David Oloke

Cost-Benefit Analysis for Accident Prevention in Construction Projects

AbstractConstruction is the most dangerous land-based work sector in Europe and the United States The cost of accidents has received much attention in the recent past, and online interactive tools were developed to assess the cost of accidents to organizations. Online tools and other sources of information on costs of accidents in the construction industry were a useful development but failed to support the decision-making process in regard to construction health and safety measures. A cost-benefit analysis (CBA) methodology is presented that would enable contractors to assess the true cost of accidents prevention and the associated benefits of accident prevention as part of pre- and postcontract project evaluation. The research investigated the cost and benefit of accident prevention, with a view to drawing attention to the economic consequences of effective/ineffective management of health and safety by contractors. A quantitative research methodology was employed in investigating these costs and benefi...

Particular barriers and issues associated with projects in a developing and emerging economy. Case study of some abandoned water and irrigation projects in Nigeria

Abstract Abandoned projects have become a common sight in Nigeria. The root causes and probable solutions were studied using some major regional water and irrigation projects as case studies. Parameters assessed include source of funding, appropriateness of the contract conditions, unilateral enactment of government laws, inflationary trends and Contractors’ management technique. Despite stringent project management, successful project completion was negated by certain factors in each case. These include inadequate source of funding, price variation and corruption. Feasible approaches to overcoming these barriers were identified as definition of alternative sources of funding, phased completion of projects and the review of certain clauses in the Particular Conditions.

Developing Practitioner Skills in Construction Health and Safety Management: An Integrated Teaching and Learning Approach

Abstract The Construction (Design and Management) - (CDM) Regulations of 1994 and their subsequent revisions have played an important role in improving construction health and safety management. However, the awareness of corresponding responsibilities and the intuitive management of relevant knowledge continue to pose the greatest challenges to the duty holders in terms of implementing the Regulations. Within the context of established learning styles and teaching techniques, an integrated problem-based and collaborative learning approach is being adopted in the delivery of a series of special construction health and safety short courses for construction professionals. The programmes are attended by an average of ten participants with varied construction related backgrounds on each of the iterations. Starting from the theoretical framework of the Regulation requirements, the approach evolves into contextualised problem solving in respect of each of the stages of the construction process. Well defined pre-selected problem solving tasks and background related problem solving tasks are collectively applied to facilitate efficient and effective knowledge transfer and acquisition. A collaborative learning approach was finally applied to elicit peer knowledge thereby enriching participants’ individual knowledge base of the generic issues. Participant feedback suggests that the programmes have been successful in achieving their main aim of enabling awareness and improving the health and safety knowledge and management skills of the practitioners. Further work is envisaged in extensively reviewing other learning approaches and developing the more reasonable integrated approach to reflect changes in relevant legislation and the diversified experience of the practitioners who attend the programme.

Overcoming the Challenges facing Lean Construction Practice in the UK Contracting Organizations

Despite the benefits realized from Lean construction practice over the past two decades, the uptake of the Lean concept in the UK seems to be sparse. The UK contracting organizations engaged in Lean construction practice are faced with challenges that need to be addressed to facilitate wider application of Lean concepts so as to gain its benefits. The purpose of the study is to investigate the challenges facing the application of Lean principles in the UK construction industry with a view to proposing solutions that could be used to address the challenges. A qualitative research approach was adopted and semi-structured interviews were conducted with Lean construction practitioners working with 10 contracting organizations in the UK. The study identified 10 dierent challenges across the organizations that participated in the research and discovered 13 strategies that could be used to overcome the challenges. Findings from this study will lead to a better understanding of the challenges facing Lean construction practice in the UK so that further research could be done on how each challenge could be addressed. The findings could also help practitioners in addressing the dierent challenges

THE APPLICATION OF LEAN CONSTRUCTION TOOLS IN UNITED KINGDOM CONSTRUCTION ORGANISATIONS: FINDINGS FROM A QUALITATIVE INQUIRY

1. School of Technology, University of Wolverhampton, Wolverhampton, WV1 1LY, United Kingdom. Email: abubakar.bashir2@wlv.ac.uk 2. School of Technology, University of Wolverhampton, Wolverhampton, WV1 1LY, United Kingdom. Email: s.subashini@wlv.ac.uk 3. School of Technology, University of Wolverhampton, Wolverhampton, WV1 1LY, United Kingdom. Email: d.a.oloke@wlv.ac.uk 4. Faculty of Environment and Technology, University of the West of England, Bristol, BS16 1QY, United Kingdom. Email: david.proverbs@uwe.ac.uk 5. School of the Built Environment, University of Salford, Greater Manchester, M5 4WT, United Kingdom. Email: r.gameson@salford.ac.uk

A Practical Framework for Implementing Distributed Leadership by AbuDhabi Police

Abu Dhabi Police (ADP) is as a major client in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). ADP undertakes several capital projects every year; and uses two project managers (PMs) i.e., distributed leadership on their construction schemes. These dual PMs are chosen during the design stages of upcoming project schemes. A research did investigate the efficacy of this approach where 145 potential respondents were asked to complete a questionnaire survey and 90 (62%) responded. The data collected were analysed by descriptive and inferential statistics to reveal that more of the PMs perceived themselves to have more leadership than management characteristics. They also supported the use of distributed leadership which informed the development of a new practical framework for its implementation. This framework was validated with 10 top managers of ADP who supported its recommendation for adoption.

Housing Policy Impact on Affordable Housing Production in Lagos Nigeria

It is a realistic expectation of the populace to demand adequate housing from the government as well as from the private sector. The government has realized that a combination of providers is the only way to meet the demand. In other more developed countries this combination of suppliers have struggled and housing policy and its delivery is constantly being reviewed. It is hoped that the recently revised national housing policy has considered the different implication and will endeavour to accommodate the variety of need.

MODEL PREDICTING COST BENEFIT ANALYSIS (CBA) OF ACCIDENT PREVENTION ON CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS

Health and safety issues are major concerns in the United Kingdom (UK) construction industry. Evidence suggests that research studies on construction health and safety management issues have yet to lead to a significant reduction in the number of accidents. To tackle the causes of days lost through accidents and to improve health and safety performance in the construction industry, the industry needs to understand the cost benefit analysis (CBA) of accident prevention. The paper reviewed the rate of accidents in the UK construction industry and presents a model predicting CBA of accident prevention on construction projects. A quantitative method approach was used to collect data from health and safety managers in the UK construction industry for the survey. A total of 79 contractors (small, medium and large) participated in the questionnaire survey. A simple linear regression model was adopted to identify the effect of total costs of accident prevention on benefits of accident prevention. The result revealed that costs of accident prevention are significantly associated with benefits of accident prevention. The model predicted that the more the contractors spend on accident prevention the more the benefit of accident prevention they derived. This is part of a wider study to improve the management of health and safety and to propose a way forward for safer and healthier construction sites. Keywords accident prevention, construction projects, cost benefit analysis, health and safety Language: en

Developing a Safety and Health Program

This book is a second edition. The objective was to expand on the topics in the original and provide readers with access to review questions at the end of each chapter thereby testing readers’ comprehension. Although the book is written predominantly as a book covering health and safety practices within an industrial context, the author has utilized the universality of the topic to ensure that several other fields of endeavour can benefit from its contents. Split into 12 chapters, the book covers key areas that provide guidance to the implementation of a robust health and safety programme. It thus presents an overview of the requirements for developing: policy, communication, job safety programmes and accident investigations. It also looks at risk management, fire loss control, emergency response planning, permits to work, confined space matters, personal protective equipment, noise control, occupational health and biological issues. Finally, five supplements are included as a means of further broadening the applicability of the book to the wider practice sectors. These supplements cover topics relating to: welding; materials handling and general housekeeping; transportation safety; overhead hoists and slings; and portable tools and machine guarding. The context of the book has substantially been set in the North American domicile of the author but again, a considerable amount of effort appears to have been made to expand much more on the principles underpinning each theme rather than concentrating too narrowly on the local regulations. All in all, the book forms a useful repository which most readers will find a valuable source of reference. The book should thus be of interest to students, academics and practitioners alike. As for general content, the book covers most of the key topics that normally need to be addressed if a reader is seeking to gain understanding of the subject by reading the book. The author makes the case for developing a safety and health programme from the perspective of a practitioner within the industrial engineering discipline. Commencing with policy and communication, the book takes the reader through gaining an appreciation of administrative requirements to practical guidelines that are suitable for toolbox talks and similar onsite training activities. The book is academically credible and is very strong when evaluated purely in the context of industrial engineering in North America as it makes several references to authentic literature that relate to the subject. Perhaps a slight weakness in this regard would be that, although efforts were made to refer to some international standards, some key country-specific standards should have also been mentioned. This would have definitely expanded the appeal of the otherwise well-written book. The format and overall layout of the book are also worthy of mention. The book is quite a concise text and each chapter follows the same format: introduction, definitions, responsibilities/procedures (main body), review questions and bibliography. This enables the reader to extract relevant facts from each chapter quickly and generally makes the book an easy read. Students will find the review questions quite useful as well. The book also makes good use of illustrations and photographs to hone in on key points throughout. To conclude, the book is generally a good piece of work by the author. Dealing with a subject that could be relatively difficult to communicate to non-experts, it presents the matters discussed in the most simple terms using a very suitable format. I would recommend it to students, academics and practitioners alike.

A WEB-HOSTED INFORMATION MANAGEMENT SYSTEM FOR PREDICTING THE BREAKDOWN OF OFF-HIGHWAY PLANT

Effective management and utilisation of plant history data can considerably improve plant and equipment performance. This rationale underpins statistical and mathematical models for exploiting plant management data more efficiently, but industry has been slow to adopt these models. Reasons proffered for this include: a perception of models being too complex and time consuming; and an inability of their being able to account for dynamism inherent within data sets. To help address this situation, this research developed and tested a web‐based data capture and information management system. Specifically, the system represents integration of a web‐enabled relational database management system (RDBMS) with a model base management system (MBMS). The RDBMS captures historical data from geographically dispersed plant sites, while the MBMS hosts a set of (Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average – ARIMA) time series models to predict plant breakdown. Using a sample of plant history file data, the system and ARIMA predictive capacity were tested. As a measure of model error, the Mean Absolute Deviation (MAD) ranged between 5.34 and 11.07 per cent for the plant items used in the test. The Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) values also showed similar trends, with the prediction model yielding the highest value of 29.79 per cent. The paper concludes with direction for future work, which includes refining the Graphical User Interface (GUI) and developing a Knowledge Based Management System (KBMS) to interface with the RDBMS.