California State University at San Bernardino

San Bernardino, California

The CSU Classroom/Student Service/Faculty Office Building at the San Bernardino campus, consists of approximately 150,000 square feet of lecture type classrooms, teaching labs of designated disciplines, student service functions, and faculty offices. The building program is composed of two distinct sections - a three story classroom/student service wing to the west, and a four story faculty office wing to the east. An exterior, landscaped terrace is located in between the wings for student/faculty interaction, class break areas and circulation.

Due to the differences in building configurations and dynamic characteristics between the two wings, they are treated  structurally as two buildings separated by an expansion joint but resting on a common base.

The long and slender building dimensions of the faculty office wing make it very sensitive to torsional forces induced by strong ground motions. In order to control the twist effectively, eccentrically braced steel frames were introduced in the short direction and placed inside the partition walls between offices.