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The Theme Building is a structure at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), considered an architectural example of the Space Age design style. The Airport Theme Building Exterior and Interior was designated as a historic-cultural monument in 1993 by the city.[1]

Coverage[]

The Theme Building is featured in Sky's the Limit.

It was introduced in 10 years after people when airports are already crumbling but some were exceptions like the Theme Building. The episode explains that the architectural landmark was constructed in 1961 to resemble a landing spacecraft and was called the Theme Building to usher in a Jet Age theme for the airport. By 2010, it is one of the few surviving airport buildings of it's era because of a 2 year renovation that strengthened it to withstand the test of time. 10 years after people, the arches dominate the empty airport and it will continue to endure because of a surprising form of protection that keep it safe from the most powerful forces of nature.

ThemeBuildingonlystructure

The Theme Building is the only structure at the airport still standing.

In 125 years after people, the only two buildings remaining at the Los Angeles International Airport are the steel-reinforced control tower and the Theme Building. In the time of humans, seismologists discovered a major fault line just a few miles away and calculated that the odds of a massive earthquake were 1 in 8 in the next 125 years. As part of the overhaul of the Theme Building in 2010, engineers installed 1.2 million pounds of steel on rubber to counteract the devastating shockwaves of an earthquake, called the mass damper. The systems are typically placed underneath or inside buildings but the space age architecture of the Theme Building made it unworkable. Steven S. Ross stated that it has four stilts that is not connected to one another until up to the restaurant level and the one want to have all four stilts to move perfectly together making it no way to guarantee in an earthquake. Instead, it became the first building in North America with a mass damper on the roof. Because of it, when a violent 6.5 earthquake strikes at dawn 125 years after people, the mass damper saves the Theme Building while the LAX Control Tower collapse, which leave it the only structure at the airport still standing.

Gallery[]

Series

Official Concept[2]

References[]

  1. Wikipedia: Theme Building
  2. Patrick Almanza Website | LAX
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