Noise Solver for Refurbishment Construction Site Design

The noise generated by the presence of a construction site within complex structure in operation (e.g. school, hospital) is a problem that too often is underestimated but that can generate problems of different nature, both concerning the health of the actors involved and regarding the performance of daily activities present within such structures (e.g. carrying out a lesson, a surgical procedure). The main aim of our tool is to highlight the impact of the noise generated by the construction site activities on these daily activities and to allow the simulation in real time of the viable solutions, thus arriving to find the one that is considered most suitable

CONVIS: A tool enabling uninterrupted operation during refurbishments of complex buildings

Clash Detection refers to the identification of geometrical overlaps within a Building Information Model (BIM). This paper seeks to extend the notion of overlapping to activities: Given a construction site within a building, we seek to find clashes between construction activities and occupant routines. Such a situation is often encountered in the context of refurbishments of complex buildings operating 24/7 (e.g. airports, train stations, hospitals, prisons). By finding the influence radii of adverse effects resulting from construction - i.e. dust, noise and vibrations, functions may be temporarily relocated in order to guarantee uninterrupted operation. Our tool CONVIS implements these simulation and scheduling aspects and seeks to provide a digital project plan for refurbishments in the said context

A Simulation Model for Logical and Operative Clash Detection

The introduction of the Building Information Modeling (BIM) approach has facilitated the management process of documents produced by different kinds of professionals involved in the design and/or renovation of a building, through identification and subsequent management of geometrical interferences (Clash Detection). The methodology of this research proposes a tool to support Clash Detection, introducing the logical-operative dimension, that may occur with the presence of a construction site within a hospital structure, through the integration of a BIM model within a Game Engine environment, to preserve the continuity of daily hospital activities and trying to reduce negative impacts, times and costs due to construction activities

Space-centred information management approach to improve CAD-based healthcare building design

This study focuses on developing a space-centred CAD tool to enable designers to effectively manage and implement the information of design guidance information and user requirements during design processes, especially for the stages of design briefing and conceptual design. It aims to structure and store design guidance and user requirements for healthcare building design into a relational database, and link them to relevant space entities in design plans. The tool is developed on the platform of Autodesk Architecture Desktop (ADT). It also enables users to store and retrieve pictures associated with textual information, because pictures have been always used by designers as an effective medium to represent and deliver design information and knowledge. This can give users directly visual and more understandable perceptions of the design guidance. The tool is fully embedded with Autodesk AutoCAD systems to ensure the application of this tool being fully merged with CAD-based design process. A set of design guidance about Alzheimer clinic built environments are adopted as a sample to demonstrate and validate the tool. Moreover, the scenario of expanding this application to more broad areas has also been foreseen

Overview of building information modelling in healthcare projects

In this paper, we explore how BIM functionalities together with novel management concepts and methods have been utilized in thirteen hospital projects in the United States and the United Kingdom. Secondary data collection and analysis were used as the method. Initial findings indicate that the utilization of BIM enables a holistic view of project delivery and helps to integrate project parties into a collaborative process. The initiative to implement BIM must come from the top down to enable early involvement of all key stakeholders. It seems that it is rather resistance from people to adapt to the new way of working and thinking than immaturity of technology that hinders the utilization of BIM

Design Creativity: Future Directions for Integrated Visualisation

The Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) sectors are facing unprecedented challenges, not just with increased complexity of projects per se, but design-related integration. This requires stakeholders to radically re-think their existing business models (and thinking that underpins them), but also the technological challenges and skills required to deliver these projects. Whilst opponents will no doubt cite that this is nothing new as the sector as a whole has always had to respond to change; the counter to this is that design ‘creativity’ is now much more dependent on integration from day one. Given this, collaborative processes embedded in Building Information Modelling (BIM) models have been proffered as a panacea solution to embrace this change and deliver streamlined integration. The veracity of design teams’ “project data” is increasingly becoming paramount - not only for the coordination of design, processes, engineering services, fabrication, construction, and maintenance; but more importantly, facilitate ‘true’ project integration and interchange – the actualisation of which will require firm consensus and commitment. This Special Issue envisions some of these issues, challenges and opportunities (from a future landscape perspective), by highlighting a raft of concomitant factors, which include: technological challenges, design visualisation and integration, future digital tools, new and anticipated operating environments, and training requirements needed to deliver these aspirations. A fundamental part of this Special Issue’s ‘call’ was to capture best practice in order to demonstrate how design, visualisation and delivery processes (and technologies) affect the finished product viz: design outcome, design procedures, production methodologies and construction implementation. In this respect, the use of virtual environments are now particularly effective at supporting the design and delivery processes. In summary therefore, this Special Issue presents nine papers from leading scholars, industry and contemporaries. These papers provide an eclectic (but cognate) representation of AEC design visualisation and integration; which not only uncovers new insight and understanding of these challenges and solutions, but also provides new theoretical and practice signposts for future research

Integration of virtual reality within the built environment curriculum

Virtual Reality (VR) technology is still perceived by many as being inaccessible and cost prohibitive with VR applications considered expensive to develop as well as challenging to operate. This paper reflects on current developments in VR technologies and describes an approach adopted for its phased integration into the academic curriculum of built environment students. The process and end results of implementing the integration are discussed and the paper illustrates the challenges of introducing VR, including the acceptance of the technology by academic staff and students, interest from industry, and issues pertaining to model development. It sets out to show that fairly sophisticated VR models can now be created by non-VR specialists using commercially available software and advocates that the implementation of VR will increase alongside industryis adoption of these tools and the emergence of a new generation of students with VR skills. The study shows that current VR technologies, if integrated appropriately within built environment academic programmes, demonstrate clear promise to provide a foundation for more widespread collaborative working environments