Our four FIRST LEGO teams have been meeting once a week since August 2019 ending after the competition on December 14, 2019. They wanted to share with you highlights of their City Shaper research projects. Their challenge was to choose a problem with a building or public space, create a solution, and share it. The teams met with multiple experts and went on field trips to support their research. Here’s a list of the experts they consulted:
CMU
Stan Caldwell
Jeremy Ficca
Jamison Fielding
Mike Kelley
Costa Samaras
Wilkins School Community Center
Patty Doody
The Port Authority
Dave Wohlwill
Kennywood
Matt Phillips
FLL Team 2641, CM Blues
We are FLL 2641, The CM Blues. Our members are Amy. Lucia, Nana. Lilia, Mahika, Sophia, and Madison. Our City Shaper project is about the Kennywood amusement park located in West Mifflin PA, near Pittsburgh. Someone in our group passed out at an amusement park because of the heat, so we decided to find a solution. Our plan is to add a roof to the already existing roof covering part of the line area and add solar panels to it. Then, we will add fans to the underside of the roof to provide an extra cool environment for all the hot days. The solar panels will give energy to batteries, and those batteries will power fans to cool down the people at Kennywood, more specifically, the people waiting in line at the Thunderbolt. This will work best on the Thunderbolt because it has a roof to add onto for the solar panels and the fans. It will cost approximately $950, which is cheap considering that they spent about 20 million dollars on the new Steel Curtain. We’d like to thank Mr. Phillips for giving us a tour of Kennywood.
Resources used:
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2006/08/how-does-heat-kill-you.html
https://familydoctor.org/condition/heat-exhaustion-heatstroke/
https://lifehacker.com/top-10-ways-to-beat-the-heat-5913149
https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g53964-d272121-r214251652-Kennywood_Park-West_Mifflin_Pennsylvania.html
https://news.energysage.com/how-much-does-the-average-solar-panel-installation-cost-in-the-u-s/
FLL Team 4212, Dot Dot Dot
We are the FLL 4212 Dot Dot Dot; Jack, John, Camille, Nora, Dusty, Aashi, and Amelie. Cheezit and Sketchy_Nik are our robots. Our City Shaper project is to fix handicap accessibility in the Wilkins School Community Center (WSCC), the building we work in. One of our ideas was to put in an elevator, but it is hard to put an elevator in a building that is older. WSCC was built in 1927. Eventually we decided that it would be easier to build an exterior elevator because there was no space for it inside the building. None of the other solutions worked and this was the best possible solution we could think of. We’d like to thank Ms. Patty Doody for giving us a presentation and a tour of the WSCC. Also, we’d like to thank the WSCC Board of Directors for inviting us to share our project at their December board meeting.
Resources used:
dreamscape foundation.org
https://www.fixr.com/costs/elevator-installation
http://www.linselevator.com/Elevator_Installation.htm
https://wsccpgh.org/about-our-organization/
https://remakelearning.org/organization/wilkins-school-community-center/
https://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2018/04/19/Pittsburgh-accessibility-Americans-with-Disabilities-Act-city-council-step-Deborah-Gross-DJ-Stemmler-Paul-O-Hanlon/stories/201804190134
https://www.publicsource.org/watch-your-step-how-pittsburgh-businesses-can-satisfy-accessibility-rules-and-still-not-be-open-to-people-with-disabilities/
https://www.disabilityrightspa.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/CurbRampsNov2017.pdf
http://www.astarlifts.com/en/blog-lifts/lifts-lifts/where-to-install-elevators-in-old-buildings
https://www.homeadvisor.com/cost/disability-accommodation/repair-an-elevator-or-stair-lift/
FLL Team 18137, The Green Gears
Hello! We are the Green Gears, FLL 18137. The City Shaper problem we chose was bus bunching. Bus bunching is when buses get grouped together when they aren’t supposed to. For example, two buses could come every twenty minutes instead of one every ten minutes. This could happen because of traffic, or too many people getting off or on at one stop. It is a challenge because everyone else chose a specific problem. For us, people all over the world experience bus problems, like bus bunching, over-crowdedness, and pollution. A bus management company called Port Authority attempted to solve this problem using an app that tells the user where the buses are, and gives him/her the transit schedule for the day. We wanted to talk to Port Authority about this app because if other bus companies provide a similar app, bus riders will be notified when there is a delay or overcrowded bus ahead of time. We’d like to thank Mr. Caldwell for visiting our team and for his feedback on our project. We’d also like to thank Mr. Wohlwill for sending feedback on our final project presentation.
Resources used:
https://blog.ballard.com/4-ways-to-improve-public-transport
https://reason.org/commentary/does-bus-transit-reduce-greenhouse/
https://www.transit.dot.gov/sites/fta.dot.gov/files/docs/PublicTransportationsRoleInRespondingToClimateChange2010.pdf
https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/10/how-seattle-bucked-a-national-trend-and-got-more-people-to-ride-the-bus/542958/
https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2019/06/23/Port-Authority-Pittsburgh-crowded-buses-efficiency-lines-routes-transportation/stories/201906230104
https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2019/04/03/Port-Authority-P1-Smithfield-Street-Sixth-Avenue-Pittsburgh-passenger-limits-improve-service-efficiency/stories/201904030134
https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2011/03/28/port-authority-riders-upset-over-crowded-buses/
https://www.pghcitypaper.com/pittsburgh/how-can-port-authority-tackle-a-common-public-transit-problem/Content?oid=1962809
https://www.portauthority.org/siteassets/services/service-request/2018asr.pdf
https://www.publicsource.org/pittsburgh-public-transit-2019-plans/
https://triblive.com/opinion/colin-mcnickle-budget-challenges-for-port-authority/
https://www.nextpittsburgh.com/city-design/port-authority-gets-59-new-clean-diesel-buses-that-offer-outlets-for-phone-charging/
FLL Team 33303, The Pittsburgh Purploids
We are the Pittsburgh Purploids, FLL 33303, and our names are Maeve, Brayden, Emily, Selin, Claudia, and Alessandro.The year is coming to an end and we wanted to let you guys know what we have done this year. Our big City Shaper problem is I-376. I-376 in downtown Pittsburgh is nicknamed the “Bathtub”. Can you guess why it has the nickname “The Bathtub”? This busy highway floods in heavy rain. This “Bathtub” can close when flooded. A lot of commuters take this route.. About 5,000 people who live in Green Tree can be delayed or stopped when the “Bathtub” floods. An expert we talked to was Professor Samaras. He talked to us about a concrete sponge. A concrete sponge is just like a normal road except there are holes in the concrete and a “sponge” underneath. The concrete sponge idea won’t work because of the Pittsburgh weather. Because Pittsburgh is so cold in the winter, and we have a lot of different weather with all the weather we get. There will be potholes, and we learned that concrete sponge isn’t good for areas like highways. So, we came up with a different solution, a manmade pond. Underground pipes would drain the water from the “Bathtub” and put it in a manmade pond. It would be 35 feet deep, and 35 feet wide. We thought of making a pond because we think that is the best and most efficient way to drain most or all the water out of the bathtub. Our team took field trip to the “Bathtub” area located next to the Mon Wharf parking area in Pittsburgh.
Resources used:
https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2018/01/16/Interstate-376-Downtown-Pittsburgh-bathtub-flooding-long-standing-engineering-problem-emergency-rescue/stories/20180116016
https://www.wtae.com/article/live-video-train-derails-in-hempfield-township/29742496
https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2019/02/08/parkway-east-bathtub-expected-flooding-february-8/
http://www.brooklineconnection.com/history/Facts/Flood2004.html
https://www.newcivilengineer.com/archive/thames-water-tackles-concrete-clogged-sewers-02-06-2017/
https://www.wesa.fm/post/pittsburgh-s-had-lot-rain-year-not-much-record-making-2018#stream/0
https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2019/02/06/pittsburgh-weather-ohio-river-flood-advisory-rain/
https://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2018/01/13/Storm-flood-warnings-continuing-in-Western-Pennsylvania/stories/201801130076
https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2005/01/23/Getting-Around-No-ring-about-the-Parkway-East-s-Downtown-bathtub/stories/20050123016
http://www.pahighways.com/interstates/I376.html
https://www.wpxi.com/news/top-stories/drivers-rescued-after-bathtub-area-of-i-376-floods/683292827