Green Building (MIT)

The Cecil and Ida Green Building, also called the Green Building or Building 54, is an academic and research building at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. It was designed by Araldo Cossutta and I. M. Pei. Pei, among the world's most noted architects, had received his bachelor's degree from MIT in 1940. Principal donor Cecil Howard Green received a bachelor's degree and master's degree from MIT and was a co-founder of Texas Instruments.

The Green Building was constructed during 1962-1964, in reinforced concrete. It has 18 floors, equivalent to 21 stories or 295 feet (90 m) tall, with a concrete facade that more or less matches the limestone and concrete of the older MIT buildings near it. The basement of the building is below sea level and connects to the MIT tunnel system. Three elevators operate in the Green Building. There are staircases at both the east and west sides, whose exterior facades present a vast windowless expanse relieved only by one-story tall concrete recessed panels. On the "LL" level (actually one story above ground level), is Room 54-100, a large lecture hall. The second floor formerly housed the Lindgren Library, part of MIT's library system, but this separate facility was consolidated into another library in 2009.

The Green Building is the tallest building in Cambridge. When it was built, there was a limit on the number of floors. Thus, it was designed to be on stilts, with the first occupied floor approximately 30 feet above grade in order to "circumvent" this law. The footprint of every floor measures only 60 by 120 feet (18 by 36m), which research groups quickly outgrew, forcing some of them to disperse elsewhere on campus.

The tower's height has some functional purpose, since its roof supports meteorological instruments and radio communications equipment, plus a white spherical radome enclosing long-distance weather radar apparatus. This technical equipment all requires a line-of-sight vantage point for optimum range and accuracy, and would have required construction of some kind of tower to function as intended. To minimize interference with radio signals, other buildings on MIT's central campus are less than half the height of the Green Building, and the dormitory towers of Eastgate, Westgate, and MacGregor House are at least 1500 feet (450 m) away.

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