Sustainability In Construction Projects: Part 2 (Case Studies)

The guideline developed in a companion study by the authors is applied and studied in this work to assess the sustainability score of several big construction projects in Kurdistan Region of Iraq. Results were varied as the sustainability measures being applied on certain steps and neglected on many others .Attention on this issue can be found in the conclusions

Environmental Pollution and Impacts of Dust Storms on the Traffic Safety

The study aims to investigate the negative effect that the dust storms leave on the human health in general and on the traffic safety as well. Five represented samples of the dust have been collected from the storms which occurred during (2009 and 2010) in Tikrit city/ north of Iraq to find it's particle size distribution, existence of heavy metals, and radioactive minerals, in addition, a survey that consists from 70 samples has been collected to examine the driving difficulty during such condition. Grain size analysis show that the silt size forming the majority (62.6% ), fine sand (23.52%) and clay (13.88%) , also CaCO3 and organic content have been determined with average (25.9%) and (2.11%) respectively. The heavy metals including Cd, Ni, Pb, Cr, Co, and Zn showing that Zn , Ni, Co and Cr are more than the standards in the crust of the earth which considered pollutant elements while Cd and Pb are less than the standards. It was found that 92% of the drivers face difficulty during driving in dusty weather, 47% of the drivers has health problems concerns the dusty weather and 20% of them tend to change their destination or drive faster when they face dust storm while drivin

Erbil Citadel Landscape Assessment In Order To Regional Best Practices

Many heritage areas around the world are suffered from neglect in maintenance or rehabilitation, and never consider their historical values as an attraction places for visitors, in addition to these problems a lot of ancient buildings were removed in different old cities and a new modern constructions were shown instead of traditional ones, and that leads to visual and structural distortion and thus a problem in tourism. The area surrounding the citadel of Erbil suffered from many of these troubles, thus we have to focus on them, and present suggestions to solve the problems by presenting a world successful experience in this fiel

Prediction Of Pressure Coefficients For Flat Lip Vertical Gates

The main function of dam structures is to regulate the discharges and heads of water required to satisfy the demand of power generation and water quantity supplied to river or stream behind the structure, hence the sluice gate will play the big role to achieve this process and then its design needs much more attention. The sluice gate within the tunnel of the dam is exposed to many types of static and hydrodynamic forces .Among these forces is the hydraulic downpull force which created from difference between downward force produced by flow passing over the top surface of gate and uplift force exerted by the jet flow on bottom gate surface . The evaluation of positive and / or negative downpull force values is important due to its effects on closure of the gate. The estimation of such force needs determination of many related parameters such as pressure distribution along and cross the bottom gate surface, top pressure ,jet velocity issuing below the gate ,operation head and the head downstream the gate shaft. In present research, the hydraulic model is used to carry out the required measurements and different types of gate lip shapes have been examined with various flow conditions and gate openings to evaluate the downpull force coefficient. The analysis of results assured that the geometry of the lip gate has significant effects on the hydrodynamics forces and consequently on its operation which in the case of its negative value will prevent the gate to close and make some failures and damages

Prediction of Time-Dependent Deflection of High Strength Concrete Panels

This work presents a model for predicting analytically the time dependent deflection of high strength concrete HSC slabs. This model considers the factors that are significantly influence the long-term deflection of concrete slabs. Realising the effect of time on slab flexural rigidity, the proposed method follow the method of conducting short-term deflection of slabs.The analytical deflection based on the proposed method are compared with the experimental work conducted by the authors in 2005 (1) and also with several field measured deflections

RESIDENTIAL BUILDING DEVELOPMENT PROCESS IN KURDISTAN REGION GOVERNMENT

Nowadays, Residential buildings have become the most important part of real-estate markets in (KRG). The layout of housing in Kurdistan has transformed the face of major cities across the Region. Rapid changes since 2003, have witnessed copious architectural structures and large housing projects that have reshaped the landscape of its cities. The aim of this study is to study the housing developing policy in KRG. The objectives of the study are to evaluate the KRG's housing development policy and to investigate the types of house and the price range preferred by the potential buyer. The study focus on private residential building development projects and it is carried out by questionnaires and interviews. The respondents are the house buyers and the developers. A total of 100 questionnaires were distributed to the respondents and 78 questionnaires were returned duly answered. The data collected is analyzed using the SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) and Average Index. The results of research indicated that the KRG’s housing development policy covers the ownership of the project land, full repatriation of project investment and profits allowed, import of spare parts tax exempt up to 15% of project cost and the employment of foreign workers allowed. Moreover, the types of house preferred by the house buyers are of double storey type and to be of corner lot. The price range preferred by the potential buyers are between (40,000 to 100,000) USD

Spatial Adhocism as Practice for Conflict Politics: Theorising Urban Politics in Kolkata

This thesis critically examines how people at the urban margins of Kolkata form various kinds of political relationships with the postcolonial state to exert rights in the city. It considers these relationships as conflict politics and analyses its spatial manifestations through the notion of ‘spatial adhocism’. Spatial adhocism refers to the quasi-permanent state-political society relations for the mobilisation of resources outside legality. The thesis expands upon existing literature to provide new analytical and empirical insights into the discursive socio-spatial subjectivities of postcolonial cities. It does so, by examining how the practices of conflict politics and spatial adhocism are deployed by the postcolonial state and the political society. The thesis also contributes to the understanding of adhoc geographies which exist in postcolonial urbanism. The empirical evidence underpinning this thesis is collected from three illustrative case studies from Kolkata, namely Loomtex jute mill worker’s movement, Salt Lake anti-eviction movement and Bhangar anti-power-grid movement. Methodologically, this thesis adopts an ethnographic approach, particularly semi-structured interviews, document analysis, participant observation. In terms of comparison, this thesis utilises the experimental comparison method of analysing differential patterns of conflict politics and interconnected trajectories of spatial adhocism. The central findings of the thesis are that the relationships between the state and political society are heterogeneous and that spatial adhocism is omnipresent in postcolonial urbanism. Firstly, the thesis challenges the binary relation of dominance and resistance between the state and the political society and establishes the relation as various forms of engagements. Secondly, it shows that spatial adhocism enables political society to practice various forms of conflict politics with the state to alter hegemonic socio-spatial relations. For the postcolonial state adhoc practices limit conflict politics and help it to maintain an ambiguous relationship with people at the urban margins. This ambiguity serves a two-fold aim. It helps the state to promote capital accumulation in a contingent way, and it also promotes a selective allowance of rights for the people at the margins of the state. Overall the thesis claims that postcolonial urbanism can be theorised through an understanding of the heterogeneity of discursive political practices and their spatial manifestations

Applications Of Geographic Information Systems In Construction Management

Construction management is one of the fields of Civil Engineering. It includes planning, analyzing, coordinating and controlling of sequential activities in construction site. The primary goals of construction management are to minimize the loss of time and construction costs by appropriate materials, adequate labor and resource selection. These objectives can be achieved by current and updated continuous information flow between participants and departments of construction organization. When information sharing doesn’t happen effectively and timely it results delays and additional costs at the construction projects. Information technology has become prominent position in the development of technology. It supplies some opportunities to construction industry. One of the important parts of information technology is geographic information systems. It provides effective solutions to the locational based problems so they are used in many areas. The possibilities of using GIS in construction management and new models have been developed in various countries in the world in recent years. In this study, using GIS in construction management is investigated and a new method in construction management is tried to develop by use of GIS. Another aim is to supervise all data related with construction on a single platform. A new office block in Erbil is determined as a case study. Project drawings of the building are brought to three-dimensional form in GIS and it is visualized according to the data in the schedule of construction. Database support and visualization feature of GIS is put forward in this paper

Spatial Adhocism as Practice for Conflict Politics: Theorising Urban Politics in Kolkata

This thesis critically examines how people at the urban margins of Kolkata form various kinds of political relationships with the postcolonial state to exert rights in the city. It considers these relationships as conflict politics and analyses its spatial manifestations through the notion of ‘spatial adhocism’. Spatial adhocism refers to the quasi-permanent state-political society relations for the mobilisation of resources outside legality. The thesis expands upon existing literature to provide new analytical and empirical insights into the discursive socio-spatial subjectivities of postcolonial cities. It does so, by examining how the practices of conflict politics and spatial adhocism are deployed by the postcolonial state and the political society. The thesis also contributes to the understanding of adhoc geographies which exist in postcolonial urbanism. The empirical evidence underpinning this thesis is collected from three illustrative case studies from Kolkata, namely Loomtex jute mill worker’s movement, Salt Lake anti-eviction movement and Bhangar anti-power-grid movement. Methodologically, this thesis adopts an ethnographic approach, particularly semi-structured interviews, document analysis, participant observation. In terms of comparison, this thesis utilises the experimental comparison method of analysing differential patterns of conflict politics and interconnected trajectories of spatial adhocism. The central findings of the thesis are that the relationships between the state and political society are heterogeneous and that spatial adhocism is omnipresent in postcolonial urbanism. Firstly, the thesis challenges the binary relation of dominance and resistance between the state and the political society and establishes the relation as various forms of engagements. Secondly, it shows that spatial adhocism enables political society to practice various forms of conflict politics with the state to alter hegemonic socio-spatial relations. For the postcolonial state adhoc practices limit conflict politics and help it to maintain an ambiguous relationship with people at the urban margins. This ambiguity serves a two-fold aim. It helps the state to promote capital accumulation in a contingent way, and it also promotes a selective allowance of rights for the people at the margins of the state. Overall the thesis claims that postcolonial urbanism can be theorised through an understanding of the heterogeneity of discursive political practices and their spatial manifestations

D4.2 Intelligent D-Band wireless systems and networks initial designs

This deliverable gives the results of the ARIADNE project's Task 4.2: Machine Learning based network intelligence. It presents the work conducted on various aspects of network management to deliver system level, qualitative solutions that leverage diverse machine learning techniques. The different chapters present system level, simulation and algorithmic models based on multi-agent reinforcement learning, deep reinforcement learning, learning automata for complex event forecasting, system level model for proactive handovers and resource allocation, model-driven deep learning-based channel estimation and feedbacks as well as strategies for deployment of machine learning based solutions. In short, the D4.2 provides results on promising AI and ML based methods along with their limitations and potentials that have been investigated in the ARIADNE project