In a way, GP's post perfectly captures what's going wrong in much of modern software "engineering". Piling on and on more complexity to work around follow-up issues, instead of having the courage to go back and reverse a bad decision.
What I am illustrating is that MILLIONS and MILLIONS$$ of dollars go into the design of these "environments" -- every major Architect on the planet will continue to do such, while claiming to be LEED/GREEN/etc...
Gensler is famous for such.
My job was to ensure proper installation and implementation of said designs in conjunction with all trades (Not the stairs per se...)
But - these types of designs are not going away.
(Glass' primary material is effectively "free" from the earth (not in energy or manpower etc))
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So we can call out all we want, but this stuff is here to stay.
To be clear, see my other reply below -- I agree with you, its just that I know a LOT of architects. (worked with the infomous Frank Gheary on MPKW, designers of billionaires homes and yachts)
The design ideas are going full video game. Forever.
Have you played any level on Hitman 3? The level design on this video game surpasses a lot (or more) of architectual designs I have worked on building IRL...
So, the idea is that "smarter materials" "LEED/SMART buildings" "tech permeating every aspect of a building" -- so that basically any future building ~20 years from now is going to be a toxic supersite once it peaks its lilfetime.)
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What I personally just dont have experience with in this space ; Building Lifecycle Management ;; We put in all this tech, that relies on plastics, heavy-metals and carcinogens embedded in the building, in a less-harvastable way, when EoL -- and we have a shit ton of recycling problems to solve... else, just throw it all in the ocean like we have been doing for eons.