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Development plans for the Palatinus public baths
Mélyépterv (Civil Engineering) Consulting Ltd. - Budapest, Hungary
One of the masterpieces of the European Bauhaus movement can be found in Hungary, on an island in the Danube river, which provides a relaxing natural environment in the heart of the country's capital city.
The central building of the Palatinus Public Baths, designed by István Janáky in 1939, is now a protected Historical Monument. This building contains all the locker rooms, showers, and other auxiliary facilities and features basking terraces on the roof. Spiral staircases provide access to the pools. The location and functional arrangement of the building serves as a separation between the (semi public) baths area and the rest of the island's (public) park area.
The Palatinus Public Baths also includes another main building, several smaller buildings, five pools, a water-chute, playgrounds and sport facilities. The buildings have been extended and re-modeled several times. The main pool of the bath is 140 m long and 48 m wide; two smaller children pools are located at the south end and there is also triangular training pool and a thermal pool.
In efforts to revive the aging baths the owners have initiated a development and refurbishment plan. Short-term development is targeted at renovating the pools' water circulation equipment whereas long-term development includes refurbishment of the buildings and the surrounding areas to restore the baths to its original splendor created in 1937.
Mélyépterv (Civil Engineering) Consulting Kft. was contracted as the main contractor/designer of the area refurbishment project. Zoltán Tóth, project leader, responsible for the development of all the architectural designs and plans of the Palatinus Public Baths describes the firm's involvement in the project, "We were responsible for preparation of all the documentation that represents the actual stage of the area. We have been also actively involved in the design development for the conceptual architectural plans."
ArchiCAD users since 1998 for the development of our architectural projects, Mélyépterv Consulting Kft. switched to ArchiCAD 5.0 from 'the drafting board.' "We tested some other CAD packages as well, but we have decided to use ArchiCAD because it was the 'friendliest' and the easiest to use/learn," Tóth explained. For the Palatinus Public Baths project, Mélyépterv Consulting Kft. took advantage of Graphisoft's latest product, Plan2Model as the basis of their work.
"The existing two-dimensional DXF files helped our architectural design work. These files contained all the survey (geotechnic) data of the buildings and their environment. With the new Plan2Model product, we could transfer the data into the ArchiCAD environment more efficiently," Tóth explained. Plan2Model runs in the environment of ArchiCAD, creating three/dimensional building components from two-dimensional line-work based on complex recognition algorithms. "Until now we had to do this work 'manually' without any automation."
Tóth notes that the team was up and running on the new product in only a few days. "It didn't take long for us to become productive with the program. We set up the 'conversion library' from the available DXF databases and files - matched the 2D figures and elements with 3D ArchiCAD elements. This took a little time, but after that, Plan2Model did the rest. In practical terms, we spent about two days on learning the software, which included setting up the conversion libraries for our project. Using Plan2Model application saved us five working days for two architects on this project alone, so the product paid for itself in about two weeks.
With a single mouse click, the three-dimensional Floor Plan was ready in a couple of seconds. All walls intersections were clear, all openings, doors and windows were positioned to their exact location and all other building components (furniture, fixtures, etc.) were inserted perfectly. Using the same conversion library, the next story was then converted in seconds. For such projects as this one, a pubic building, as well as other types of larger structures with repetitive elements, Plan2Model is most effective at creating an ArchiCAD model.
"After completing all the stories, we could get all the necessary sections, elevations and perspective views from the model in ArchiCAD," Tóth relayed. "We also found ArchiCAD's Magic Wand Tool to a great help not only in the creation of zone and room stamps, but also in the creation of floor- and roof slabs in one click. Plan2Model doesn't include conversion of these elements, but can be easily added in ArchiCAD."
With renovation of the pools at Palatinus Public Baths already under way, visitors will soon be enjoying the first fruits of the renovation project when reopened for the summer. Meanwhile, Tóth's team continues to shape the long-term architectural reconstruction and refurbishment plan. "Normally we would have expected this phase to take much longer. It's great that we could get to the design phase already," Tóth disclosed. Having built the model from the 2D data in ArchiCAD, the team now tackles the design requirements for historical monument preservation and restoration of the Palatinus Public Baths to their former greatness.
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