> Seems to me that HN users in this thread and UCS students aren't able to look past those tradeoffs.
It seems like HN users (and architects) aren't even considering that those tradeoffs exist. It's like they want to design a building without any regard to land use, cost or how many students it serves.
I see no acknowledgement that:
1. UCSB is located on a narrow coastal plain, where land is at a premium.
2. Giving every bedroom a window implies blowing up the surface area/volume ratio of the building (so build it taller or build 2x or 3x as many buildings).
3. A bunch of long, skinny buildings requires more land (and probably more $) to house the same number of students as one borg cube.
Additionally, much of the criticism fails to acknowledge the actual design of the building.
Yes, each bedroom does not have a real window, but bedrooms are grouped into suites of 8, with a study area, kitchen and bathrooms... and that common space does have real windows!. An additional common area on each floor, shared among 8 suites, spanning the width of the building, has a wall covered with real windows!.
I agree that the borg cube is ugly, but I'd like to see the proposed alternative. The alternative needs to house the same number of students on the same amount of land and cost roughly the same amount. I don't think you can do the first two without building something 35 stories tall (more than twice the height of Storke Tower). And then you'll get the predictable comments about the "Manhattanization" of SB.