Munger also did the same thing for the University of Michigan's graduate residence building^; 95% of the rooms have no windows.
The vibe of the building is similar to an hotel. As you enter, there is a foyer with elevators. The upstairs floors have windowless corridors where you enter the suites.
Each suite has a long corridor with doors to the rooms (4 on each side, if I remember correctly). Each room is on the "inside" of the building, so they don't have windows, but they have private bathrooms.
The living quarters have a shared double kitchen (two fridges, two cooking ranges, etc) and a double living room (two couches and two tvs). This room also has a wall of windows so there is plenty of sunlight there.
The suite I visited was coed and had graduate students from different schools living together. It was definitely an interesting vibe.
As any dorm, there are other amenities that are shared with everyone like a patio on the roof, a gym, rec room, and study spaces. Also, all the rooms are furnished, so it might be a good set up for someone that doesn't have furniture or doesn't want to worry about it.
When compared to other grad student housing options (Northwood 1-3 for single students or a shared room in Northwood 4-5), Munger is definitely an improvement (mostly it's location and the fact that is a new construction, to be honest) but it is a little bit more expensive than NW offerings.
You might not be able to extrapolate your own experience over all hotels, there are countless of hotels without windows, and it's surely not illegal everywhere.
https://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/2015/07/heres_your_firs...
It houses 96 suites, 6—7 bedrooms each. Each bedroom is 16x9 with their own private bathroom. In one of the blueprints in the UCSB article, there appears to be 1 bathroom per 8 suites [1].
To be fair, graduate housing is supposed to be a bit better than undergrad dorms — especially in regards to not having to share a bedroom with a total stranger. And maybe the UCSB's tiny single room design (windowless or not) will be a good tradeoff for not having to have a roommate as an undergrad.
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_WUixhkwu4&t=32s
[1] https://www.independent.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/munge...
That looks like two bathrooms per 1 suite, or 1 bathroom per 4 rooms. I never shared a bathroom with less than 3 other people in my four years at college, so that doesn't seem particularly out of the ordinary for an undergraduate dorm.
The difference in size of rooms seems significant, though.
The podsize also isn't that bad in theory — they aren't much smaller than I remember the single rooms in my dorm being. The big difference is that the single rooms had windows, but also allowed for lofted beds — e.g. you would put your desk under the bed, and there'd be enough room to have a small couch where the desk would normally be. The UCSB pod furniture appears to be fixed (but again, it's just an architect drawing)
[0] https://www.independent.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/dormi...
But that seems like a bad solution to rent inflation.
Maybe someone else can design a building that has similarly good/better reviews and gives students windows. But to just assume that there are unproven better cost/benefit options at the needed scale... Well, does not seem justifiable either
Most of the 9 or 10 star reviews say the lack of windows is a problem, yet still give 9 or 10.
There are very few low ratings. A 1, a 5, a 6, the rest 7+.
You do, in fact, want to have 100 year water systems that would work in a cholera epidemic. Designing buildings for good airflow will probably not go out of style either.
Also, there are a bunch of things that we consider normal that were born of crisis: [1]
[0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-08-05/the-curio...
[1] https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/war-famine-pestilence...
But for any long-lived building, thinking how it will work in various disaster scenarios is crucial, as your design will affect the life or death of thousands living there, even if it's "just" for one-two years. And given everything we know about the recurrence of pandemics, it's virtually certain that at least another one will come around within 100 years.
"Feels less dystopian than what you're used to"
It feels mean, for lack of a better word. Maybe particularly in Santa Barbara with its beautiful sunny days. There's something dystopian about putting young students in windowless rooms and figuring "they'll get used to it". Next step is to save money by getting rid of windows in apartments, office buildings, etc. and everyone will spend their day under artificial lighting. There will be social clubs for people who want to see the outside world once a week.
I had a windowless dorm room for a year in a very cold northeastern city where I couldn't realistically spend time outside for most of the year. It was attached to a windowed suite common room and I liked my roommates, so it was no big deal. I think I would have suffered a lot had I been a real social recluse, though.
Its a stick instead of a carrot in your most personal place, your home.
Are you saying that you liked only having 2 toilets and 1 shower per 16 people? Are you saying that since your experience was that, others should have similar?
Just trying to understand the purpose of you bringing up your anecdotal experience.
edit: Also looking at the link it looks like two students get 1 private room with a window, and some even get balconies. There's outside courtyards as well. Not sure how this is similar to the design mentioned.