Case study 5: The Building that Melted Cars

Driving a car in London just got a lot more dangerous. A soon-to-be-completed skyscraper in the downtown area is having an impact that no one could have imagined: It is starting fires and melting cars. The buildingdesigned by internationally renowned architect Rafael Violyis a dramatic edifice with curved exterior walls. Built at 20 Fenchurch Street in Londons financial center, the 38- story skyscraper is known locally as the Walkie-Talkie for its unusual shape. But that curvilinear shape is exactly whats causing the problem: The south-facing exterior wall is covered in reflective glass, and because its concave, it focuses the suns rays onto a small area, not unlike the way a magnifying glass directs sunbeams onto a superhot pinpoint of light. Fundamentally its reflection. If a building creates enough of a curve with a series of flat windows, which act like mirrors, the reflections all converge at one point, focusing and concentrating the light, says Chris Shepherd, from the UKs Institute of Physics. Its like starting a fire with a parabolic mirror. The beam caused by the curved skyscraper concentrating the suns rays was measured at more than 110 degrees Celsius (230 degrees Fahrenheit) in September. So far, the building has been responsible for partially destroying a parked Jaguar XJ luxury car, catching carpets on fire in nearby shops, and shattering slate tiles at local restaurants. This situation is likely to be a recurring problem for any structure built within range of the powerful reflected light coming from the building. Because the effect is caused by the suns elevation in the sky at certain times of the day and during a specific time of the year, experts expect the intense light and dangerous heating effect will last about two hours a day over a period of three weeks. To help in the short term, the buildings owners have contracted with local authorities to block off a limited number of parking spaces that are right in the reflected beams path. Longer term solutions are more problematic; the design of the building will not change and of course, the suns path is not likely to alter in the near future! This isnt the first time Violys architecture has been the subject of similar controversy: His Vdara Hotel in Las Vegas has been criticized for directing sunbeams onto the swimming pool deck that are hot enough to melt plastic and singe peoples hair. The technical term for the phenomenon is a solar convergence, but the hotspot more popularly became known as the Vdara death ray. The Vdara resolved the death ray effect with larger sun umbrellas, but fixing the problem in London might take a lot more work. There are examples in the past where an architect has had to rebuild the faade, said Philip Oldfield, an expert in tall buildings at the University of Nottinghams Department of Architecture. If this is serious, then I dread to think how expensive it will be. Architectural critic Jonathan Glancey says the story is not unprecedented. In 2003, the opening of the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, designed by architect Frank Gehry, had a similar problem. The building was clad from head to toe, right down to the pavement, in stainless steel panels, and they would send the sun dazzling across the sidewalks to hotspots where people were. It was measured up to 60C (140F). Local people living there complained they were having to crank their air conditioning up to maximum to cool things down, he says. Blinding glare also affected drivers passing the building. After computer models and sensor equipment identified the panels causing the problem, they were sanded down to break up the suns rays. In the case of the London Walkie-Talkie building, developers could employ a number of possible solutions. They could coat the windows to reduce reflectionwhich would be a cheap fixbut the downside of that is it could reduce the light entering the building. Another solution would be for them

to misalign the window frames, to slightly alter them by about a millimetre, but that would be very expensive, Chris Shepherd noted. Source: Pinto, JK 2020, Project management Achieving competitive advantage, 5th edn, Pearson Education Ltd, Malaysia.

1. Search London Walkie-Talkie Building on the internet, then click through pictures of the structure and read some of the articles posted. For example, note that the building won the Carbuncle Cup by the Building Design Magazine for Worst Building of the Year in 2015. What are some of the reasons the building has been so ridiculed?

2. What are some of the challenges with assessing risk when constructing a building? In other words, what risks can be assessed up front, and what risks are examples of unknown- unknowns?