I lived in my own room with a shared living room in a dorm room decades ago. And it had a window and opened to the outside. The point is that better designs exist, but people will defend Munger just because his design could be worse.
I think my opinion and reaction is based upon his reaction. He rejected all criticism outright and refused to listen to anyone. It was his design, or he would take his money away.
Better designs exist, but they are rare, often due to circumstances like costs.
I too would have welcomed a private windowless dorm room versus having a forced roommate with no privacy. I specifically chose to commute an hour+ from my parents home because I couldn’t stand the lack of privacy offered by any of my school’s dorm options.
I saw more of the opposite - people dismissing him because of identity politics and just because he's a billionaire.
My impression was he had strict requirements because part of the design is about tradeoffs and cost and the reason this kind of thing takes forever and gets expensive is because of all of the arguing that happens during it. You end up with a design by committee and worse outcome.
I'm skeptical of the 'better designs' not having these tradeoffs.
I think my opinion and reaction is based upon his reaction. He rejected all criticism outright and refused to listen to anyone. It was his design, or he would take his money away.