Daniel Daesoon Kim
Manufacturing and Design Engineer
Capstone Project: Fall Quarter
The long journey towards a problem space
MaDE Capstone
Manufacturing and Design Engineering culminates in a comprehensive 30-week capstone project. Students are given a real client through the university and told to design and produce a product from scratch. From design conception to manufacturing and commercialization, students are given point on the entire design process. Students are also encouraged to do their own research and needfinding to arrive at a specific problem space within the client's given white space.
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Team Size:
team of 3
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Project Duration:
30 weeks (10 per quarter)
The Client & White Space
The Morton Arboretum:
"The Morton Arboretum is an internationally recognized tree-focused botanical garden and research center in Lisle, Illinois."
-Morton Arboretum website
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The Client:
Dr. Chuck Cannon, Director of the Center for Tree Science at the Morton Arboretum
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What is a "white space"?
A "white space" is any large enough problem space where there is a lack of existing solutions. This can be from the problem statement being too vague, lack of knowledge in the current field, or the fact that the field is new.
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Client's Given white space:
To create a product that either aids in the understanding of trees or keeps them healthy.
Initial Focus: Arborists
Initial Stakeholder Mapping
After conducting initial research, the class mapped out possible stakeholders in tree health. We quickly realized the huge difference between amateur and expert stakeholders, and then split the class into our individual teams. My team chose to go after experts.
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Who are arborists?
To conduct needfinding we decided to first focus on arborists, who are state certified professionals that focus on the cultivation, management, and study of trees.
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Expert Interviews & Journeymap
After 10+ interviews with IAA (Illinois Arborist Association) arborists, we were able to create a journeymap about the diagnosis process of a commercial arborist.
Takeaways
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Arborists usually determine the health of trees through more qualitative methods than quantitative (experience-based)
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Tools are rarely used. For tree diagnosis and health, at most a sound mallet is used.
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We needed more information on other expert stakeholders
Arborist Conference
Gathering More Data
To meet with more arborists, as well as run into other expert stakeholders, we partook in an arborist conference. There were tree researchers, Tree Fund affiliates, and tree product salesmen. We set up a booth, networked, and had experts fill out our survey in order to gauge what problem needed most solving in the tree industry.
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Besides being an extremely fun outing, we were also able to get 30+ additional interviews and an enormous amount of quantifiable data!
Opportunity Spaces
Conference Data
After organizing the data from 30+ interviews, surveys, and a lecture on soil microbiology, we were able to use a decision-making matrix to choose the top four opportunity spaces.
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We thought we were just a step away from finding our problem space until our other data, research, and benchmarking yielded some conflicting and difficult discoveries.
Difficult Discoveries
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Root Detection: Current GPR (ground-penetrating radar) technology is new and not precise enough, and out of the scope of this project. In addition, experts rarely use the technology because of its expense.
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Structural Integrity: Is usually done through visual methods, and the current benchmark product is a sound mallet, which is localized and cheap.
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Internal Decay: Once it is detected, it is often too late to save the tree.
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Microbiology Soil Testing: While everyone agrees it plays a factor, there is little agreement on what is truly important for tree health.
Data driven: Pivot
A New Game Plan
It was a hard decision to take a step back, but it was an informed one. After sorting our data, we came to the huge realization that most expert stakeholders did not care about tree survival as their top priority.
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Splitting Stakeholders
We had assumed that those that worked closest with trees had their survival as one of their top priorities, but it turned out that for many, tree mortality came in as a secondary or tertiary priority. We immediately set to divide our stakeholders again based off their objective and then created a plan in order to expedite the process to fit within the 10-week time frame.
Expert Stakeholders in an Urban Environment
We found that we could split all stakeholders into those that primarily care about trees for scientific reasons, commercial reasons, safety reasons, or for their innate value. In categories A, C, & D, trees were often cut down as a means to an end. We decided that we wished to pursue the expert stakeholders in category B.
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After pursuing interviews from municipalities, landscape caretakers, and several doctors from the Tree Fund, we came face-to-face with the exciting space in which trees were hardest to care for: urban environments!
The Urban Battleground
A Rough Place to Survive
It's not surprising that trees have a tough time surviving in suburban and urban environments. Trees are surprisingly sensitive, especially young saplings. In any given suburban/urban setting, trees can be facing these conditions:
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lack of space for roots
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acidic soil
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compacted soil (prevents root penetration)
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salt runoff (from salting pavements and roads)
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nitrogen runoff (from pesticides, fertilizer, etc.)
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carbon monoxide and ozone pollution
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internal sap freezing (cold cities)
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heat stress (hot cities)
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vandalism
Michael Callahan
The city of Evanston, IL. The green dots represent a tree that has been planted and maintained by the Evanston Forestry Dept.
Behind-the-Scenes Tree Warriors
Meet Michael Callahan. He's the director for the Forestry Department for the city of Evanston, Illinois. His department's job primarily deals with urban forestry, the care and management of tree populations in urban settings.
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We often take for granted the trees around us or their survival, but trees, especially young saplings, cannot survive without consistent maintenance. It is through the under-recognized efforts of people like Michael that we can enjoy our beautiful and green suburban/urban settings.
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Nearly all cities have a tree-dedicated department in one form or another, and he tells us that for a majority of American cities, their situations are roughly the same as his.
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Too Much with Too Little
This information was taken from Michael Callahan in 2020, during a live interview at his office:
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They oversee 3,200 + 400 new trees/yr
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Crew of only 16 (understaffed)
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Annual budget of $135,000 (underfunded)
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10-15% of new trees die every year
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It costs ~$400 to replace a dead tree
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Chicago tree canopy is down from the last 10 years from %19 to %16
finding pertinent problem spaces
Needfinding
Varied Users, Same Goal
In addition to the Evanston Forestry Department, we found two other ideal users that dealt with tree mortality in urban settings: The Chicago Region Trees Initiative and Northwestern University Groundskeeping.
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Evanston Forestry Department
An example of a government stakeholder that preserves trees for public welfare. They are the primary caretakers of trees in any given suburban/urban setting.
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Chicago Region Trees Initiative
An example of a non-profit stakeholder that is eco-centered and interested in tree mortality as well as public involvement and awareness.
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Northwestern University Groundskeeping
An example of a private landowner stakeholder that keeps their trees alive for a variety of reasons, especially aesthetics and atmosphere. This category also includes private residencies.
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General Takeaways
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young trees are most at risk
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a journey and a half
Final Problem Space
Evanston Forestry Department's Problems
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Primarily dealt with young saplings
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had to deal with nearly every facet of a young tree's survival and external factors
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Chicago Region Tree Initiative's Problems
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Dealt more with public awareness and publicity
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NU Groundskeeping's Problems
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With a much smaller scope, they could afford to keep an eye on mature trees
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Final Problem Space
After meeting with each of the stakeholders, we found that they all cared for young saplings and that consistent irrigation was the most important common thread to their survival.