Design of Civil Structures and Infrastructures

The SE_A3 module teaches you how to design engineering (infra)structures within a realistic context: from scratch, investigating multiple variants and materials to find the most suitable design. You will make a functional and technical design, with considerable level of detail.

A3 will be organised as an engaging module:

• during the first weeks of the module keynote lectures from industry and expert staff members will be organised; broad and advanced content on design methodology, and the design of buildings, bridges, rail track and roads/pavements.

• in parallel you will be trained in various (soft/hard) skill-related lectures/workshops (teamwork, parametric design, presentation, setting up a clear calculation, visual communication)

• the central task is a group assignment around a realistic clients brief, containing buildings, bridges, rail and/or road, and including an individual contribution of each team member in the form of a preliminary design of one structural type.

• for deepening your knowledge on subjects, which is necessary for your individual contribution to the team design, various self-study content will be offered from a learning pool.

In A3, attention will be given to ethical aspects of design of engineering structures by means of addressing a realistic design context and working in a realistic team atmosphere. Considerations related to ethics are:

• Which team member will take responsibility for which part of the design?

• Can we guarantee that the design is safe?

• Is this design addressing the societal need in a correct way?

• To what extent is our global environment loaded by the presented design?

• To what extent will people be affected by the construction process of this design?

• Can the design be constructed safely and how?

The Core faculty module (CFM) will provide the fundamental basis for ethics, on which the course will build forth.

Structural Design is also about optimisation and graphical representation – CFM content that prepares for this will be built upon.

This module also considers topics that will continue the line of both modelling and coding from the MUDE module. MUDE: Coding skills (Python, Matlab etc.) and MUDE on modelling, data and uncertainty analysis are pre-requisites. This module will follow the lines of MUDE by analysing advanced methods with application on bridges, building, road, railway structures and circularity. The MUDE course in this aspect prepare students to understand reliable design parameters, criteria and reliable design choices out of several options.

The assessment is as follows:

1. General design principles of (infra)structural systems - Written Exam (35%)

2. Specific design aspects of buildings, bridges, rail and road structural systems - Report (25%)

3. Design challenge - Project (40%)

A successful participation in the module, requires a minimum evaluation of 5.8 in all units.

A3-1:

Written exam (digital exam)

A3-2:

The level of the submitted work for the design assignment (SE-A3- Learning Unit 2) will be assessed against the frame of reference and learning objectives of the available self-study content. In this assessment, students will be assessed by means of some prescribed questions about their learnings of A3-2. The assessment of A3-2 will be done both in formative and in summative way. In the formative assessment, students will be asked to peer-review each other’s answer sheet and prepare a report on the assessment. In the second step, students will be asked to submit these questions (individual summative assessment and the peer review report). This means that the final report that the students will submit will contain two parts (a chapter containing A3-2 en peer report; and second report of A3-3). While carrying out the final assessment, attention will also be given on the improvements that the students made on the A3-2 questionnaire on the basis of peer review comments. The description of A3-3 assessment has been provided later in the document.

A3-3:

A3-3 module will be evaluated as a project on the basis of a final report and group presentations. The final grade will be determined in a single rubric based on the level of understanding displayed at the oral exam (presentation) and the quality of the final assignment reports. This submodule will be assessed against the frame of reference and learning 259 objectives of A3-3. Final report (individual and group part) and presentation will be rubrics in one summative assessment format. Final report (80 points): It is expected that each team will provide a report containing chapters both from their individual learning together with their team's final design. Please note that since one student per group will be a leader of a specific topic, this will provide the assessor a mean to judge the performance of the individual student. 25 points will be given on the basis of the overall report, whereas 55 points will be given on the basis of the individual chapter. Group presentation (20 points): A group presentation per team will be scheduled at the end of A3-3 sub module. This will be an overall evaluation of the team's final design choices. Students are expected to defend these choices in from of team of assessors.

For more information on grading, see article 14 in the Rules and Guidelines (RGBE):

https://www.tudelft.nl/en/student/ceg-student-portal/education/education-information/educational-rules-and-regulations

Permitted Materials during Exam

Calculator and a Formula sheet.