Risk Management of Construction Projects

This study aims to Analyzing the nature of Construction Projects, Analyzing the Nature of Construction Projects Risk, and Analyzing The mechanism of Risk Management. This Study adopted The Quantitative Method. The Summary Concluded From The Study Lies in the Theoretical Study of construction Project`s Risk. The Construction Project Contains Many Risk Which Related to Different Factors: Legal, Organizational, Technical, Zoning, Financial, Social and Political Factors. The Process of Management of Construction Projects includes: Planning of Risk Management, Risk Identification By (Checklist Analysis, Questionnaire, Personal Interview, Brainstorming Technique, Delphi Technique), Risk Analysis By Qualitative Analysis By (Probability and Impact Assessment, Cause and Effect Diagram, Probability and Impact Matrix) and Quantitative Analysis By (Probability Distributions, interviews , Sensitivity Analysis, Fault tree, Events tree, Munte Carlo Simulation), Planning the Response to Risk By (Strategies for Response to Negative Risk , and Strategies to Positive Risks), and Risk Control and Cheek. Depending on The Conclusions, The Study Recommends the Following: Process of Assessing The Efficiency of Construction Companies. Use Qualitative Analysis and Quantitative Analysis in The Process of diagnosis, and Categorization of Risk in the Process of Risk Management. Studying Types of Contracts of Construction Projects.

Approaches to Addressing Informal Settlement Problems: A Case Study of District 13 in Kabul, Afghanistan

Afghanistan witnessed rapid urbanization in recent decades due to the post-war recovery process. When the war ended in 2001 with the fall of Taliban regime, most Afghan refugees returned to urban areas of Afghanistan, especially in Kabul. Moreover, the rapid urbanization, migration from rural areas, and population growth impacted Kabul with the manifestation of informal settlement. The residents of informal settlements suffer social and economic exclusion from the benefits and opportunities of an urban environment. Furthermore, the residents of informal settlements experience disadvantages such as geographical marginalization, shortage of basic infrastructure, improper governance framework, vulnerability to the effect of poor environment, and natural disasters. With all the above, the problems of informal settlements are considered enormous challenges for informal residents. Therefore, this paper aims to identify the proper approaches to addressing informal settlement problems in District 13 of Kabul. To reach the aim of the research, the interview and questionnaires survey were used as instrument in data collection. The finding of this paper indicates that through the resident’s preferences, government capacity, and District 13 physical condition, there are three approaches that can be implemented and adopted for improvement of informal settlement in District 13 of Kabul, which is settlement upgrading, the land readjustment, and urban redevelopment.

Reviewer Acknowledgements for Engineering Management Research, Vol. 8, No. 2

Reviewer acknowledgements for Engineering Management Research, Vol. 8, No. 2, 2019

Examining the Role of Partners in Improving Innovation Performance

The purpose of this paper is to study the innovation performance with regards to the input of collaborative partners in new product development processes leading to an innovation. A thoroughly-designed questionnaire was distributed to operations managers of 729 manufacturers. Data collected was subjected to regression analysis indicating significant comparative effect on innovation performance in favor of lead users.

Analysis of Land Use and Land Cover Changes in the Wetland Ecosystem of Port-Harcourt Metropolis, Nigeria

The study analyzed changes in land use and land cover overtime in Port-Harcourt metropolis using remote sensing techniques from 1984-2013.The Geo-referencing properties of 1984, 1999, 2003 and 2013 include; universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) projection, and datum WGS 84, zone 32, ERDAS Imagine (2014).These were used for displaying processing, enhancement, classification of the imageries and also used for the delineation of the study area imagery. IDRIS SELVA was used for the development of land use land cover classes. ArcGIS 10.1was used in developing, display and processing of the location maps. Total percentage change and total rate of change for the entire trend after conversion are thus: Saltwater Wetland 23.44%, to- 2.17, Freshwater Wetland - 26.44%to- 11.49 Fallow land- 47.13%to- 5.41 Built-up Area 43.33% to 7.41Water bodies 43.36% to 3.06.The study recommended that activities shrinking wetlands size should be thoroughly put to check by the government and better efforts should be focused on those activities that inspire wetland conservation.

Interlocking Block Masonry (ISSB) for Sustainable Housing Purposes in Thailand, With Additional Examples From Cambodia and Nepal

This paper is about Interlocking Stabilized Soil Blocks (ISSB) as developed in Thailand. ISSB are seen as an eco-friendly building material for home building and structures such as water tanks and sanitation facilities. For several decades the Thai R&D Institute TISTR has worked on developing and testing ISSB, which in other countries are called compressed stabilized earth blocks or CSEB. The composition of building blocks and the quality of building structures determine together the structural quality of the house or building. If there is a need for earthquake- and storm resistance, the building blocks and the structures must have specific features. Building stacked houses is an important issue given the growing scarcity of land for housing and the increasing land prices. ISSB is not only applied in Thailand, but also in Cambodia for low-cost housing and in Nepal for home reconstruction after the 2015 earthquake. ISSB or CSEB is also applied in other countries as an alternative building material and technology to replace the use of fired bricks and concrete building blocks for housing. Reducing the use of cement in the materials and structures is important for environmental reasons, but in ISSB/CSEB the use of cement as a stabilizer cannot always be avoided. This is surely the case in areas where earthquakes, heavy storms and floods can occur. Although this paper focuses mainly on technical aspects of sustainable housing and construction, there is also a focus on social sustainability, meaning a strong involvement of local communities in the production of sustainable building materials for walls, newly developed construction technologies, and mutual house and facility construction.

Application of Decision Support Technology for Conceptual Cost Estimation

Conceptual cost estimates are often made at the beginning of the project when project scope is not yet well defined. Hence, predicting the conceptual costs on time, with high accuracy, presents a considerable challenge. One potential solution is to more effectively utilize historical data via integration with predictive analytical models. In this project, a decision support system was developed which predicts conceptual costs of construction projects and supports decision-making for long-term capital planning in public universities. The prototype system was developed based on historical data for roofing projects at the University of Alabama. We collected this historical data via a web-based data entry form subsystem. The developed system uses ridge regression models to train historical data. This system has a user-friendly interface and supports what-if analysis, allowing the user to see multiple scenarios of the estimation. The system also encompasses capabilities to forecast the effects of inflation on multi-year projects. Subsequent validation has demonstrated improvement in the resulting accuracy of the conceptual estimates.

Defining Resilience for Engineered Systems

This paper surveys the literature on resilience, provides several definitions of resilience, and proposes a new comprehensive definition for a resilient engineered system, which is: a system that is able to successfully complete its planned mission(s) in the face of disruption(s) (environmental or adversarial), and has capabilities allowing it to successfully complete future missions with evolving threats. This definition captures the subtle differences between resilience and a resilient engineered system. We further examine the terminology associated with resilience to understand the various resilient time-frames and use the terminology to propose a resilience cycle, which differentiates mission resilience (short term) and platform resilience (long term). We then provide insight into various resilience evaluation methodologies and discuss how understanding the full scope of resilience enable designers to better incorporate resilience into system design, decision makers to consider resilient trade-offs in their assessment, and operators to better manage their systems. A resilient engineered system can lead to improved performance, reduced life-cycle costs, increased value, and extended service life for engineered systems.

Flood Height Measurement and Analysis in Parts of Obio/Akpor Local Government Area, Port Harcourt Metropolis, Nigeria

This study was conducted on flood sensitive areas in parts of Obio-Akpor Local Government Area, Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria, in order to determine the impact of flood on the residents of the area. The method of study involved field work and laboratory analysis. Field studies involved flood height measurements. Flood heights monitored and measured over a period of one week was used to determine the flood daily encroachment rates and the flood daily receding rates. Flood encroachment rates ranged from 9.47 to 19.67 cm/day in Rumuigbo, and 6.47 to 9.00 cm/day in Ozuoba. Flood recede rates ranged from 0.87 to 3.93 cm/day and 5.00 to 8.00 cm/day in Rumuigbo and Ozuoba. These results were confirmed by the high annual rainfall (2198.73 mm/hr on average) that occurs on average round the year in Rivers State. The buildings in these flood prone areas were constructed with concrete and blocks which are susceptible to cracking and failure when constantly immersed in water for prolonged time. It is therefore recommended that large sloping gutters be constructed within strategic places in the area in order to properly transport water to the nearby rivers and ensure that dumpsites around flood prone areas are evacuated to prevent contaminated water from recharging the aquifer.

Assessment of the Profitability of an Apartment Building Complex Using a Stochastic Cash-Flow

The economic feasibility of apartment building complexes is mainly done by using one of the economic analysis methods: present worth, future worth, annual worth, rate of return, or benefit-cost ratio. The cash-flow used is based on the assumption that a certain fraction of the apartments will be sold during the construction period, and the rest equally sold annually over a certain period of time. This model may work sometimes, but its estimated profitability is inaccurate. The actual cash-flow to be used is stochastic. In this paper, we shall use a cash-flow with random separation time between successive sales of apartments after the construction period. We shall find a compact form of the expected present worth, and determine a range for the annual discount rate so that the project is profitable.