Universal Design

This message has been cross posted to the following Discussion Forums: Young Architects Forum and Universal Design .
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It seems to me that the inclusion of Universal Design principals in all good design would help reduce healthcare costs by enabling more people to remain out of expensive institutions and keeping fit. But I think we need more good, peer reviewed research done that supports this hypothesis. At our round table discussion in New Orleans it was suggested that such research might be worthy of the Latrobe. Suggestions for the wording of the request for proposal seemed to be the next step. If you have ideas about this I hope you will contribute.

gunnar,
i couldn't agree more that we need good research and there is certainly a paucity of UD-related research. the 2 major reasons?...the difficulty in undertaking real world research that has enough rigor to convince a funding agency to fund it and the cost of running a controlled experiment.  the former speaks for itself. the latter is due to the fact that it costs too much to build or renovate enough buildings for research.  the research would have to be done as a naturally occuring experiment - ie, being able to find enough examples of existing UD (housing would be the easiest) to run a matched sample study against non-UD structures. since this would be equivalent to an epidemiological study enough examples would equate to alot. 

Nonetheless, it  would be great to do this kind of research.

jon

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jon sanford
Assoc Prof & Director CATEA
Georgia Institute of Technology
Atlanta GA
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Show Original Message -------------------------------------------
Original Message:
Sent: 06-22-2011 08:31
From: Gunnar Baldwin
Subject: Research needed?

This message has been cross posted to the following Discussion Forums: Young Architects Forum and Universal Design .
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It seems to me that the inclusion of Universal Design principals in all good design would help reduce healthcare costs by enabling more people to remain out of expensive institutions and keeping fit. But I think we need more good, peer reviewed research done that supports this hypothesis. At our round table discussion in New Orleans it was suggested that such research might be worthy of the Latrobe. Suggestions for the wording of the request for proposal seemed to be the next step. If you have ideas about this I hope you will contribute.

This discussion forum seems like a good place to share ideas about this. I hope you will take part.

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Gunnar Baldwin
Water Efficiency Specialist
TOTO USA, Inc.
Thornton NH
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