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Comment by VWWHFSfQ | Hacker News Reader

> an 11-story, 1.68-million-square-foot structure that would house up to 4,500 students, 94 percent of whom would not have windows in their small, single-occupancy bedrooms.

> Munger maintains the small living quarters would coax residents out of their rooms and into larger common areas, where they could interact and collaborate.

That seems unlikely.

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I lived in a building like this at Cornell University. The building was a converted mental health asylum prior to its purchase. Tiny rooms, with tiny slit windows, common areas, and doors that automatically swung shut in every room.

Every year, students did their best not to get stuck living in that building. The only ones who considered it voluntarily were the engineering students (due to proximity to the eng campus). The "bolstered" social communal area did not make up for the additional anxiety and mental pressure of the jail-cell like rooms, and the feeling of isolation and no-escape that the layout fostered. The only thing it did do, was make a notable increase in the school suicide rate.

I'm sorry you had a bad experience in Cascadilla Hall, but this seems like a lot of exaggeration. For others who want to see what these dorms look like, you can see images of the Cascadilla rooms alongside more modern campus dorms like Mews on this page: https://conferenceservices.cornell.edu/planning/accommodatio....

Mews looks pretty unfortunate, yes. It's bad when the realtor taking a picture from the extreme corner of the room to make the room look big style photos still make a room look like a prison cell.

That's basically le Corbusier, if not in the details, then in the totalitarian urge to organize people's lives.

They should make the outside more brutalist to be honest about the intentions.

That would be in accordance with much the rest of UCSB's architectural motif. Something of a Mission-Brutalist aesthetic: oppressive concrete blocks topped with Spanish tile.

Yeah this doesn't work. The Marines stuffed me into a very small barracks room and gave me a room mate. It doesn't make you leave any more often, it just makes you fight.

But in this case, every student will have a single, on a campus where the lack of singles is one of the biggest student complaints. Especially loathed are triples, which would be eliminated campus-wide once this building opens.

Every student will have a single when the thing opens, and then later they'll put in the bunk beds.

Spot on. The barracks this happened in was built in 1945, and was single Marine occupancy. Now up to three Marines share the same room, depending on rank.

I lived in a rather small double occupancy dorm room for a couple years of my college career.

It was common to leave your door open if you wanted to socialize, but then close it if you needed some quiet to study.

And there are all types. Some really do need the quiet to concentrate. Some apparently like having others around while studying, like the folk who were in the 24-hour study lounge of the main library at midnight.

The accommodations should cater to all kinds who have different needs.

I do wonder if the tiny bedrooms will have sufficient sound insulation, in the walls, ceilings and floors, and especially the doors. And I wonder if the AC will be sufficient, individually controllable, and always working so that it is feasible to shut yourself up in your room to study.

And also... sometimes you just get tired of your roommates. All it takes is one guy to chews his food loudly to mess things up for everyone else. (No, that didn't happen to me, but my freshman year roommate regularly stunk up the place with weed. Or incense to cover up the weed. Which didn't fool anyone.)

Why not provide adequate living facilities and those that want to venture out and socialize will, and those that want to hang out in their room will do so. Seems odd to try and force them out of their room.

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