First a few details its a 27 story apartment complex. The ground floor has a lobby, front desk, elevators, stairs and break room for staff. Below ground there are 4 floors to provide 2 parking spaces per apartment with external access to the street (swipe card to open) and internal access via elevators. As well as the first subbasement is a laundry. The 1st and 2nd floors have conference rooms of various sizes. The 3rd to 19th floors have residential apartments. There are 13 apartments per floor (a total of 208), elevator and stair access and a section with supplies (Janitorial equipment, cleaning equipment etc for the staff which has its own stairs and lift). The 20th floor has a fully equipped gym, the 21st has a pool and the 22nd has a resturant. All tenants are either creatures of the Shadow or aware of the existence of said creatures. Entrance is via a lobby on the ground floor which during the day is unlocked but after 8pm requires tenants to either swipe their card, buzz someone up from their room or convince the desk staff to let them in. Staff on hand 24 hours a day as not all tenants are awake during the day.
Now my questions are....
1) Mail. How is this handled in large buildings. Are there 208 mail boxes, does it go to the front desk and they call the relevant room, do apartments have their own mail slot in the door through which its delivered?
2) Staff do maintain the building (repairing damaged equipment, cleaning the halls etc but is there any other dutis they'd do I'm not aware of?
3) Apartment buildings with their own facilities (I assume they do exist, in this case they exist because not all the people wanting to use those facilities have the same needs in exercising as a human) do they charge access to those facilities or is it part of the rent?
4) Is there anything else I should be aware of for apartment living?
1) Mail is usually handled by a large mailbox with multiple key-locked boxes somewhere on the ground floor, maybe by the stairs, or handled by the front desk somehow.
2) Lets say something breaks, like plumbing. If I am correct, the landlord has to fix the thing (or hire someone to do it ), not the tenant, and pay for it, unless the tenant broke the plumbing intentionally. Then I think the tenant has to pay for it. I'm not entirelly sure on this
3) Apartment buildings now a days typically do have their own facilities, and I think the tenant is charged for the utilities.
4) If I were the designer of the apartment complex, I'd put a large penthouse for the landowner on the top floor, and have all the restraunts/pools/gyms on the lower floors; atleast the pool in the basement. Pools on another level are a bit harder to do and also a bit more dangerous if something bad happens, like a big monster jumping in and breaking the bottom.
2) there can be any level of concierge service can very greatly from just a doorman to guys that take your dog for a walk while you are at work. They can be escorts that will let deliveries into your appartment upon request, drycleaning/shoeshine... they get a tiny wage from your rent, but live ok off the fat tips for strange requests.
3) Most places it is included in your rent.
4) Even without Shadow, mostly your neighbors are freaks. Keep in mind that along with talking coming thru walls, so can bullets.
Subbasement 6-5: Underground apartments for those races who live like this
Subbasement 4-2: Parking for residents, 2 slots per apartment.
Subbasement 1: Pool
Ground Floor: Lobby, front desk, mailroom with 200+ boxes, break room for staff.
Floors 1-2: Conference rooms
Floor 3: Gym
Floors 4-20: Residential apartments
Floor 21: Resturant
In response to specific things
@Kitsune Yasha: This place is maintained by an organization primarily for the purposes of housing shadow creatures who are freshly arrived until they move out and get their own place so there wont be an individual landowner who'd want a penthouse apartment. As for the resturant I'm mainly putting it on the top floor so diners have a nice view of the city while eating (I'm thinking of giving it two resturants one big one on the top floor and a smaller one without windows i.e. internally located on the 1st floor).
Anyway appreciate the help.
so tha is 4 million pounds or 2 thousand tons.
See the problem? Of course you can make the pool be relatively shallow and small.
I am not sure how detailed you are being, but maybe the parking garage is not as big as the entire apartment complex, and under part is the pool, and under another part is 2 levels of parking. (note, say the pool is 10 feet deep, and the ceiling is 10 feet high, that is roughly 2 parking levels. It is possible you could cut through the correct wall of the parking garage and right there would be the pool.
second, the restraunt on the top seems just wrong. Now, I know the idea is for the shadow creatures to be somewhat incognito, but generally you want the restraunt on the ground floor so that people who don't live htere can easily stop in and eat. You also don't want the security risk of non-residents having access to the whole place simply because they were going up to the restraunt and decided to get off the elevator early.
Note, each apartment unit will have it's own kitchen, 200 families who might decide to dine out wouldn't support a restraunt, and is the restraunt open 24-7? if not, sometimes you want to eat at off hours.
Skip the restraunt, put it on the bottom floor with public access, or rename it caffeteria, open specific hours, restricted to residents and guests, just like a college dorm, you grab a tray, walk past maybe 5 different main course offerings select what you want, then past some different side dish opions, salad bar, desert bar.
Also how ritzy and fancy is the place? Just throw a pizza join or chinese food place at the bottom that specializes in delivery. Delivers to the apartments or to anyone in the neighborhood. That way the bugbear need not go out, he can just live on pizza delivery like certain college freshmen, and get mooshoo pork to break the monotony
1) Re the pool since the parking garage is same size as the building (there's over 400 spots) I'll move the pool to sub-basement 5 and its now parking, two uderground residential floors, pool.
2) Re the resturant its actually on top so diners can have a nice view while eating nothing to do with the residents being incognito (In fact the whole building operates on a principal once your beyond the lobby you no longer need hide what you are). The resturant provides an environment where the various shadow beings can stop by and enjoy a nice meal out without having to worry about dietry requirements/hiding what they are. So you have non-dairy foods for the kobalds, non-brocali ones for the orcs, non-animal based ones for nymphs, raw eggs for snake people and so on. The security isn't really an issue as I've just said if your past the lobby its assumed you either (a) know the truth about what's going on or (b) are about to have part of that truth explained to you.
As for the hours/support issue its open 24 hours (not all races have the same sleep/eating cycles) and it also draws a lot of business because its a nice resturant where you are guaranteed a meal that will cater to your races dietry needs and allow your to be in your true form while still being a nice place to eat. For example kobold X decides to take Kobold Y out for a nice romantic dinner and he rememebrs the nice resturant in the apartment building he stayed in till he got his current job. He know's it (a) has a nice view of the city, (b) wont require him and his intended to pretend they aren't kobalds, (c) will be aware that because they are kobalds they can't eat any foods with dairy in it (milk, cheese, certain sauces etc) without needing to be told and (d) will have seating that's at a comfortable height for a short race without requiring them to drag childrens booster seats around a table.
Finally as I said this apartment is a government run place for shadow creatures to stay while getting used to their new world so there is a certain amount of subsidization going on.
I did consider having a cafeteria style place on the first floor as well providing an eating area for the conference rooms that could be dedicated to dealing with those who don't know the truth but decided to skip it.
Agree pool on the penultimate floor would be an engineering...challenge, but it could also add some fun little misadventures, as your hero suddenly regrets not taking more ranks in swim as all the water from the busted pool comes crashing through his ceiling...along with something from the elemental plane of water...
Why not make the top floor restaurant a private tenants only club? That would solve the privacy issue mentioned above. Lots of 'luxury' apartments have clubhouses for private parties.
Does your complex include maid service like a hotel? Otherwise no need for all the janitor closets. Of course, maids would give the landlords a way of spying on tenants...or an excuse for a disguised enemy to get in...
As for mailboxes, never had a place that brought mail to me, they are always down on the first floor. Of course, as swanky as your place is, they might just do that...
I wouldn't get bogged down in utility bills myself, as that seems to bring too much RL into the game. In my experience, however, water and trash are inlcuded, power, cable and telephone are not.
Be interesting to see what kind of shops this place would have. You could have normal shops on the first floor, and shadow shops on the second in place of conference rooms. A sort of shadow mall, if you will.
Overall, sounds neat.
Second to Brokenoakelys in order....
> Why not make the top floor restaurant a private tenants only club? That
> would solve the privacy issue mentioned above. Lots of 'luxury' apartments
> have clubhouses for private parties.
Hmmm something to think about.
> Does your complex include maid service like a hotel? Otherwise no need for
> all the janitor closets. Of course, maids would give the landlords a way of
> spying on tenants...or an excuse for a disguised enemy to get in...
Yes and no its something you can sign up for and the maids come around every few days so those who don't want others in their home can clean it themself while those who are busy with other things can just sign up for the maid service at an extra fee. Part of the services section contains cleaning supplies for maids as well as janitors.
> As for mailboxes, never had a place that brought mail to me, they are
> always down on the first floor. Of course, as swanky as your place is, they
> might just do that...
Nope first floor it is.
> I wouldn't get bogged down in utility bills myself, as that seems to bring too
> much RL into the game. In my experience, however, water and trash are
> inlcuded, power, cable and telephone are not.
Not planning to either the groups going to receive an apartment and rent payment (incluing access to facilities, phone, water, trash etc will just be deducted from their pay checks i.e. ignored).
> Be interesting to see what kind of shops this place would have. You could
> have normal shops on the first floor, and shadow shops on the second in
> place of conference rooms. A sort of shadow mall, if you will.
Interesting idea there although I don't think apartment buildings have shops in them do they?
Thanks for the Simtower suggestion I'll take a look for that.
The overall floor layout I'm planning to use.
http://www.hotelindubai.com/real-estate/quattro-hotel-business-park/Quattro_hotel_floor_plan.jpg
A better idea of the actual apartment layouts, substitute this for interal layout of each flat in the above image with a little shuffling to keep the doors consistent i.e. they're a little larger than the ones in the first image.
http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j146/Senko_photos/Flat.jpg?t=1208352198
Most "skyscrapers" are business space, because the businessmen want to all be clusted in an hot downtown business area for easy access. When the demand for realestate is high enough 'skyscrapers' are built.
But for an apartment complex, that is quite big. About the only ones you see like that are some of "the projects" where no-one wants the poor people all spread out so they just pile em up on top of eachother. Now, the shadowy overlord is probably doing the same thing, pilling em up, but 27 stories is going to be big.
Also note, a 1 bedroom apartment is usually roughly 800 square feet, and a 2 bedroom a little over 1000 square feet. You have 13 units per floor, plus stairs, elevators, hallways, that makes your square footage per floor as 15,000 to 20,000, almost 150ft by 150feet, plenty of room for 4 or 5 shops
So I could easily convert a lot of the conference space into shops and still retain some for meetings to take place in. However the questions remain what kind of shops would they be and how would they work.
I guess I could work it as the same as the resturant catering to Shadow folk and those in the know via word of mouth as well as providing a few more unusual items although for the really exotic you'd have to track down a store elsewhere, for that matter as its only slightly over half occupied maybe I could convert 2 above ground apartment floors into a cinema (With just a slight readjustment of the floor plan switch the lifts and apartment 4 so the back section could be the cinema itself).
Hmmmmm I'm growing to like this idea brand name sweats with four arm holes in the clothing store and a computer store with regular games/equipment and the option of custom ordering "Special items" like the telepathic keyboard, thaumatech processor or spellchecking software (Check's incoming emails for magical spells for your protection, comes in the basic 10SR or professional 20SR versions). I'll have to look into this more and see what kind of stores apartment buildings have in them. If your getting notified about this Brokenoakely's I'd appreciate your letting me know what your place has.
So currently I'm looking at something like
Twenty First Floor: Plant Room (I understand buildings have these at least my
uni did although I've no clue what they actually do beyond
being a possible emergency power supply and mechanical
equipment for things like elevators)
Twentieth Floor: Resturant
Ninteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Eigheenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Seventeenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Sixteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Fifteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Fourteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Thirteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Twelth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Eleventh Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Tenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Ninth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Eighth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Seventh Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Sixth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Fifth Floor: Cinema
Fourth Floor: Cinema
Third Floor: 3 Shops (Some kind of domestic one (sheets, cookware), ?, ? and
a state of the art meeting area)
Second Floor: 3 shops (Computer Store, Clothing Store, Grocery Store)
First Floor: Gym
Ground Floor: Lobby
Basement 1: Parking
Basement 2: Parking
Basement 3: Parking
Basement 4: Parking
Basement 5: Below Ground Apartments
Basement 6: Below Ground Apartments
Basement 7: Pool
Our building has a staff of about 12, but it's only 8 floors, so I'd imagine at least 30, not counting the restaurant.
We have a gym in the basement next to the laundry room, and a community room with a pool table, large screen plasma TV with theater seating, and a refrigerator.
Roof: Pool and possibly a few amenities (Toilets, snack food stand, some seating for those trying to sunbathe etc)
Twentieth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Ninteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Eighteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Seventeenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Sixteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Fifteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Fourteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Thirteenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Twelth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Eleventh Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Tenth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Ninth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Eighth Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Seventh Floor: Above Ground Apartments
Sixth Floor: Gym (replacing apartments 1-3 and 10-13), Laundry (replacing apartments 6-8), Common Room (Replacing apartments 4-5)
Fith Floor: Cinema (Screen and restricted access film storage/projection room and possibly VIP seating)
Fourth Floor: Cinema (Lobby, seating and toilets)
Third Floor: 1 huge store (Household supplies [furniture/cookware] replacing apartments 1-3 and 11-13 on floor plan), 1 large store (groceries replacing apartments 8-10 on floor plan) and 2 small ones (Shoe Store replacing apartmnets 6-7 on map and a Book Store replacing apartments 4-5 on map)
Second Floor: 1 huge store (Resturant replacing apartments 1-3 and 11-13 on floor plan), 1 large store ( Computer Store replacing apartments 8-10 on floor plan), 1 small one (Meeting/Conference Area replacing apartmnets 6-7 on map) and 1 set of toilets (Male/Female replacing apartments 4-5 on map)
First Floor: 1 huge store (Clothing Store replacing apartments 1-3 and 11-13 on floor plan), 1 large store ( Video store replacing apartments 8-10 on floor plan) and 2 small ones (Toy Store replacing apartmnets 6-7 on map and Jewellry/Watch Store replacing apartments 4-5 on map)
Ground Floor: Lobby
Basement 1: Parking
Basement 2: Parking
Basement 3: Parking
Basement 4: Parking
Basement 5: Below Ground Apartments
Basement 6: Below Ground Apartments
In recent years a couple of skyscrapper condo towers have been built in New York with a view on Central Park. The 2 lower levels are dedicated to shops, the mid levels to offices. and the top levels to condos. You might also want to consider having a couple of floors near the top with larger condo-style apartments with mezzanine level (2 floors).
A technical floor for air-conditioning and other mechanical services is needed. Usually, its near the top floor but can be at mid point depending on how you want to set up the apartment block. A water tower is necessary in high rises to keep the pressure running in the plumbing. Since its a government facility I suggest using the technical floor to put a surveillance and security HQ.
Elevators are also an issue in big apartment complexes. For questions of security some elevators need a key to operate while others cannot reach the top. For exemple: Elevator A : Floors 1-5, Elevator B : Floors 1, 6-10, Elevator C : 1 and direct to the top. Elevators need not be next to each other. They can be spread out around the complex with dedicated basement and street level entrances.
Helicopter landing pads are cool ...;)
- More on the elevators:I have seen some cases where there are two elevators from parking to the lobby and one from parking to the penthouse. Then the lobby had 6 elevators (front desk was between the parking elevators and the 6). One was VIP and you could not get IN without a key then 2 where 'all access' up to a certain point and the other three where 'all access' but you needed a key to go higher than a certain floor...oh, and there was a service(ish) elevator in the parking level. (probably went up to the equipment room as it was smaller and designed to carry stuff, not people.)
probably went up to the equipment room as it was smaller and designed to carry stuff, not people
Acually, they are ususally quite big, to accomidate moving something like a couch or piano