Sidewalk Labs, the urban infrastructure startup from Google parent company Alphabet, has released a ?digital proof-of-concept? that details a new model for designing tall timber towers.
Exterior rendering of office and residential levels of Proto-Model X, Sidewalk Labs? prototypical timber building. (Image: Michael Green Architecture and Gensler) via medium.com/sidewalk-talk.
To explore how factory-produced timber buildings can grow even taller, the Sidewalk Labs team designed a 35-storey mass timber proto-model, called Proto-Model X, or PMX.
With PMX, the team demonstrates how a modular 35-storey tower can be built in mass timber?a height that?s yet to be achieved in practice. The detailed model is rendered in Revit, and hosted in BIM 360. According to Sidewalk Labs? Medium page, PMX was developed through collaboration with a team of architects, engineers, and environmental designers who advanced the building through eight key steps. The consultant team includes Michael Green Architecture, Gensler, Aercoustics, Aspect Structural Engineers, Atelier Ten, CadMakers, Integral, JE Dunn Construction, RDH, Sweco, and Vortex Fire.
The eight steps of PMX. (Image: Michael Green Architecture and Sidewalk Labs) via medium.com/sidewalk-talk.
Sidewalk Labs describes mass timber as a ?nimble and light? material compared to other structural building elements. PMX is approximately 2.5 times lighter than its concrete counterpart, and when researchers began doing wind analysis, they discover...