. A mixed-use urban center enhances walkability by providing a culturally significant neighborhood that locates residential, retail, commercial, and open spaces within close proximity of one another. The research examines smart growth urban planning principles along with implemented urban center designs from around the nation, focusing on the integration of building usages and placements, street networks, and open spaces. The research is then applied to design a retrofit plan for the 320 acre Urban Plains neighborhood in south Fargo.Item Systems for Social Change(North Dakota State University, 2011) Jacot, AndrewThrough the design of low-income housing in Fargo, North Dakota, this thesis will reevaluate the relationship between market forces and architecture, seeking to develop a new system for housing the low-income sector and creating an architecture that is reflective of that system. This new approach will reflect a patient capitalistic sense of development, one which employs market-driven listening tools in an aid sector. Keywords: system, low income, housing, cooperative, modular, patient capitalism, marketItem Sustaining Rural Communities(North Dakota State University, 2012) Parkinson, SamanthaSustaining Rural Communities This thesis analyzes the use of sustainable architecture to satisfy the socio-economic needs of a rural community. The research methodology used to create this project is a mixed-method, quantitative and qualitative, approach. A mixed-use development allows an opportunity to solve and satisfy more than one need in a rural community. Bowbells, North Dakota, is a good example of a community that can benefit from this type of project. Research was conducted on green development and its benefits; the needs of Bowbells, North Dakota; and current solutions to providing opportunities in rural North Dakota. In response to the research conducted and needs of Bowbells, the building includes a cooperative grocery store, business incubator, deli and coffee shop at ground level. The upper two floors contain apartment units and community room. The building is approximately 42,000 square feet and is located on the corner of Main Steet and Railway Street in Bowbells, ND.Item Breach: Building Integrated Flood Protection, Addressing the Inadequate Response to the Flood of 1997 by the City of Grand Forks(North Dakota State University, 2018) Naastad, TannerIn response to The Flood of 1997, the city of Grand Forks, ND constructed a flood wall along the river. It protected the citizens from the seasonal floods but it was an inadequate solution. It created a physical, visual, and emotional disconnect from the river front. The properties along the river front, some of the most valuable in the city, were predominantly rendered useless by the wall. Thus, peace of mind was achieved but at great cost. This thesis project will investigate alternative flood protection methods that could potentially provide a more thoughtful solution to flood protection than a flood-wall and dike.Item Brewing Up a Community(North Dakota State University, 2013) Huebsch, JohnThis thesis begins to answer the question: through design how can different zoning types, such as commercial and industrial, be built to create a hybrid structure that would complement each zoning type? The Typology used for the examination of this problem is a 30,000 square foot Destination Brewpub. The Theoretical Premise/Unifying Idea that will guide the research is: “Approaching an integrated design with a holistic view draws upon multiple influences that, when combined, create new design opportunities and solutions.” The Project Justification is: With increasing industries, mixed-use buildings provide new jobs and products. These buildings must be looked at in a holistic sense in order to integrate them into the community. The site for the project is located in Fargo, North Dakota.Item Urban Resurrection(North Dakota State University, 2011) Leidholm, DustinCommunities are becoming increasingly aware that current trends of expansive growth are not sustainable. Infill development, or the development of vacant or under-utilized sites within urban areas, can be an alternative to sprawl. In many areas around the country, new ideas are being formulated by looking at codes and policies that shape the way a city grows. This thesis intends to look into ways that infill projects may become feasible to developers and appealing to those using and living in the area, while strengthening existing neighborhoods. This project will look into the outcome of rail consolidation in Fargo. Removal of the northern Prosper Subdivision track would create an opportunity for revitalization of surrounding neighborhoods, as well as creating new downtown lots available for development. This will be done in accordance with, in support of, and in addition to the existing Downtown Framework Plan. The typology of the project is a pedestrian focused mixed-use urban infill project that includes residential, commercial, and integrated light industrial uses.Item Rural Transitions: A Supplemental Community(North Dakota State University, 2013) Mikkonen, BlainThe thesis, Rural Transitions, investigates the problem that has become a growing trend as more people move from rural, agricultural areas into suburban or city life. Many of the existing country dwellers are no longer exercising the agricultural practices of their ancestors and have opted to seek convenience in populated areas instead. This has left small communities struggling to survive taking many necessities from the communities. Rural Transitions responds to this issue; the project will instill the rural and agricultural lifestyle into a rural mixed use, live, work play environment. This opportunity also provides a supplemental facility to surrounding communities as well as a unique style of living that maintains a rural quality of life and provides a more sustainable lifestyle.Item Building Within Our Bounds(North Dakota State University, 2011) Olson, DrewThis graduate thesis explores where waste (or unutilized material) is being produced in the design methodology of a mixed-use building in Fargo, ND. There is waste produced in the construction process that is inevitable, but the majority of waste can be attributed to the decision making process of the architect's methodology for generating a building's form and space. By analyzing the different approaches taken toward design decision making, one can determine at what point(s) the designer is intentionally or unintentionally creating a building that produces unutilized material, whether through the means of drawing floor plans, assigning dimensions, modular design, creating a form then working inward on space allocation, BIM computer programs and so forth. The interpretation of this information will be gathered at multiple levels: through the deduction and analysis of a building's spaces and form, algorithmic computations that analyze and calculate a building's waste production, as well as analyzing an "economical" formation of space to the aesthetical success of space.