The integration of physical and digital urban infrastructures: the role of “Big data”

Le molte evoluzioni nell’ambito della gestione delle informazioni, l’affermarsi dei concetti di Big Data e IoT (internet of things), lo sviluppo e la diffusione della sensoristica stanno aprendo a innovativi scenari e delineando nuove questioni rispetto alle attività conoscitive e decisionali, con declinazioni specifiche se considerate in relazione all’ambito applicativo delle infrastrutture e dei beni edilizi e urbani. A partire da queste premesse, obiettivo del paper è delineare l’attuale quadro dei fattori tecnologici di innovazione e proporre alcune ipotesi circa i potenziali scenari futuri dei servizi di supporto alla gestione e allo sviluppo del territorio e dei manufatti edilizi a partire da diverse possibili forme di integrazione tra infrastrutture urbane fisiche e digitali. Nell’ambito delle infrastrutture, l’analisi del ruolo dell’informazione rispetto all’interazione tra materiale e immateriale pone una serie di questioni interpretative che il paper tratteggia.

Estimating, and setting targets for, the resilience of transport infrastructure

To ensure that transport infrastructure provides acceptable levels of service with respect to extreme events, the resilience of the infrastructure needs to be estimated and targets for it need to be set. In this paper, the methodology proposed in the Foresee EU research project is presented. The methodology allows managers to measure, and set targets for, the resilience of transport systems in all situations. It requires clear definition of the transport system and how the service provided and the resilience are to be measured. The methodology allows consideration of the fact that transport infrastructure managers need to estimate resilience with various degrees of accuracy depending on the specific problem to be addressed, the time frame at disposition and the expertise available. These various levels of accuracy are covered by proposing the use of (a) simulations, (b) indicators whose values are directly related to increases in expected restoration intervention costs and reductions in service, and (c) the percentage of fulfilment of indicators. Once resilience has been estimated, the methodology provides guidance on how to set resilience targets with or without cost-benefit analysis. For demonstration, the explanation of the steps of the guideline is supported by their use for a simple transport system.This work has received funding from the EU Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the grant agreement 769373 (Foresee project)

Estimating the resilience of, and targets for, a transport system using expert opinion

To ensure that transport infrastructure provides acceptable levels of service with respect to extreme events, the resilience of the infrastructure needs to be estimated and targets for it need to be set. Recent work in the European research project Future Proofing Strategies for Resilient Transport Networks against Extreme Events (Foresee) has shown how this can be done in situations with a wide range of available data, time frames for the estimation and expertise. This paper provides an example of how an infrastructure manager can use the guideline to estimate the resilience of, and set resilience targets for, an example transport system in a relatively short period of time, even in the case of limited expertise in all the relevant areas and limited knowledge and information on all the basic input variables. The example is fictive but realistic. It is based on a transport system consisting of a section of the A16 highway, in Italy, where a potential landslide could discharge enough material to damage road sections and bridges. The resilience is estimated using resilience indicators with differentiated weights, and the resilience targets are set using cost–benefit analysis, to identify the indicators to be improved first.This work has received funding from the EU Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement number 769373 (Foresee project). This paper reflects only the authors’ views. The European Commission and Innovation and Networks Executive Agency are not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein

Risk management in architectural design: control of uncertainty over building use and maintenance

This book analyzes the risk management process in relation to building design and operation and on this basis proposes a method and a set of tools that will improve the planning and evaluation of design solutions in order to control risks in the operation and management phase. Particular attention is paid to the relationship between design choices and the long-term performance of buildings in meeting requirements expressing user and client needs. A risk dashboard is presented as a risk measurement framework that identifies and addresses areas of uncertainty surrounding the satisfaction of particularly relevant requirements over time. This risk dashboard will assist both designers and clients. It will support designers by enabling them to improve the maintainability of project performance and will aid clients both in devising a brief that emphasizes the most relevant aspects of maintainability and in evaluating project proposals according to long-term risks. The results of assessment of the proposed method and tools in tests run on a number of buildings of worship are also reported

The control, at the design stage, of risks related to buildings management over time

In the present paper an apparatus of tools and methods is presented to evaluate, at the design stage, the risks over a set of objectives through buildings lifetime. To this purpose a tool is first presented to relate technological requirements of each technical elements to the pertinent maintenance interventions. Then a process is also proposed to estimate the risks on user requirements runningMonte Carlo simulations. The risk management process proposed in the present work aims to support designers and promoters in making predictions on the outcomes of long, not standardized, multivariable dependent processes – as the building process is – in order to indicate the attitude of a designed building to meet a framework of important objectives through its lifetime

Investing in water supply resilience considering uncertainty and management flexibility

This paper demonstrates how to make investment decisions that optimally improve water supply resilience, taking into consideration both future uncertainty and management flexibility. The demonstration is done by evaluating investment strategies for a 38 Ml/d water treatment plant serving an urban area with approximately 75 000 inhabitants, where there is uncertainty with respect to future population growth, industrial production, external demand and the amount of rainfall due to climate change. It is shown that the quantification and comparison of the possible reductions in service and intervention costs over comparably long periods enables the optimal investment decisions – that is, the ones with the optimal trade-offs between stakeholders. Additionally, it can be seen that the used methodology enables the consistent and transparent consideration of (a) the concerns of multiple stakeholders, (b) the future deep uncertainty associated with key concerns and (c) the flexibility of infrastructure managers to make decisions in the future using new information. The methodology also ensures that managers have clear plans of action and considerable insight into the extent of required future financing. </jats:p

Evaluating design modifications on a building portfolio considering future uncertainty and multiple stakeholders

The optimization of interventions for urban regeneration projects is a complex task that involves substantial investments and impacts the service provided to stakeholders over a long period. Part of the complexity of optimizing interventions on large building portfolio is that they are typically financed by a subset of the affected stakeholders, i.e., the owners or building developers who are understandably inclined to maximize their own interests and not those of the wider community. Another part is the need to account for uncertainty in future market demand across a portfolio of buildings, e.g., the possible future large-scale use of remote working, makes it questionable whether the current fixed configurations of many buildings (e.g., offices that have been dimensioned for a fixed demand, and residential units without proper places to work) will enable an optimal use of space, affecting the service provided to multiple stakeholders. This problem is particularly acute in urban areas. In recent years, the possibility has been put forward to use the real options method for optimizing the design and management of assets considering future uncertainty. The method, however, has never been used to determine optimal design of multiple buildings for multiple stakeholders. In this paper a general methodology is presented to evaluate design modifications for a building portfolio considering future uncertainty and the interests of multiple stakeholders. The methodology makes explicit that there is a need to consider the effects of regulations and incentives in to encourage owners to select design modifications that are in the best interest of all stakeholders