Jimmie Hinze

Construction-Safety Best Practices and Relationships to Safety Performance

AbstractThe construction industry has experienced a great deal of safety improvement after the Congress passed the Occupational Safety and Health Act in 1970. In the last twenty years, improvements have been made largely due to safety interventions that exceed compliance with government regulations. Researchers have long attempted to identify the most effective safety programs. However, studies in the past focused only on a small subset of potential injury-prevention options. In addition, to date, there has yet to be a study that documents a comprehensive list of safety strategies implemented by industry-leading companies. This research addresses this knowledge gap by creating a comprehensive list of construction-safety strategies from relevant literature and supplementing it with input from an expert panel. Once the strategies were identified (n=104), the research team conducted interviews with representatives from 57 projects in the United States to determine which strategies were implemented on each pr...

AN EVALUATION OF SAFETY PERFORMANCE MEASURES FOR CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS

There are various measures of safety performance for construction projects. Although the metric involving the incidence of lost workday/restricted work activity injuries per 200,000 hours of worker exposure has been used for many years; other measures have also evolved in recent years. The incidence rate of injuries is the measure frequently employed as an industry standard. Despite this, these types of measures have the distinct disadvantage of focusing on the negative aspects of safety performance. That is, safety performance is only good when injuries do not occur. The occurrence of injuries, a negative parameter, generates concern. Information on the physical jobsite conditions, as determined through project safety inspections, provide a measure of conditions and work behavior that do not involve the actual incidence of injuries. Similarly, the evaluation of near misses measures events that could have resulted in an injury, but did not. Behavior based worker observation data is yet another measure that collects information on both safe behavior and unsafe behavior. Worker safety perception surveys provide yet another glimpse of the safety picture on a project. The advantages and disadvantages of using these measures of performance should be understood.

Cost and Schedule Risk Analysis of Bridge Construction in Pakistan: Establishing Risk Guidelines

AbstractThe construction process is inherently prone to risks. Risk management is an essential and integral part of project management on virtually all construction projects. Risk analysis is one of the core components of risk management that enables professionals to quantify and analyze risks that may pose potential threats to project performance in terms of cost, quality, safety, and time. This research was conducted to identify and analyze risks associated with bridge construction in Pakistan. A questionnaire was conducted to collect data. Risks affecting bridge construction project performance were identified through interviews conducted with engineers and managers involved with various bridge projects. Cost and schedule impacts of project risks were supplemented by conducting a case study using the Monte Carlo simulation. The key findings indicate that financial risks were a major factor that affected cost and schedule objectives. The highest ranked factor identified was unavailability of funds with ...

Empirical Analysis of the Learning Curve Principle in Prestressed Concrete Piles

The principle of learning curves can be applied in construction for the prediction of the time/cycle of future work, work performance levels, and other performance measures. Learning curve principles can be effectively utilized in litigation cases where production is compromised by delays. The objective of this study was to determine if learning curves could be used to accurately predict the production efforts of future units by applying the principles to the prefabrication and driving of prestressed concrete piles. The individual time to cast each of the concrete piles was recorded and used to compute the cumulative average time ( CATN ) to fabricate the concrete piles. The data were used to compute the learning rate (ϕ) and the theoretical time to complete the first unit ( Kc ) . From this information, predictions were made as to the amount of effort to fabricate future piles. The results showed that the pile fabrication crew improved its learning throughout the pile fabrication effort, but this improve...

Use of Building Information Modeling in Design to Prevent Construction Worker Falls

AbstractThe construction industry has incurred the most fatalities of any United States industry in the private sector in recent years. Whereas many factors may contribute to this statistic, one likely cause is due to designers who often lack design for construction safety knowledge, which results in many safety hazards being built into project designs. Therefore, there is a compelling need for tools that can put the safety-in-design concept into practice. To improve the current situation, a prevention through design (PTD) tool based on computer software was developed. Construction safety best practices were compiled into computable rules so that the PTD tool can automatically conduct compliance checking. Particular emphasis was placed on fall accidents since falls are the most frequently occurring cause of fatalities on construction sites. This tool efficiently makes PTD suggestions available to designers and constructors. With this PTD tool, it is possible for project participants to work together to op...

Subcontracting Practices in the Construction Industry of Pakistan

AbstractSubcontracting on construction projects is a common and well-established practice. Contractors enlist the services of subcontractors to achieve certain objectives, including obtaining cost reductions, securing access to specialized services, and risk sharing. Nonetheless, subcontracting on a project can introduce certain associated problems that can affect construction management and construction quality. This research explored exclusively the subcontracting practices in the construction industry of Pakistan, identified the main problem areas, examined the overall satisfaction with the quality of service provided by subcontractors, and focused on ways to improve the quality of construction affected by subcontracting. A questionnaire survey was conducted to investigate the extent and involvement of construction firms in subcontracting, reasons for subcontracting, and the selection criteria of subcontractors. Additionally, interviews were conducted with researchers, professionals, and experts in the...

Validation of Autodesk Ecotect™ accuracy for thermal and daylighting simulations

Autodesk Ecotect™ is an environmental analysis software which according to the U.S. Department of Energy, has not been validated yet. Therefore, the objectives of this research were to validate accuracy of Ecotect™ for thermal and daylighting simulations of buildings and provide recommendations to the Architecture, Engineering and Construction community on application of Ecotect™. Analysis of thermal performance of an institutional building was conducted for one year while the daylighting performance was studied from January to September. The thermal loads and illuminance levels of the building were first measured in the field. The field measurements were then compared to the simulated thermal loads and illuminance levels obtained by Ecotect™. The validation results showed that Ecotect™ underestimated thermal loads in all the analyzed cases and overestimated illuminance levels in 98% of the analyzed cases. Therefore, these findings show that Ecotect™ cannot be used for accurate simulations of thermal loads and illuminance levels.

Integration of Construction Worker Safety and Health in Assessment of Sustainable Construction

DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0000651IntroductionThere are many definitions that have been used to describesustainability and the green building concept. To understand sus-tainable practices, a working definition is needed. In academic,social, political, and ecological circles, sustainable developmentis often defined by a quote from a UN-sponsored commissionUN-sponsored commission (World Commission on Environmentand Development 1987): “those paths of social economic andpolitical progress that meet the needs of the present without com-promising the ability of future generations to meet their ownneeds.” From a design, planning, and construction perspective,the Office of the Federal Environmental Executive defines greenbuilding as “the practice of 1) increasing the efficiency with whichbuildings and their sites use energy, water, and materials, and2)reducingbuildingimpactsonhumanhealthandtheenvironment,through site selection, design, construction, operation, mainte-nance, and removal–the complete building life cycle.”To construct a building, resources such as energy and raw ma-terials are consumed. However, during their occupancy, buildingsalso generatewaste andpotentiallyharmful atmosphericemissions.Under the banner of sustainability, designers and builders aretasked with the goal of creating facilities that are energy and waterefficient,accessible,secure,healthy,andproductivewhileminimiz-ing any adverse environmental impacts. Buildings that successfullymeet those objectives are often labeled high-performance build-ings. These buildings often go through third party validation ratingsystems to verify that the design and construction meet a certainminimallevelofaccomplishmentsbeyondtraditionaldesign.Theseevaluation measures often consist of requirements or prerequisitesand elective credits or points that may be incorporated into thedesign and construction process to reach certain minimum levelsof approval and higher levels of prestige. This begs the questionof whether a building that meets current standards of sustainability,but at some point during the process of its construction a workeris seriously or fatally injured, should be considered a high perfor-mance building. At a minimum, should the safety policies of theconstruction firms and the amount of safety training that is offeredto the workers over the course of construction be given somemerit in the evaluation process? The purpose of this paper is topronounce that the safety policies of the builder and the actualsafety performance during the construction of a green buildingshould be considered in the same manner as commissioning orinstallation guidelines.Sustainability is essentially a holistic approach that takes intoconsideration the impact of the built environment on the naturalenvironment. This approach calls for balancing the needs of thepresent versus the needs of the future. The overarching concernof sustainable development is the balancing of the resulting impactof current development projects with the protection of environmen-tal and social resources for future generations. The question inthis context is where the individual safety of the worker that buildsa project fits into this equation. Whereas considerations for aspectssuch as living wage and cultural rights have been discussed on aglobal political level, the consideration of worker well-being andlife has been largely excluded from current discourses within thesustainable built environment movement. This is a major short-coming that should be addressed, given that there should be noconflict between the goals of preserving all valued resources.Protecting the environment and human resources should not beviewed as being mutually exclusive objectives. “Workplace safetycannot be separated from the need to protect the environment”(Mogensen 2006). The challenge is how to implement sustainablepolicy and practices in a manner that generates win-win payoffs forco-optimizing growth, energy efficiency, environmental and con-sumer protection, and worker safety.Sustainability can be viewed as being a moral issue or even anethical obligation. The precautionary principle that is advancedfrom the environmental movement clearly obligates producers,such as builders and building material manufacturers, to maintainethicallyresponsiblepracticesbydemonstratingthattheirproducts,and the processes (e.g., the actual design and construction processof a given building) that are utilized to generate their products,do not pose a threat to human health and the environment beforeintroducing them into the workplace and broader community(Mogensen 2006). For example, the American Society of CivilEngineers has adopted in its Fundamental Canons of its code ofethics that “Engineers shall hold paramount the safety, healthand welfare of the public and shall strive to comply with the prin-ciples of sustainable development in the performance of their pro-fessional duties” (ASCE 2006). The International Confederation ofFree Trade Unions, which represents 148 million workers throughits 233 affiliated national trade unions in 152 countries, is activelyinvolved in integrating sustainable development concepts withthe protection of workers ’safety and health and workers overallwell-being (Mogensen 2006).Inclusion of Construction Safety and Health inSustainability DefinitionsThe realm of sustainability seems to concentrate on limitingimpacts to the environment, reducing energy, and incorporatingless harmful materials. This general theme is echoed in several

Subway System Safety Risk Analysis Based on Bayesian Network

Subway system is associated with a high level of uncertainty because it usually operates in a dynamic environment in which technical and human and organizational malfunctions may cause possible accidents. This paper proposed a Bayesian network approach to model causal relationships among risk factors. This model explicitly represented cause and effect assumptions between variables. The method allows for multiple forms of information to be used to quantify model relationships, including formally assessed expert opinions whe quantitative data are lacking. This makes the risk and safety analysis of subway systems more functional and easier. A case study of the fire risk due to human errors during operation was used to illustrate the application of the proposed model.

Engineering Mandates Stipulated in OSHA Regulations

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) standards relate to the safety of the construction site, the implementation of safe work practices, and the safety of temporary structures, such as fall protection, ladders, scaffolding, and excavations, all of which are typically part of the constructor’s responsibility on a project. The engineer’s scope of work, namely the design of the permanent structure, is not directly addressed in the OSHA standards. Nonetheless, engineers are required to be involved, as stipulated in some regulations. This paper describes a study involving the identification of those OSHA regulations that address the role of the engineer in ensuring a safe construction project. OSHA regulations that incorporate reference to engineers and those that could be fulfilled through design modifications were found through an electronic search of the OSHA regulations. This search identified those provisions that require the involvement of a licensed professional engineer. These provisions were then categorized to understand where an engineer’s input is specifically required. As part of the review of the OSHA regulations, each provision was also examined from the viewpoint of how the design of the permanent structure could be modified to eliminate specific hazards and thereby avoid the need to address certain safety measures on-site. A list of design modifications was then created by which an engineer could assist the constructor in maintaining a safe construction site. If such recommendations were to be followed, construction safety truly would have its beginning in the design phase.