Message-Id: <9306211211.AA01833@podge>
To: sipb@Athena.MIT.EDU, sipb-prospectives@Athena.MIT.EDU
Cc: "Mark W. Eichin" <eichin@Athena.MIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: office map 
In-Reply-To: Your message of Sun, 20 Jun 93 18:21:48 -0400.
             <9306202221.AA00779@hodge> 
Date: Mon, 21 Jun 93 08:11:06 EDT
From: Richard J. Barbalace <rjbarbal@Athena.MIT.EDU>


> ~eichin/office/sipb-building is an idraw postscript file with the
> major furniture to a one-inch resolution. Please look it over and and
> use it as a reference for planning office moves.
> 							_Mark_

After several hours of pondering and experimenting, Chad and I
have come up with nine plans for remodelling the office.  These
proposals and the current map are displayed on the new bulletin board
next to Milo.  See ~rjbarbal/plan#.ps for the idraw files, where
# is from 1 to 9.

The plans have tried to balance office needs and space limitations
while trying to achieve the following:
	o  Make the office more open.
	o  Avoid having members face away from the door.
	o  Create wider travelling space to facilitate walking,
		handicap access, and soda cart movement.  The
		main travel route is twice as wide in some of
		the proposed layouts.
	o  Provide sufficient space for workstation use.
	o  Clear the view of the front window.
	o  Move members' drawers to more secure locations near
		the back of the office, while avoiding blocking
		the air from the vents.
	o  Balance the positions of chairs with respect to
		air conditioning.
	o  Avoid congestion of having too many chairs in too
		little space.
	o  Avoid blocking bulletin boards.
	o  Maintain the cubby where the fridge and CDs
		are hidden in the back of the office.
	o  Move the sofa and green chair into better positions
		for viewing the dry-erase board to create a
		small meeting location.
	o  Place bookshelves in useful locations (usually in
		a "document corner") that can be easily
		reached and searched by users.
	o  Place the "history" cabinet near the door to
		help people find and remember to save
		the "save in case of fire" box (only in
		some designs).
	o  Solve lots and lots of problems that came up while
		trying to figure out how to do the above.
	o  Last and least, make the office look cool.

Some explanation of the symbols:  Unmarked boxes are desks and
tables.  Trapezoids on desks mark approximate positions of
monitors (which can be easily rearranged).  Boxes marked
"member" are members' filing cabinets from the front of the
office.  Circles are coatracks.  Shelf #1 is marked "1, new cd"
because it would be used for holding CDs and the stereo.  Shelf
#2 is marked "2".  The current CD shelf becomes a bookcase
marked "old cd".  The "tall" bookcase is the one in the back
of the office.  The "short" bookcase is the one outside the
office.  The "history" box is the filing cabinet with the
History of the World.

None of the plans is perfect.  Some show definite problems in
rearranging the furniture.  I think my top three choices would
be plan8, plan7, plan9 in decreasing order (but it's hard to
decide).

Take a look at the diagrams, come to tonight's meeting (I can't),
and argue, and maybe even come to a decision.

Thanks.
- Richard