Introduction
Introduction Statistics Contact Development Disclaimer Help
_______ __ _______
| | |.---.-..----.| |--..-----..----. | | |.-----..--.--.--..-----.
| || _ || __|| < | -__|| _| | || -__|| | | ||__ --|
|___|___||___._||____||__|__||_____||__| |__|____||_____||________||_____|
on Gopher (inofficial)
Visit Hacker News on the Web
COMMENT PAGE FOR:
Robots move Shanghai city block [video]
codedokode wrote 21 hours 6 min ago:
Wikipedia says building were being moved since 19th century. We also
had a large-scale building relocation during Stalin's Moscow
Reconstruction (basically, destroying beautiful historical houses to
expand ancient curvy streets into straight wide roads) - some buildings
were moved without cutting water supply, electricity and even with
residents inside [1]. This probably was intended to showcase the
achievements of Soviet engineering but judging by the comments here
(and by English Wikipedia article on the topic) nobody even remembers
this.
Personally I think that there should be no new construction in
historical areas and there is no need to move anything.
[1]: https://www.mos.ru/en/news/item/13744073/
bitwize wrote 1 day ago:
In the first episode of Kyoryū Sentai Jūranger, the inspiration for
the first bit of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, the witch Bandora (Rita
Repulsa) appears on Earth riding a flying penny-farthing bicycle, and
terrorizes the people by shifting a bunch of Tokyo skyscrapers around
to form her palace.
Seeing the time lapse of that whole city block being moved in one lump
made me think of that. Very cool.
CommenterPerson wrote 1 day ago:
This is a tremendous engineering, coordination and public works feat.
Using words like "robots" and "AI" shows how much hype has taken over
the latter two fields, with actual achievements being modest in
comparison to the hype.
rembal wrote 1 day ago:
Nothing new, a lot of landmark buildings larger than this were moved
like this in the 1940s in Warsaw, during post-war reconstructions. 80
years ago.
qwertox wrote 1 day ago:
Reminds me of the Rinsdorf-Talbrücke in Germany, which got finished
last month.
In order to renovate/rebuild the bridge they first built a new half
(full lanes) next to the old bridge, collapsed the old bridge, then
built the other half where the external half of the old bridge used to
be, and finally moved the previously newly built half to join that
latter new half, so that the new bridge can take the place of the old
one, all of this while parts of it could still be used for traffic.
It is the kind of "German Engineering" which people used to talk about,
but sadly our government didn't feel that this was an opportunity to do
some proper PR. The Chinese have become experts at this kind of PR.
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iseMMVEEojk&t=23s
Stevvo wrote 1 day ago:
There's a great video of the Amish doing this by hand:
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tc6IT5L3ZSk
mensetmanusman wrote 1 day ago:
Changing the view of the Bellevue: [1] I wonder if humanity in the
future will make this a typical part of every house so that they can
slowly move towards or away from water.
[1]: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=I52IwcC3a3c&pp=ygUaTW92aW5nIGJ1a...
netsharc wrote 1 day ago:
Hah, people sometimes wonder "This isn't where I parked my car, and
it's pointing in a different direction", imagine returning to a
building and its pointing a different direction
jffry wrote 1 day ago:
Here is an article that seems to be the primary source for the
time-lapses:
[1]: https://english.shanghai.gov.cn/en-Latest-WhatsNew/20250605/67...
joshdavham wrote 1 day ago:
This reminded me of that classic SpongeBob clip:
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iyn-0af_hlI
Animats wrote 1 day ago:
That's a nice approach. Here's a similar move back in 2020, again from
the SCMP.[1] This one turned a corner.
The robotic part is that all the lifters have load measurement,
probably in at least 3 axes, and report stresses to the controller.
Other ways of moving big structures require getting big rigid steel
beams underneath to make the building strong enough to move. Like these
US building moves.[2] [1]
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gwu4ovaSiQY
[2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htdVWM42mRg
dluan wrote 1 day ago:
If anyone is ever in Shanghai and interested in seeing this, it's in a
very cool area called Fengshengli, where you can see these old
preserved style warehouse buildings. The area is filled with hip
breweries, coffee shops, bike shops, art galleries, and clothing
boutiques, and it's actually not that crowded or busy compared to other
touristy spots. It's also nicer compared to Xintiandi imo, where it
feels more produced and fake, like a reconstruction as opposed to
actual heritage buildings.
Great snapshot of classic Shanghai architecture, blended with new, like
this really cool coffee spot:
[1]: https://www.archdaily.com/973430/birdie-cup-coffee-fog-archite...
RainyDayTmrw wrote 1 day ago:
This, and the few other famous photos and videos of similar operations,
confuse me, because it violates my mental model of how buildings work.
My mental model is that a modern building has a large, concrete
foundation that extends significantly below the ground, and that the
foundation is attached to the structural frame of the rest of the
above-ground building. Then, how can jacks, whether manual or robotic,
raise a building up off of its foundation?
Also, how can they scoot some, but not all, jacks over on any given
step, and alternate? I understand that rigidity isn't fully binary, but
I figured that buildings were on the more rigid side.
incompatible wrote 1 day ago:
These aren't modern buildings, and they aren't skyscrapers that would
need significant foundations. The details of the foundations would
still be interesting. I suppose they got the process started by
finding or clearing spaces underneath, inserting support beams, and
jacking them up.
entropie wrote 1 day ago:
A few years ago they moved a (historic) train station where I lived. It
needed to be moved for some underground tube construction, but also a
few meters to make the new buildings fit. I witnessed, it was awesome.
[1] /
[1]: https://www.e-architect.com/images/jpgs/leipzig/bayerischer_ba...
[2]: https://www.e-architect.com/leipzig/bayerischer-bahnhof-buildi...
smusamashah wrote 1 day ago:
I dont understand this. I always thought houses/buildings have
underground supports on which the structure is erected. Doesn't have to
be tall towers, all small buildings have underground support too.
How come these buildings don't have any of that? Or is the support in
form of metal rods which these structures are freely screwed to?
lukaslalinsky wrote 1 day ago:
From the video, it seems like the houses were cut from the original
foundation and a huge blocks
of concrete was formed underneath the houses. Before pouring the
concrete, they dug under the houses and inserted metal framework for
the move, that was likely how they lifted the whole thing to insert
the jacks later on. The process of doing this seems way more
interesting to me than the final move with these synchronized jacks.
I'd love more details about that
tartoran wrote 1 day ago:
I wish that they showed that part too, the synchronized robo-jacks
are interesting but the first part seems more challenging.
thenthenthen wrote 1 day ago:
I just walked passed, it seems they cut the foundation and
somehow poured a new one underneath? Here are some pics: [1]
[1]: https://ibb.co/yttQQhJ
[2]: https://ibb.co/KxbM6cnY
linsomniac wrote 1 day ago:
Search youtube for "crawl space underpinning" for some videos
of a residential process.
I'm sure they're doing something more elaborate there, but in
residential you do this underpinning technique if you want to
replace or extend your foundation (in my case, putting a
basement where there is a crawl space), where you mark the
foundation into 2' segments and label them A, B, C. Then you
go through and dig/cut out all the "A"s, and pour footings and
foundations in place, then repeat for the Bs and Cs. I'm
thinking about doing this for my crawl space just to have some
more space for storage.
rendaw wrote 1 day ago:
And how did they get the robotic legs under there in the first place?
Once they're in place the walking is cool, but that seems like the
less impressive part.
toast0 wrote 1 day ago:
It looks like the building was constructed on a concrete slab
foundation. The slab is poured in the ground, but not anchored into
it. When it's time to move it, you dig under the slab to put in jacks
to raise it off of the ground underneath the slab. These jacks also
can move it a bit at a time.
For smaller buildings, you might jack it up, and put wheels under it
to move it. For smaller buildings on perimeter foundation, you might
unbolt it from the foundation to move it, and attach it to a newly
poured foundation at the new location.
Repairing a sinking foundation is similar... Dig under, lift up as
needed, fill in under the sinking areas, hopefully with something
more stable.
Much taller buildings need deeper anchoring. Small buildings on sites
with difficult soil conditions need deeper anchoring too.
Avicebron wrote 1 day ago:
I found this because I had a similar question, I think it might be
hard to gauge how much prep work was done from the video. [1] The
houses:
[1]: https://parametric-architecture.com/shanghai-relocates-7500-...
[2]: https://shanghaistreetstories.com/?page_id=1288
bmmayer1 wrote 1 day ago:
This is incredible -- serious question -- has anything of this scale
been done in the US or Europe? Do we even have the technology?
timmb wrote 1 day ago:
In Romania in the 80s, a number of churches were moved to
make space for new building projects.
[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/dec/14/bucharest-mov...
orbital-decay wrote 1 day ago:
Structure relocation is 19th century tech, still as fascinating as
back then. This was done all over the world, on a much bigger scale
than a single block. In some US cities in particular, and in Moscow
they moved entire streets like that, with people inside.
It's just expensive and there's no reason to do that unless the city
is being actively developed, which Shanghai still is, and older
structures are in the way.
hombre_fatal wrote 1 day ago:
I think the real question is whether we can do it today.
e.g. When NYC expanded its subway system for the first time in 50
years in 2017, it cost $2.5 billion per mile. 8-12x more expensive
than similar projects in foreign cities.
There might be too much regulation and too much cost and too many
meetings and too many contractors and too much political conflict
to do many of the feats we did in the 19th and 20th century.
gbil wrote 1 day ago:
Back in 1991 a church built in the 1500s was moved on rails at
Kifissia, Greece. Sure, not the same scale but taking into
consideration the time it was built, it was a great achievement
Sorry, could only find reference in Greek language but the pictures
and diagrams are universal :) plus translation options are always
available
[1]: https://www.mixanitouxronou.gr/to-ekklisaki-pou-xethemelioth...
seabass wrote 1 day ago:
The town of Kiruna in Sweden is currently being relocated because it
is sinking into the iron mine that originally led to the founding of
the town. Some buildings are being relocated on tracks in a similar
way to that Shanghai video.
[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/05/why-a-swedish-...
dluan wrote 1 day ago:
Something similar but different was back in the early 1900s, several
city blocks in Seattle were moved or relocated when large chunks of
the city were blasted away with water to flatten it. Although most
old buildings were simply demolished.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regrading_in_Seattle
funkaster wrote 1 day ago:
lower tech/scale but in Chile (in the island of Chiloe) they have
been doing this for centuries for individual houses: [1] - although
no smart jacks, only bulls and people.
[1]: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/moving-houses-of-chilo...
slyall wrote 1 day ago:
Moving single buildings is pretty common
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structure_relocation
foxglacier wrote 1 day ago:
Not the same scale but the 4-story concrete building The Museum Hotel
in New Zealand was moved on rails in the 1990's [1] Maybe the scale
of these other moves were limited by not having the adaptable height
jacks to keep everything straight.
[1]: https://www.rejigit.co.nz/database/redactor_images/large/689...
mayneack wrote 1 day ago:
[1] In the 60s a massive stone monument was moved 200m up in
elevation to avoid being flooded by a dam.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Simbel#Relocation
dcrazy wrote 1 day ago:
In 1930 they moved an entire telephone exchange in Indianapolis
without even taking it offline: [1] The technology in this video
appears to be computer control of the many pistons underneath the
raised block. I would estimate that could be done with roughly
1970s-level of technology.
[1]: https://indianahistory.org/blog/instead-of-moving-mountains-...
pxc wrote 1 day ago:
So the impressive thing is really the social coordination, the
project management, which was doubtless challenging but is hardly
unique.
It's still kind of a wonderful, imo. And it's awesome to be able to
see it on video like this.
piptastic wrote 1 day ago:
not quite the same scale area wise, but interesting nonetheless [1]
As for your actual question, I'm pretty sure we (US, Europe, humans
in general) could do quite a bit more than we do now if we had a
reason to do so. (or were 100% sure about the results)
[1]: https://www.archdaily.com/973183/the-building-that-moved-how...
crooked-v wrote 1 day ago:
Check out the raising of Chicago ( [1] ). From buildings up to entire
city blocks were raised, moved on rollers, or both, usually while
businesses and residents stayed in them for normal day-to-day life.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raising_of_Chicago
userbinator wrote 1 day ago:
In five days the entire assembly was elevated 4 feet 8 inches
At a constant rate that's approximately 1.3 tenths (3.3um) per
second, definitely far below the threshold for people noticing.
wenc wrote 1 day ago:
Chicago also reversed the flow of the Chicago River. [1] They also
rebuilt much of the city because it was wiped out during the Great
Chicago Fire of 1871, and now the grid system is one of the most
commonsensical ones in any major American city.
Chicago is an example of a (more or less) clean-slate engineered
large city -- one that arose as a result of tragedy (fire) and
failure (cholera).
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_River#Reversing_the_...
janfoeh wrote 1 day ago:
Here is the Kaisersaal in Berlin being moved on air cushions in 1996
[1]. And wasn't a better part of Chicago jacked up building by
building some time in the 19th century to make room for a sewage
system?
[1]: https://www.bz-berlin.de/archiv-artikel/hier-schwebt-ein-den...
quakeguy wrote 1 day ago:
The Sonic Youth Gig there was awesome ;)
mmsc wrote 1 day ago:
Yes, it has been common enough, no "robots" required. The Indiana
Bell Building is a famous one from a century ago, which gets videos
posted about it on social media ever so often.
selimnairb wrote 1 day ago:
This title is misleading. It makes it seem like the robots did this
autonomously, when in reality hundreds if workers were involved. The
“robots” were “smart jacks” I would say. Humans couldn 
done this without hydraulic jacks, they used fancy hydraulic jacks.
MSFT_Edging wrote 1 day ago:
I think it's more the general advancement in the tech. We used to do
this by jacking up onto large sets of wheeled trucks or along rails.
The many independent "walking" hydraulic jacks walking in unison is
the cool part.
We've been moving buildings for 100s of years, its cool to see the
advances in it.
nottorp wrote 1 day ago:
Pretty sure it's been done in the past without "AI".
Earliest example on wikipedia seems to be from 1930: [1] More here:
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT%26T_Building_(Indianapolis)
[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structure_relocation
linsomniac wrote 1 day ago:
The Indianapolis AT&T building is particularly interesting because
it was a telephone exchange AND they did the move while keeping the
exchange in operation.
[1]: https://www.archdaily.com/973183/the-building-that-moved-h...
ddtaylor wrote 1 day ago:
I was not really lead to believe they did this autonomously. It
seemed to me like either (a) they were doing the lockstep in a
pre-programmed way that required timing of the equipment working
together or (b) the same but with humans operating the timing. In
either case I find the use of robots impressive.
stevenicr wrote 21 hours 13 min ago:
I was expecting to see a few hundred humanoid robots picking up
things and moving them. Appreciate the comment here as it informed
me and saved from the click and drain of youtube things.
mixdup wrote 1 day ago:
Calling these robots is like calling a wrench a robot
jayde2767 wrote 1 day ago:
It is still a very impressive feat of engineering.
selimnairb wrote 1 day ago:
Oh, absolutely.
<- back to front page
You are viewing proxied material from codevoid.de. The copyright of proxied material belongs to its original authors. Any comments or complaints in relation to proxied material should be directed to the original authors of the content concerned. Please see the disclaimer for more details.