Extending constructability concept to include operation and maintenance issues

The concept of constructability uses integration art of individual functions through a valuable and timely construction inputs into planning and design development stages. It results in significant savings in cost and time needed to finalize infrastructure projects. However, available constructability principles, developed by CII Australia (1993), do not cover Operation and Maintenance (O&M) phases of projects, whilst major cost and time in multifaceted infrastructure projects are spent in post-occupancy stages. This paper discusses the need to extend the constructability concept by examining current O&M issues in the provision of multifaceted building projects. It highlights available O&M problems and shortcomings of building projects, as well as their causes and reasons in different categories. This initial categorization is an efficient start point for testing probable present O&M issues in various cases of complex infrastructure building projects. This preliminary categorization serve as a benchmark to develop an extended constructability model that considers the whole project life cycle phases rather than a specific phase. It anticipates that the development of an extended constructability model can reduce significant number of reworks, mistakes, extra costs and time wasted during delivery stages of multifaceted building projects

Safety distance awareness system for Malaysian Driver

It is known that the risk of an accident increases exponentially with the speed of the vehicle and most collisions happen when the driver fails to brake at the required time and distance. The objective of this research is to create a Safety Distance Awareness System which aims at warning the driver of the potential frontal collision and to alter Malaysian driver attitudes. This system is to manipulate Malaysian driver attitude that likes to tailgating and to prevent rear-end collision in Malaysia. This is done by using a Sound Navigation and Ranging (SONAR) range finder to determine the distance of the vehicle or obstacle in front of the host vehicle. With the help of microcontroller, the distance of the host vehicle could be determined and a warning will be issued in the form of both visual and hearing so driver could take the correct preventive measure. There will be few stages of warning, the system will intensify the distress warning until the collision occurs. These SDAs do not take any automatic prevention or control to the vehicle to avoid collision. In overall the research hopes to achieve a more convenient driving experience and a safer driving environment by implementing the SDAS to keep drivers aware of the potential hazards ahead of their vehicle. Hopefully the Malaysian government will involve in this research, since the implementation of Safety Distance Awareness System can provide a new alternative in the safety system hence it can reduce accidents in Malaysia

Evaluation of the role of the contractor’s personnel in enhancing the project constructability

Contractors’ personnel play a prominent role in enhancing the constructability of facilities design, construction and assessment. Looks at the constructability concepts identified by the Construction Industry Institute at Austin, Texas (CII) and represents and describes the constructability concepts in relation to contractors’ personnel. Discusses the role of each of them in enhancing constructability of facilities projects. Concludes that a set of obligations are the answer to the question of “How can the contractor’s personnel enhance the project constructability?”

Constructability Research Trends: A Review and Future Directions

Implementing constructability concepts in a project can bring many benefits such as reduced project cost & duration, enhanced project quality, and improved site management. There were numerous research on constructability concepts since its introduction in late 1970. However, there are limited contemporary literature to review the research on constructability in a structured way. Therefore, this paper aims to review the literature with respective to the constructability concepts. The trend of constructability development, limitations of current research, research gaps and future direction will be briefly presented. Constructability development internationally will be discussed first before the limitation of the constructability research conducted in Malaysia are presented. The literature review reveals that the constructability research in Malaysia are still limited. Apart from building projects, there is a need for more constructability studies with respect to infrastructure projects. The trend of constructability development had moved towards the use of quantitative models. For future direction, quantitative models related to infrastructure projects in Malaysia can be developed. There is a potential of the quantitative models to be embedded with Building Information Modelling (BIM) so that automated assessment is made possible

A constructability assessment model based on BIM in urban renewal projects in limited lands

One of the most significant concerns in urban development today is the organization of areas of cities that have become run-down over time. In order to complete previous constructability studies in other fields of construction, the current study evaluates constructability based on BIM, specifically in the context of the Tehran limited land renewal project. The motivation for this study is the current difficulties facing renewal designs for limited lands, and the lack of a quantitative constructability model for urban renewal projects in Iran. This paper aims (1) to discuss the design elements that should be considered in the design phase of urban renewal projects; (2) to identify the factors that may affect constructability; and (3) to propose a framework for assessing urban renewal designs by considering constructability factors using building information modeling (BIM). To meet these needs, this paper investigates constructability factors and their relative importance, considering the design elements that should be acknowledged in limited land renewal, using a multicriteria techniques. Some 28 constructability factors are identified through a literature review, and based on 52 responses received from a questionnaire survey, the factors are ranked using pairwise comparisons of the analytic hierarchy process (AHP). The final constructability factors that are identified through the technique for order preference using the similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) method are standard dimensions, safety, simplification of structure, resource intelligence and alignment, and skilled labor availability. The contribution of this research to the body of knowledge is, firstly, the development of constructability factors for measuring the constructability of urban renewal designs, and secondly, the introduction of BIM as a most beneficial tool for assessing the constructability of the proposed designs. In using the constructability assessment framework and identifying the trade-offs between the constructability of renewal projects in the limited areas of urban spaces, design alternatives become more feasible

Critical Constructability Principles for Girder Bridge Construction in Malaysia

Implementing constructability concepts in a project can bring many benefits such as reduced project cost & duration, enhanced project quality, and improved site management. There were numerous research on the constructability concept since its introduction in late 1970. However, there are limited studies that identified the critical constructability principles for infrastructure projects. This study identified the critical design stage constructability principles for girder type river bridge construction in Malaysia. Based on extensive literature review and unstructured interviews with the experts in bridge construction, 54 constructability principles were identified. Questionnaires were distributed to professional engineers and G6 & G7 contractors in Malaysia to rate the 54 constructability principles in term of their importance or impact in enhancing the constructability of bridge construction based on 5-point Likert scale. The received 143 responses were analysed using factor analysis which is a data reduction tool of SPSS. Varimax method of orthogonal approach was adopted for factor rotation. Factor analysis had helped to generate 11 principal components or critical constructability principles. Cronbach’s Alpha reliability test also indicated good reliability of the questionnaire scale. The identified critical constructability principles can provide guidelines to the construction practitioners at the design stage to enhance the performance of bridge construction

Application of Constructability Concepts in the Industrialised Building System for the Malaysian Construction Industry

Constructability is generally reducing the problems of construction by incorporating the construction knowledge into the design of a construction project. The Malaysian construction industry is attempting to promote and use Industrialized Building systems (IBS) for better construction practice with more effectiveness and efficiency, but in terms of constructability and research into the application of constructability concepts for IBS little work has been done. In fact the Malaysian construction industry is still not applying the concepts of constructability in totality and there is lack of constructability research in Malaysia. In this research the application status of constructability concepts which have been previously defined for Malaysia are examined and assessed within the Malaysian IBS industry. The ease of constructability application of IBS and conventional building methods are investigated and finally the concepts that are not being applied up to their potential level in IBS construction and resemble possible problems in the process of application are identified. A survey is used to obtain the essential data needed for the research from the active IBS industry participants of Malaysia. It was found that the IBS contractors are applying constructability more than the designers and suppliers and also the early constructability concepts gained a higher application score than other concepts. Using information technology and the innovative concepts of the field operation phase were the most difficult concepts to apply and generally the application of constructability concepts in IBS construction is easier compared to the conventional building systems according to the IBS industry participants

Constructability: The key to reducing investment risk

The National Technology Roadmap for Semi-conductors indicates that the growth of the advanced technology factory cost is creating an exponential growth in factory investment risk. Management techniques are needed to help reduce that investment risk. Constructability implementation, if performed right, is a management concept that has been shown to reduce construction costs by 10 to 20 times its implementation cost. A corporate and project level constructability implementation program was developed by the Construction Industry Institute (CII) to help integrate construction knowledge with engineering, beginning at project inception. This article provides an historical base describing the development of constructability, constructability program criteria, and the constructability review process