Strategies for improving Informal Interaction in study of School of Environmental Technology, Federal University of Technology Minna using Isovist visibility Graphs.

Abstract

This paper discusses the concept of an isovist, derived from architectural literature, and shows how isovists can help architects understand visibility and its importance in a physical environment. An isovist is defined as the set of all points visible in all directions from a given vantage point in space. The overlap between two or more isovists locations can be used to assess reciprocal visibility and thereby assist in the design of offices, commonly utilized spaces and even office/staff allocations. This work illustrates the value of isovists for architectural design using field data from a faculty building in the Federal University of Technology, Minna. The paper also shows how an isovist analysis can be used to propose alternative design solutions at design and even post-design stage. The as-built plan of the school of Environmental Technology (S.E.T) building, Federal University of Technology (F.U.T), Minna was developed using AUTOCAD 2014 software and analysed with DepthmapX; using isovist visibility graphs: a space syntax tool to reveal the relative connectivity and visual integration of the designed spaces with interesting results. The paper also proposed probable alterations to the present design of the S.E.T building thereby revealing higher levels of connectivity and integration. The analysed as-built plans which showed average (av.) connectivity of 3775.22 and average (av.) visual integration values of 10.8 were seen to have increased positively after alterations, to 3830.45 and 11.1 respectively. The paper recommended that this method be adopted in the analysis of proposals especially in environments that require its users to provide productive outcomes through face-to-face interactions.