We are at a crossroads. The world around us is changing at an unprecedented pace in surprising and disruptive ways. As civil engineers, our focus has long been to protect public health, safety, and welfare by designing infrastructure for somewhat predictable demands based on past experiences, using reliable materials and systems.
But this approach may be insufficient in a world of uncertainty, where climate change, new types of hazards, disruptive technologies, and other trends can strongly impact the basis of design. Furthermore, these trends can combine in unexpected ways that amplify their impact on society – even generating catastrophic events.
Further reading:
- Bringing the cities of the future into today
- How civil engineers must adapt to the new risks of flooding
- Work ramps up to integrate climate data into ASCE codes and standards
We can use the 1906 San Francisco earthquake as a learning tool. While the temblor produced massive ground motions, its most intense damage resulted from postearthquake fires. The initial shaking ruptured gas mains citywide and damaged water distribution lines that quickly drained available reservoirs and tanks. Firefighters, starved of water, could not contain fires triggered by gas main ruptures, resulting in a conflagration that destroyed some 28,000 buildings and much of the city. Thus, three earthquake effects – ground motions, ruptured gas mains, and ruptured water lines – combined in an unexpected way to trigger one of our nation’s most costly disasters.
We face a challenging future, but perhaps we can find inspiration from past engineers who adapted successfully. The 1906 earthquake changed how engineers design buildings and infrastructure, and today San Francisco has a hardened firefighting water system. Tested in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, this forward-thinking approach saved property and lives. Using a future-focused approach, we can design and build future ready structures to last in a changing and uncertain world.
Civil engineers design infrastructure that must serve the public for decades or even centuries. What types of events might arise that should be considered in today’s designs? For example, in recent years we have seen an increase in wildland-urban interface fires as well as increased demands on our water systems from urban expansion and drought conditions.
Intense heat and moisture evaporation from these fires have driven new types of super-regional weather systems. These types of events are not covered in our codes and standards and are just one example of the new types of hazards that might be important to consider in the design of infrastructure.
Strategic thinking is a must
How can we avoid unexpected outcomes like the 1906 earthquake and encourage safer and more resilient outcomes?
Recognizing the need for strategic thinking about future infrastructure needs, ASCE developed the Future World Vision initiative. This program leverages the idea of “scenario planning,” borrowed from businesses and intelligence agencies charged with imagining long-term and disruptive futures in the absence of complete information.
Future World Vision started by identifying key trends that will impact future infrastructure – including climate change, alternative energy, smart cities, autonomous vehicles, advanced materials and construction methods, and policy and funding. Using data and expert input from stakeholders, the group then imagined five different scenario cities that might arise in 50 years.
The Future World Vision toolkit includes detailed descriptions of these scenarios, some of which were developed by ASCE into virtual reality experiences and used in the movie Cities of the Future. Since 2019, Future World Vision materials have been used by students, teachers, researchers, and professionals to drive change in planning, design, and construction of infrastructure.
The initiative provokes creative thinking by engineers about the long-term impact of our work. By imagining different scenarios in a strategic planning exercise, engineers are forced out of their comfort zones of daily design work and asked to think strategically.
Using this approach, WSP has developed a framework for the design of building structures called Future Ready Structures. It addresses the needs of society while managing the safety and resilience of communities. It is used for planning, designing, and building infrastructure projects that consider the effects of the long-term future. Four key lenses evaluate structures from conceptual design to construction: sustainability, resilience, reusability, and adaptability.
This requires close collaboration with design partners, builders, and owners to understand and respond to projects’ needs. The approach also involves new tools for decision-making, beyond simple cost estimation or material optimization.
Principles in action
Several recent projects in Providence, Rhode Island, illustrate the application of these principles.
At the Rhode Island School of Design, our team designed and built one of the region’s first mass timber and steel hybrid structures as a student housing building. It was the first building for which we selected the structural system using an approach called choosing by advantages.
We developed the design option in collaboration with the architect; mechanical, electrical, and plumbing engineers; contractor; and owner. By comparing viable options using key factors that were most important to the client – including embodied carbon, speed of construction, and cost – the team built an innovative type of structure using steel framing and cross-laminated timber floors.
The system evolved not from a design manual or preassigned playbook but a collaborative work session in which we established the sustainability advantages of this approach and combined it with on-demand estimating and scheduling tools.
At another Providence project, called South Street Landing, a 100-plus-year-old waterfront power plant was transformed into a vibrant academic and research center.
We adapted the abandoned plant for Providence’s new economy – life sciences, education, and a growing health care sector. The adaptive reuse by itself represents a transformational step in low-carbon development for a changing society.
But our team also addressed a pressing issue in the city – the increase in nuisance flooding from the adjacent Providence River. In response to rising flood levels, the original power plant floor was raised by 4 feet. This was done without impact on the pile foundations, using an innovative system of lightweight fill.
Furthermore, key features of the building, such as its massive concrete monoliths that once housed turbine machinery, were preserved in place and adapted to new uses. Thus, the project demonstrates all four lenses of the Future Ready Structures framework, incorporating a sustainable approach to design, improved resiliency for future flooding, reuse of materials and structures, and creative adaptation of the building to new uses.
At Brown University, another recent project – the Lindemann Performing Arts Center – takes adaptability to a new level. The client wanted a building that could change to accommodate different types of musical performances – and even encourage types of performances that artists may invent in the future.
The overarching idea was to be future ready; when students and performers come up with new ideas and types of performances, the space and acoustics can be adjusted. The team of WSP/Odeh Engineers and Magnusson Klemencic Associates worked on this structure with a team of architects, acousticians, and theater designers to imagine a new type of concert hall.
Not only can the stage floor be adapted to each performance, but the structure is actually “upside down,” with seating balconies suspended from long-span roof trusses. A system of gantries riding on rails transforms the space for different uses and acoustics. This is the essence of sustainability and reusability – a building that can evolve with changing needs over time can avoid obsolescence.
These projects involved intense collaboration with multiple stakeholders and creative thinking in the presence of an uncertain future. They illustrate how civil engineers can actively lead the conversation and be innovators who drive successful outcomes.
We can do a lot more. For example, could the structural elements in these buildings be deconstructed easily and recycled? Can we drive market innovation in reduced embodied carbon systems that make them more affordable to owners of all building types? Can buildings be designed to change heights or even locations as climate conditions evolve? The Future Ready Structures framework is designed to encourage teams to ask such questions and help clients think through the life cycle of projects in new ways.
How to get there
Several key areas of investment are needed to advance the profession to address these challenges.
First, we need to prioritize research into new materials and systems, resilient structures, construction automation, and other technologies that can transform our ability to build future ready structures. For example, the Research on Engineering, Architecture & Construction of Timber Structures consortium at the Tallwood Design Institute is a partnership of Oregon State University, the University of Oregon, and 22 different industry partners that have invested in focused research on mass timber structural systems. The consortium, and other similar efforts such as the Charles Pankow Foundation, represent an encouraging model for industry and academic partnership to drive innovation in the civil engineering profession.
Second, we need new standards and manuals of practice that address the fundamental lenses of future ready structures. ASCE is making great strides, including initiatives like the Future Environmental Hazards Subcommittee for ASCE 7-28, which is developing the first chapter in ASCE 7 to help decision-makers incorporate knowledge uncertainty in hazards such as flood, wind, and rain.
ASCE has also published important new manuals of practice to help guide engineers in applying concepts of resilience and adaptability into their designs. For example, MOP 140 Climate-Resilient Infrastructure includes a method to incorporate the observational method to develop adaptive infrastructure designs. Other standards, including an embodied carbon calculation standard and a new sustainability standard (ASCE/COS 73-23 Standard Practice for Sustainable Infrastructure), further advance ASCE’s mission to address future trends.
Finally, it is up to practitioners to implement research and new standards into projects. ASCE has been at the forefront of changing the practice of civil engineering for more than 170 years. The role of the civil engineer must dramatically change, however, to address the challenges of the future city.
Engineers must cast our role not only as those who devise the lowest-cost project that meets the requirements of existing codes but also as stewards of our clients’ needs. We must be leaders in helping clients make decisions that will stand the test of time in an evolving world.
The Future Ready Structures framework is an example of putting these ideas into practice for structural engineering. Civil engineers can make an even bigger difference by broadly applying these concepts across all disciplines to drive better outcomes for society.
David Odeh, P.E., S.E., F.SEI, F.ASCE, is a senior vice president and national director of building structures at WSP USA Buildings Inc.
