Buildings and structures – middle years
It will boggle your mind when you begin thinking about how many
different engineering teams were involved in designing and building
the house you live in. You will find it difficult to imagine the number of
engineering skills it takes to design and build some of the largest and
tallest buildings in the world.
We all live and work in buildings, but how often do we stop and think
about who was involved in its creation? Have you ever wondered how
houses, apartments, high-rise buildings, bridges, or dams are created?
Office building in Sydney
Look around you - everywhere you look you see houses of all shapes
and sizes, tall buildings, large and small bridges and footpaths. But how were they put there? Who was
responsible for the planning, design and construction of those buildings, bridges and dams? What is your house
made out of? Why are some houses across the world made differently? Civil engineering teams can answer all
these questions.
Civil engineering teams are involved with solving problems that relate to building and construction. Structures
such as roads and bridges are also planned and constructed by engineering teams. Civil engineering teams also
have an impact on every aspect of the environment in which houses and communities are built.
Civil engineering teams research, plan, design, organise and oversee building and construction projects. There
are various fields within Civil engineering, including Structural, Geotechnical, Transport, Hydraulic, Local
Government and Building Services.
Numerous engineering teams are responsible for every stage involved in constructing a building, whether it is
the house or apartment we live in, or the high-rise office building or retail centre that we work in or shop at.
Let us look at an average Australian house.
Structural engineering teams plan the house. They invent ways of
making the house safe and more environmentally friendly. They work
with architects, builders, and Mechanical, Chemical and Electrical
engineering teams to ensure that every part of the house is designed
and built to the highest possible standard.
Geotechnical engineers test the ground upon which the house is going
to be built. They study and assess the rocks and soil to see whether the
ground is able to support the house.
A modern house
Let us think about the Leaning Tower of Pisa, in Italy. Why is it leaning?
It was built on the wrong kind of ground. The ground could not properly support a building of this sort. Today’s
Geotechnical engineering teams could prevent this kind of thing from happening.
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Transport engineering teams plan, design and construct the roads and other transport systems leading to the
house and connecting it with the surrounding area and the rest of the country. These include motorways,
railways and any type of road or path used by people or for freight. Transport engineering teams make places
accessible for us. Can you imagine travelling around in a busy city that had no traffic lights?!
Hydraulic engineering teams investigate how best to provide water to the house. They are responsible for
planning how to direct water into the house for drinking, and how to direct grey water (or water that goes down
the drain and the toilet) away from the house. In the broader community, Hydraulic (or water) engineering teams
are involved in everything from planning for floods to looking after rivers and protecting Australia’s coastline
from erosion.
Local Government (Municipal) engineering teams work on improving the environment and quality of life within
the surrounding community. They plan and construct bike paths, parks and picnic and barbeque areas.
Building Service engineering teams ensure that living areas in the house are comfortable, safe and energy
efficient. They plan safety, security, communication and movement within the house and implement services
such as airconditioning, power, lighting and phones.
Building houses
Engineering teams, from many different fields (but particularly Structural
and Civil engineering), work together to design and create houses.
Structural engineering teams design the building so that it is safe and
it will last a long time. They design the walls, make sure that they hold
up the heavy roof, and ensure that the floors can support the weight of
people and furniture.
Do you have stairs in your house? Stairs also need to be carefully
planned, and structural engineering teams make sure that they are safe
and easy to use. Of course, the roof is also important, and it is designed
and constructed to protect the house from rain, hail and snow.
Townhouses in Adelaide
In areas where there is a risk of bushfires, houses are now being
designed with sprinklers on the roof, and other systems that protect
them. Some houses may also need to be able to withstand other
natural disasters, such as earthquakes and cyclones.
Civil engineering teams make sure that houses are reachable by road
and are connected to facilities such as shopping centres. Most houses
in Australia have access to water supplies and civil engineering teams
ensure that this water reaches houses through pipes. Other water (such
as grey water and storm water) needs to be able to go somewhere, so
Civil engineering teams research and design ways to transport storm
water away from houses, and treat it if necessary.
House - construction
Engineers are involved in the design and function of every room in the house.
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The living room
• E
lectrical engineering and manufacturing engineering teams
are responsible for the design and production of the TVs, DVDs
and sound systems that entertain us in our living rooms.
• Electrical engineering teams also design the electrical parts that
make appliances, such as CD players, function. Manufacturing
engineering teams plan and oversee the making of these
appliances in factories.
House - attic living room
The kitchen
• M
anufacturing engineering teams design the equipment and
processes used to produce the appliances, such as ovens and cook tops that we
use in our kitchens.
• Electrical engineering teams design the electrical parts that make kitchen
appliances, such as toasters and sandwich makers work.
• Mechanical engineering teams design the motors that use electricity to run
our fridges and keep them cool. They also design the moving parts in the
appliances we use when we cook such as blenders, mixers etc.
• Chemical engineering teams work out the processes involved in
House - kitchen
manufacturing some of the foods we eat. They also investigate ways of
keeping food fresher and improving its quality.
• Agricultural and Biological engineering teams design, invent and implement
various technologies to improve the quality of the food we eat, such as allowing us to keep food safely
for a longer period of time.
The laundry
• E
lectrical engineering teams design the electrical parts that run the
motors in appliances such as washing machines and clothes dryers.
• Mechanical engineering teams design the motors that keep
washing machines running. They also investigate ways of reducing
the amount of electricity and water used by domestic appliances.
• Electronic and software engineering teams are involved in
creating new ‘smart appliances’. These appliances seem to do
their own thinking! One example would be a washing machine
House - laundry
that senses that it needs different cycles and water levels for
towels and clothes.
• Chemical engineering teams and chemists create the chemicals
that are used in detergents and other kitchen products. These engineering teams also design these
products with the environment in mind. They do this by using chemicals that are biodegradable.
Biodegradable products are important because they are able to break down safely and relatively quickly
in the environment.
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Amazing structures
There are millions and millions of buildings in the world, but some stand out from
the rest. They might have been standing for thousands of years, be larger or grander
than the buildings around them, be ornately decorated, or have been built with
nothing more than muscle power and basic tools.
Today’s skyscrapers are incredible, due mainly to their great height. They are
extremely complex to design and build.
Buildings tell us about the people who built them, their lives, where they chose to
build and the materials they decided to use, as well as the purpose of the building.
From the Palace of Minos to the ‘Water Cube’ for the 2008 Beijing Olympics,
engineers have played a vital part in them all.
Q1 building, Gold
Coast. Australia’s
tallest building.
The Palace of Minos
In 1899/1900, the British archaeologist, Sir Arthur Evans, excavated a site at
Knossos in Crete. He found evidence of a vast palace or temple complex which
dated back to 1900 -1700BC.
Interestingly, the palace had at least three separate liquid management systems,
one for supply, one for drainage of runoff, and one for drainage of waste water.
Aqueducts brought fresh water from springs to be gravity-fed through terracotta
pipes down to fountains and taps.
Waste water was drained through a closed system leading to a sewer at a distance
from the palace. The queen even had a flushing toilet! It consisted of a seat over a
drain and was flushed by pouring water from a jug.
Minos Palace Knossos, Crete
The palace was quite often drenched by torrential rains, so a runoff system was also
essential. Zig-zag channels were dug, with catchment basins to slow and spread out the water.
The ‘Water Cube’
The Beijing National Aquatics Centre (better known as the Water Cube)
was the main swimming venue for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, and
was co-designed by Australian architects and engineers. It is a giant cube
which looks as though it is made of thousands of irregular bubbles, each
up to 9 m in diameter.
The designers realised that bubbles always touch each other with a
regular geometry, so they developed a three-dimensional structural
system with regular intersecting points, nodes and struts, which could be
tilted to create a random pattern that looked like soap bubbles.
Beijing’s Olympic Water Cube
What does this really mean? Why not investigate this amazing building further?
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The steel space frame is the largest ETFE (ethylene tetrafluoroethylene)-clad structure in the world. The ETFE
pillows are only eight one-thousandths of an inch thick, allowing more light and heat to pass through it than
would glass. This results in a 30% saving in energy costs.
The Water Cube looks completely different at night, when the lights are on inside, than it does in the daytime.
It truly is an incredible building!
Dams/reservoirs
Dams (also called reservoirs) store water for such uses as drinking, farming
and agriculture, mining, and manufacturing. Their construction requires
the special knowledge and skills of Civil, Mechanical and Electrical
engineering teams. (For more information on these and other types of
engineering teams read the ‘Engineering – what is it? Sheet.)
Dams/reservoirs are created by building a dam wall which blocks water
flowing naturally along a river, causing it to collect in a valley or gorge for
Cotter Dam
storage. The water in the river comes from a water catchment. This is an
area of land where the natural landscape/landform is used to ‘catch’ the
rainfall which then flows into creeks and rivers. Water catchment areas
can stretch across thousands of square kilometres and hold millions of gigalitres of water, or can be as small as a
few square kilometres.
Water catchment areas include a number of key things - both naturally occurring and man-made. These include:
• a suitable location free from pollution, with a good flow of water (often situated within protected areas
such as national parks)
• ridges, hills or mountains to ‘catch’ rainfall, allowing it to flow into creeks and rivers
• a valley or gorge suitable for trapping and storing water
• a wall to hold back the water (the dam wall), allowing it to collect into a dam/reservoir for storage
• pumping stations and pipelines to deliver the water to where it is needed for use.
Catchments are important as they also provide many animals with an ideal habitat. In a dry landscape a
catchment can stand out like an oasis. The rich water supply means it is a cool and colourful place where flora
and fauna flourish. Catchments will often create wetlands made up of marshes, swamps, mudflats and lakes
that support a rich biodiversity of fish, birds and other animals.
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