Blog Archives

Living Large in Small Spaces

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

The Airstream

I have been living in houses of fewer than 100 square feet for nearly twelve years. The first of my little abodes was a fourteen-foot Airstream. I bought it in the summer of 1997 for three thousand dollars. It came as-is, with an aluminum shell as streamlined and polished as what lay inside was hideous. The 1964 orange shag, asbestos tiles, and green Formica would have to go.

I began gutting, then meticulously refurbishing the interior in August, and by October, I was sleeping with an aluminum roof over my head. The place looked like a barrel on the inside, with pine tongue-and-groove running from front-to-back and floor-to-vaulted ceiling.

I settled in on a tree-lined ridge at the edge of a friend’s alfalfa field...

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ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES AFFECTING HIGHWAY PROJECTS

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

Highway projects have the potential to result in significant social, environmental, and eco­nomic effects and, as a consequence, are the subject of a broad range of environmental reg­ulation. Potential impacts include effects on

• Community cohesion

• Land use

• Minority and disadvantaged populations

• Surface and groundwaters

• Wetlands

• Coastal zone resources

• Navigable waters

• Wild, scenic, and recreational rivers

• Flood plains

• Water quality

• Important ecological resources, including wetlands and threatened and endangered species

• Significant historic and archaeological resources

• Important visual resources

• Public parklands

• Utilities

• Prime agricultural lands

• Air quality

• Noise

• Energy

• Exposure to contaminated and hazardous mat...

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ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

James R. Brown

National Director

Transportation Environmental Programs
HDR Engineering, Inc.

New York, New York

Samuel Less, AICP

Planning Director

Transportation Environmental Programs
HDR Engineering, Inc.

New York, New York

Environmental concerns play a major role in the planning, design, construction, reha­bilitation, and maintenance of highways. This chapter provides an overview of the major environmental concerns affecting highway projects and includes a summary of the federal environmental statutes, regulations, policies, and guidance material that must be addressed in their development.

Included is a detailed discussion of the requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA), 42 USC §4321 et seq...

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Introduction

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

Water is the key to all civilization. The diverse and often competing uses of water inevitably lead to tensions and conflicts in its management and allocation. Water tech­nology has progressed from the primitive to the advanced, but this progress has not changed man’s continuous responsibility for careful and fair management of this pre­cious resource.

Initially, my objective was to give my students at l’Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chaussees a historical perspective before getting into the craft of the engineer and mod­ern techniques for flow modeling. But as I tried to travel back in time to reconstruct the historical relations between mankind and water, I quickly realized what a distant horizon this quest represented...

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WINDOWS AND DOORS

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

Is there flashing over doors and windows? If not, suspect water damage behind.

Examine windows and doors very carefully. Are frames solid? Deteriorated window sashes should be replaced, creating costs that quickly add up. Also inspect doorsills and windowsills, which are rot prone if water collects there.

Before replacing them, you’ll first need to improve drainage.

Carefully inspect doors for fit and function. Look for signs of warping, sagging, or separation between rails and stiles. Examine the jambs of exterior doors for damage from abuse, changing the hardware, or even forced entry.

Doors and windows badly out of square sug­gest a house that has shifted and may still be shifting. This can result from poor drainage and an inadequately sized foundation.

Подпись: CRACKSПодпись:Tattletak

Diagonal cracks runnin...

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CONTENT OF SMA

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

The content of SMA will be divided into the following parts (Figure 1.4):

• Coarse aggregate skeleton

• Mastic (i. e., binder, filler, fine aggregate, and stabilizer)

•

image6 CONTENT OF SMA

Voids in the asphalt mix

This division of SMA into parts (with the predominance of the main two—skele­ton and mastic) has been adopted to better explain the roles of each component of the SMA mix. A similar division may be found as a directly applied approach in some designing methods (e. g., the U. S. and Dutch methods).

The SMA components of the aggrate skeleton and mastic will be discussed in Chapters 2 and 3, respectively, and the significance of voids in the SMA mix will be discussed in Chapter 6, when we look at designing SMA, and in Chapter 9, when we examine the laydown (placement) of SMAs.

Now i...

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GUTTERS AND DOWNSPOUTS

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

Eyeball the eaves trim. Is it intact or splitting? Do you see stains or discoloration? Water damage along eaves is usually caused by clogged gutters or missing drip-edge flashing on the roof and, less often, by roof leaks.

You’ll need to replace metal gutters that have rusted through or that leak widely. But this a moderate expense, unless you replace them with copper gutters.

If the deteriorated gutters are wood, they will usually be nailed directly to fascia trim or, less often, built into a cornice. By the time they fail, they may have allowed a lot of rot behind them. Probe to see how much. Wood gutters are the most expensive to replace, so consider alternatives.

Stained siding behind downspouts may have been caused by gutter seams that rusted through...

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. New Homes Need Audits, Too

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

There are a number of reasons to have a new home audited as well, not the least of which is to ensure that the building envelope and mechanical systems are performing as they were designed to perform. The Residential Energy Services Network (RESNET®; www. natresnet. org), a not-for-profit member­ship corporation, has developed an index called the home-energy rating system, or HERS, that both predicts and confirms a new home’s energy performance. The HERS index can be used to evaluate a home’s plans and specifications before it is built, then as­sign it a number from 0 to 100. A house that scores a 0 is said to be "net zero," meaning it produces as much energy as it uses over the

A duct blaster is not quackery. similar to a blower door, a duct blaster is a calibrated fan...

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HIRING A CONTRACTOR

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

If you’re building a house, somewhere along the line you’ll likely need to hire a con­tractor. Whether it’s a surveyor, excavator, foundation contractor, plumber, electri­cian, or other tradesperson, you’ll want to choose carefully. Regardless of the job, always get bids from at least three contractors. Ask questions about their work, ask to see other work they have done, and ask for names of former clients, then follow up by talking with some of their previous clients. Make sure the contractor you choose is fully insured and bonded. Finally, before hiring anyone, call your state contractor’s board to see whether any complaints have ever been filed against your prospective contractor...

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BUILT-UP ROOFING

Posted by on 11/ 11/ 15

On older built-up roofs, there were alternating layers of heavy building paper and hot tar, cov­ered with light-colored gravel to reflect sunlight and protect the layers from ultraviolet (UV) dam­age. More recently, modified bitumin (MB) has largely replaced hot building paper. MB roofs typically have cap membranes "torched on” (heated with a propane flame) to fuse them to fiberglass-reinforced interplies, or base coats.

Blisters in built-up roofs are usually caused by water trapped beneath layers of roofing. Individual blisters can be patched with three – course patches (see Chapter 5), but if blisters are widespread, it’s time to reroof.

Foot traffic, furniture, and such can abrade and puncture flat roofs...

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