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Constructing a building that would last 1000 years is not particularly hard with modern engineering and materials. The hard part is, first and foremost, gettin

Constructing a building that would last 1000 years is not particularly hard with modern engineering and materials. The hard part is, first and foremost, getting someone to pay for it. I'm not going to live 1000 years. My great grandkids likely won't even live to see the year 3022. Why would I spend orders of magnitude more for a house if a structure meant to last ~100 years serves my needs perfectly? My friend just needed to redo the foundation on his house. He could have spent 10-100x what he needed to and installed a reinforced concrete foundation with deep steel pylons. But that would have been a waste of his money when wooden peirs works just as well for all his intents & purposes. The second problem is making sure people want to maintain the structure for 1000 years, or at least not tear it down. I don't think this is as hard as the other comentors are saying, though. Just don't build the house in a city. The house will be torn down if it's in a city. The house has a good chance of staying a house if it's built out in the countryside on a decent plot of land. Nobody will ever want anything from that structure but to live in it, so it will be maintained.

hnthrowaway0315 5y ago
Yeah, unless I' rich and thinking about building my family somewhere, I wouldn't even touch this idea. And even I do, I'll probably purchase an old, but good-standing building and heavily renovate it. Modern technology also provides means to strengthen the foundation and weight-bearing part of the building.
ghaff 5y ago
>The second problem is making sure people want to maintain the structure for 1000 years, or at least not tear it down. I don't think this is as hard as the other comentors are saying, though. Just don't build the house in a city. I live in about a 200 year old house but it has been extensively reworked over its lifetime including by me. And given that it's on a nice piece of exurban property it's hardly a stretch to imagine someone in that time deciding a teardown just made more sense than all the upgrades that have taken place over that period. Just as one example it presumably didn't have indoor plumbing when the first part of the house was built.
- meheleventyone 5y ago
  There's a bit of a question about how much of the house is actually left from 200 years ago. My house was technically built in 1897 but was moved in the 1920s on to a new foundation and we basically knocked the entire thing down and rebuilt it a few years ago after we bought it. Now we're adding to it again. It shares some of the DNA of that house from 1897 but basically none of the parts anymore and is much nicer looking whilst keeping the old timey style.
  - bkfunk 5y ago
    Mentioned earlier in the series: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus
  - ghaff 5y ago
    Probably not much. My contractor for a couple of big renovations I did figured that the 4x4-ish posts on the first floor were probably original along with at least some of the subflooring (about half of which I redid because it was collapsing). We think there was a substantial addition (probably including a second floor) around 1900. That's when the demolished barn on the now adjacent property dated to. The house I grew up in was similar. It dated to either the 1700s or possibly even late 1600s. But the original house was just two rooms (two stories) built into the side of a hill.
- azalemeth 5y ago
  I grew up in a 600 year old house. That isn't particularly unusual in the part of the UK I was born in. The village church is 1200 years old. There's a chapel not too far away that dates from around 600 AD. We're not going to change it much. We fix it when it breaks. Most of North America (or at least, the bits I've visited) seems to be fixated with new buildings of sometimes questionable construction standards, and they tend to get replaced fairly regularly. One of my Canadian friends told me that "People prefer to live in new houses". Here, the opposite is much more common.
  - cafard 5y ago
perth 5y ago
a good society is one where old men plant trees who’s shade they’ll never sit in
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- tiredofU2 5y ago
MichaelApproved 5y ago
> My friend just needed to redo the foundation on his house. He could have spent 10-100x what he needed to and installed a reinforced concrete foundation with deep steel pylons. But that would have been a waste of his money when wooden peirs works just as well for all his intents & purposes. Is your friend Grady from Practical Engineering? His latest episode talks about foundations and replacing the old wooden piers holding up his house https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_KhihMIOG8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_KhihMIOG8 Also reminds me of the classic phrase "Any idiot can build a bridge that stands, but it takes an engineer to build a bridge that barely stands."
AtlasBarfed 5y ago
The money part of this treatise is the steel frame, right? As they stated, things like warehouses and other buildings get reused because the steel frame is still useful regardless of the other stuff. The foundation actually seems to be a danger point. I don't know much about pylons/stilts for foundations, but it would seem a better plan because you can adjust those for the life of the structure, can't you? And the design called for a lifted first floor/crawlspace anyway. And that would enable a basement. American cities rebuild everything. There's at a minimum 500 year houses and buildings in most European bustling cities. Which means, I guess, that the structure and its surrounding structures should be integrated and beautiful.
duxup 5y ago
I grew up in a semi rural area. In the more rural area it was not uncommon to have on old farmhouse rotting and a new house next to it. At some point those folks wanted a new house and presumably the cost of what they wanted to remodel was close enough to new that they built news. The available space that you note can also facilitate just building a new house.
- ghaff 5y ago
  I live in an old farmhouse on some nice land. I've done fairly extensive renovations after obviously no money being put into the house for a good fifty years. And it works for me. It's also "quirky" in a lot of ways including a basement that still tends to get wet and having one small bathroom and no way to easily add another one. I can imagine a lot of potential buyers saying "Love the location but the house has got to go." (The person I bought the house from actually bought the property for the land. He built a new much larger house on one of the two plots he subdivided from the original property.)
simonebrunozzi 5y ago
> The house will be torn down if it's in a city The world is varied, it's not just a copycat of the terrible design affecting US cities. One example? I live in Venice, Italy. The city is 1,600 years old. Most houses and palazzos are at least 400 years old; a big chunk of them is at least 600-700 years old. No one is going to tear down these places. And no, rising sea levels will not destroy Venice (see the MOSE dam [0], which is working, despite the big corruption scandals). Besides Venice, which I'd agree it's a rather unique place, many other places in the world consist of small/medium towns, not huge megalopolis where a small house will be tore down to make space for a skyscraper. Finally: I'd love to build a house that will last 1,000 years. Even if my great-great-great-grandkids will not be around to see it. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mose https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mose
- dahfizz 5y ago
  > Finally: I'd love to build a house that will last 1,000 years. Even if my great-great-great-grandkids will not be around to see it. I mean yeah, in the abstract I think anyone would agree. I would also love to be able to build a 1000 year house. But it costs a tremendous amount of money, and there are things higher on my priority list than the status of a structure 900 years after my death. Until you fork up the cash for it, my point stands.
mytailorisrich 5y ago
I don't think anything 'modern' is needed. There are Roman building still standing and many of those which no longer are are so because they were abandoned and/or 'recycled'. Buildings like for instance Notre Dame de Paris are 800+ years old. A thick stone structure seems to do the job fine.
- dahfizz 5y ago
  Its easy to overlook the constant maintenance and repair these historical buildings get. Thick stone buildings are definitely sturdy, but I still maintain that modern technology makes it significantly easier to make a 1000 year building.
gherkinnn 5y ago
You and your grandchildren are only so relevant. I for one adore walking around built up areas where the original builders thought further than that. There is beauty in solid houses. They carry history. An old part of town tells so many stories. They embed culture and provide some degree of continuity. The initial cost is higher. But your grandchildren can sell it. Many generations can profit from an existing building. Floor plans can be adjusted to some degree and modern comforts added at any time. A flimsy plywood house built to be replaced in 15 years is an expensive tent. It is nothing.
zokier 5y ago
> The hard part is, first and foremost, getting someone to pay for it. Isn't that merely a matter of establishing a foundation/trust fund arrangement with the explicit purpose of maintaining the building? Of course you need enough capital so that it can sustain itself indefinitely through low-risk investments, but that is just the nature of the game.

hnthrowaway0315 5y ago

Yeah, unless I' rich and thinking about building my family somewhere, I wouldn't even touch this idea. And even I do, I'll probably purchase an old, but good-standing building and heavily renovate it. Modern technology also provides means to strengthen the foundation and weight-bearing part of the building.

ghaff 5y ago

>The second problem is making sure people want to maintain the structure for 1000 years, or at least not tear it down. I don't think this is as hard as the other comentors are saying, though. Just don't build the house in a city. I live in about a 200 year old house but it has been extensively reworked over its lifetime including by me. And given that it's on a nice piece of exurban property it's hardly a stretch to imagine someone in that time deciding a teardown just made more sense than all the upgrades that have taken place over that period. Just as one example it presumably didn't have indoor plumbing when the first part of the house was built.

meheleventyone 5y ago
There's a bit of a question about how much of the house is actually left from 200 years ago. My house was technically built in 1897 but was moved in the 1920s on to a new foundation and we basically knocked the entire thing down and rebuilt it a few years ago after we bought it. Now we're adding to it again. It shares some of the DNA of that house from 1897 but basically none of the parts anymore and is much nicer looking whilst keeping the old timey style.
- bkfunk 5y ago
  Mentioned earlier in the series: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus
- ghaff 5y ago
  Probably not much. My contractor for a couple of big renovations I did figured that the 4x4-ish posts on the first floor were probably original along with at least some of the subflooring (about half of which I redid because it was collapsing). We think there was a substantial addition (probably including a second floor) around 1900. That's when the demolished barn on the now adjacent property dated to. The house I grew up in was similar. It dated to either the 1700s or possibly even late 1600s. But the original house was just two rooms (two stories) built into the side of a hill.
azalemeth 5y ago
I grew up in a 600 year old house. That isn't particularly unusual in the part of the UK I was born in. The village church is 1200 years old. There's a chapel not too far away that dates from around 600 AD. We're not going to change it much. We fix it when it breaks. Most of North America (or at least, the bits I've visited) seems to be fixated with new buildings of sometimes questionable construction standards, and they tend to get replaced fairly regularly. One of my Canadian friends told me that "People prefer to live in new houses". Here, the opposite is much more common.
- cafard 5y ago

perth 5y ago

a good society is one where old men plant trees who’s shade they’ll never sit in

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
tiredofU2 5y ago

MichaelApproved 5y ago

> My friend just needed to redo the foundation on his house. He could have spent 10-100x what he needed to and installed a reinforced concrete foundation with deep steel pylons. But that would have been a waste of his money when wooden peirs works just as well for all his intents & purposes. Is your friend Grady from Practical Engineering? His latest episode talks about foundations and replacing the old wooden piers holding up his house https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_KhihMIOG8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_KhihMIOG8 Also reminds me of the classic phrase "Any idiot can build a bridge that stands, but it takes an engineer to build a bridge that barely stands."

AtlasBarfed 5y ago

The money part of this treatise is the steel frame, right? As they stated, things like warehouses and other buildings get reused because the steel frame is still useful regardless of the other stuff. The foundation actually seems to be a danger point. I don't know much about pylons/stilts for foundations, but it would seem a better plan because you can adjust those for the life of the structure, can't you? And the design called for a lifted first floor/crawlspace anyway. And that would enable a basement. American cities rebuild everything. There's at a minimum 500 year houses and buildings in most European bustling cities. Which means, I guess, that the structure and its surrounding structures should be integrated and beautiful.

duxup 5y ago

I grew up in a semi rural area. In the more rural area it was not uncommon to have on old farmhouse rotting and a new house next to it. At some point those folks wanted a new house and presumably the cost of what they wanted to remodel was close enough to new that they built news. The available space that you note can also facilitate just building a new house.

ghaff 5y ago
I live in an old farmhouse on some nice land. I've done fairly extensive renovations after obviously no money being put into the house for a good fifty years. And it works for me. It's also "quirky" in a lot of ways including a basement that still tends to get wet and having one small bathroom and no way to easily add another one. I can imagine a lot of potential buyers saying "Love the location but the house has got to go." (The person I bought the house from actually bought the property for the land. He built a new much larger house on one of the two plots he subdivided from the original property.)

simonebrunozzi 5y ago

> The house will be torn down if it's in a city The world is varied, it's not just a copycat of the terrible design affecting US cities. One example? I live in Venice, Italy. The city is 1,600 years old. Most houses and palazzos are at least 400 years old; a big chunk of them is at least 600-700 years old. No one is going to tear down these places. And no, rising sea levels will not destroy Venice (see the MOSE dam [0], which is working, despite the big corruption scandals). Besides Venice, which I'd agree it's a rather unique place, many other places in the world consist of small/medium towns, not huge megalopolis where a small house will be tore down to make space for a skyscraper. Finally: I'd love to build a house that will last 1,000 years. Even if my great-great-great-grandkids will not be around to see it. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mose https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mose

dahfizz 5y ago
> Finally: I'd love to build a house that will last 1,000 years. Even if my great-great-great-grandkids will not be around to see it. I mean yeah, in the abstract I think anyone would agree. I would also love to be able to build a 1000 year house. But it costs a tremendous amount of money, and there are things higher on my priority list than the status of a structure 900 years after my death. Until you fork up the cash for it, my point stands.

mytailorisrich 5y ago

I don't think anything 'modern' is needed. There are Roman building still standing and many of those which no longer are are so because they were abandoned and/or 'recycled'. Buildings like for instance Notre Dame de Paris are 800+ years old. A thick stone structure seems to do the job fine.

dahfizz 5y ago
Its easy to overlook the constant maintenance and repair these historical buildings get. Thick stone buildings are definitely sturdy, but I still maintain that modern technology makes it significantly easier to make a 1000 year building.

gherkinnn 5y ago

You and your grandchildren are only so relevant. I for one adore walking around built up areas where the original builders thought further than that. There is beauty in solid houses. They carry history. An old part of town tells so many stories. They embed culture and provide some degree of continuity. The initial cost is higher. But your grandchildren can sell it. Many generations can profit from an existing building. Floor plans can be adjusted to some degree and modern comforts added at any time. A flimsy plywood house built to be replaced in 15 years is an expensive tent. It is nothing.

zokier 5y ago

> The hard part is, first and foremost, getting someone to pay for it. Isn't that merely a matter of establishing a foundation/trust fund arrangement with the explicit purpose of maintaining the building? Of course you need enough capital so that it can sustain itself indefinitely through low-risk investments, but that is just the nature of the game.