Nader Naderpajouh

Modeling Social Opposition to Infrastructure Development

Social and political dynamics increasingly determine the fate of infrastructure development around the world. Decision makers involved with projects such as the Keystone XL pipeline in North America, the Belo Monte Dam in Brazil, and the Bujagali Dam in Uganda have been forced to substantially change their plans as a result of opposition. This study looks at such emergent dynamics to provide a quantitative assessment of risks associated with social sustainability in infrastructure development. An interactional model is proposed to analyze emergent risks in a complex system of systems and it is applied to emergent risks in infrastructure development. The analysis is based on the game-theoretic equilibria for an interaction between two actors, namely, the developer and the opposition. Using simulation the structural and contextual variations were investigated in the context of the project along with consequent emergent patterns of outcomes and associated risk profiles. The model comprises informal and formal interactional stages to investigate the impact of alternative mitigation strategies on project risk. The application of the proposed methodology is showcased in an analysis of informal and formal strategies to deliver socially sustainable projects.

Exploratory Framework for Application of Analytics in the Construction Industry

AbstractThe complex dynamics inherent to the context of decision-making in the construction industry requires more rigorous application of analytics. However, effective frameworks to facilitate such data-driven decision-making are noticeably lacking in the construction industry. To address this lack, the Purdue Index for Construction (Pi-C) is introduced in this paper as a collaborative effort to facilitate and promote data-driven decision-making in the construction industry. As a preliminary step, a hierarchical definition for health of the construction industry is explored based on the results of a literature review, survey, and interviews. The developed hierarchical definition is then used to propose a framework to benchmark, interpret, and analyze data associated with the status of the health of the industry. The proposed framework is tested with existing publicly-available data to explore its effectiveness in improving decisions made in the form of policies or strategies. The research results highlig...

A case‐based reasoning approach to application of value engineering methodology in the construction industry

A key point in value engineering (VE) methodology is to acquire and apply knowledge of the assorted fields. An appropriate definition of VE expert knowledge flow could, therefore, yield more productive VE workshops. A conceptual expert case‐based reasoning (CBR) framework is introduced in this paper to form a coherent basis for the provision of practically suitable VE expert models. The proposed framework outlines knowledge entities and their relations in the VE workshop. The model benefits from a fuzzy approach to handle uncertainties in the evaluation phase of the methodology. In addition, a computer program is devised, based on the proposed framework, using Borland Delphi 7.0. It comprises an interface representing several phases of the VE job plan. The model is employed in a tunnelling project to demonstrate feasibility of the model in a practical workshop. Owing to its expert nature, the developed model contributes to efficiency of the methodology through providing VE teams with canalized expert knowledge of diverse domains. The propounded model may avail researchers in promoting expert models for pre‐construction and specifically VE studies in major construction projects.

Integration of the Construction Knowledge and Expertise in Front-End Planning

AbstractTraditionally, construction input is integrated after the completion of the design stage of the projects. Inadequate construction input at the predesign stage and during the front-end planning (FEP) process results in fragility of plans in terms of constructability. This paper reports on a research to investigate construction input during the FEP process. The research is based on three questionnaire surveys as well as complementary case studies. Questionnaires1 and 2 were developed to assess the status of the FEP process and select areas that require construction input, respectively. Case studies were then selected from a pool of projects and collected data were analyzed to investigate barriers to construction input. Results of the surveys and case studies suggested that lack of well-established interorganizational frameworks within project organizations, as a loosely coupled network, hinders effective construction input. Based on the results, a user-friendly decision aid, a construction input ass...

Risk Assessment for the Housing Market in Mexico

The lingering experience of the U.S. housing market crisis has underlined importance in seeking new markets for the companies involved in housing construction. However, expansion to new markets requires a deliberate strategic plan to efficiently adjust to a new business environment. Identifying potential opportunities and threats may help to devise plans and spot areas in which knowledge transfer of the foreign market is essential. Mexico enjoys a growing economy and an accelerated growth of its population, which increases the need in the housing market. It is therefore an attractive market for the U.S. housing industry considering the existing channels of trade between the two countries. Therefore, a study was conducted with the focus on U.S. construction firms and their challenges upon entering the Mexican housing market. The study was defined based on the International Construction Risk Assessment Model-1 (ICRAM-1) that was developed for assessment of potential risks involved in expansion into new construction markets at the international arena. To facilitate decision making, the study identifies high-risk indicators for the U.S. firms and mitigation strategies that may assist those firms to minimize risks involved in the Mexican housing market. Finally, high-risk indicators suggested by the model such as land planning, societal conflicts, or laws versus practices have been discussed under their related topic to illustrate knowledge areas critical for this specific market expansion. DOI: 10.1061/ (ASCE)ME.1943-5479.0000128.

Quantitative analysis of policies for governance of emergent dynamics in complex construction projects

The complexity trend of construction projects is increasing, not only technologically but on several other fronts, such as the institutional diversity of the actors and the coupling of their interactions. As a result of this increase in complexity, projects frequently face the dynamics attributed to emerging actors, coalitions, contextual properties, or synergies. Reflecting this trend within the project governance framework provides a better understanding of the emergent risks that arise in the form of conflicts, project renegotiations, extreme modifications, or write-offs from projects. The aim of this study is to propose interactional analysis (IA) as a quantitative risk assessment (QRA) methodology to analyse and govern the emergent risks associated with the interactions in a system of systems (SoS), such as complex construction projects. Therefore, interactions are framed as the coupling of actors, and their associated emergent dynamics are quantified based on the equilibria of the interaction. Risk mitigation policies are then developed and analysed based on the associated interactional elements and mathematical functions. Policymakers can apply the methodology to develop policies and gauge their effectiveness in governance of the emergent dynamics within interactional contexts to overcome the challenges associated with infrastructure development.

Counterfeiting Risk Governance in the Capital Projects Supply Chain

The capital projects supply chain has proved to be vulnerable to disruption by counterfeit, fraudulent, and suspect items (CFSI). The challenges associated with CFSI are intensified considering the project-based nature of industry that involves diverse actors and a complex supply-chain structure. The aim of this research is to study governance of the risks associated with CFSI in the capital projects supply chain. First, the status of the industry regarding CFSI is updated through a multistaged survey of the industry. An analysis of the survey results underscores the lack of awareness in the construction industry about the risks associated with CFSI and highlights the need for guidelines and collaboration at the industry level. A comparative study of CFSI risks and mitigation procedures in other industries echoes these needs. Therefore, mitigation strategies and practices are explored, and a framework to govern the risk of CFSI in the capital projects supply chain is proposed. An implementation roadmap is also recommended as a two-phased collaborative approach at the construction company and industry levels based on the proposed framework.

Dynamic relationship between functional stress and strain capacity of post-disaster infrastructure

To mitigate the impact of natural or man-made hazards on the services of an infrastructure facility, it is important to quantitatively assess its available capacity. For example, in a post-disaster scenario, critical infrastructure is likely to experience (i) excessive demand for the service of an infrastructure and/or (ii) compromised capacity because of damage to the infrastructure and the failure of infrastructure interdependencies. As the demand grows and nears the capacity limit of an infrastructure facility, a shortage of services required for the community’s recovery will occur. The development of mitigation strategies and an assessment of their effectiveness require a systematic approach. In this paper, a functional stress–strain principle for infrastructure facilities is proposed to quantitatively assess their serviceability in post-disaster scenarios. Functional stress in infrastructure management represents a service-related demand on an infrastructure facility, while strain indicates its coping capacity. The dynamic nature of infrastructure services will be considered depending on the relationship between demand and available capacity. The allowable range of functional stress is then defined, considering plastic and elastic patterns of responses of a facility during recovery to explore strain capacity variations. The proposed principle facilitates a systematic understanding of how infrastructure facilities can adapt themselves to growing stress and the maximum level of stress they can handle. The application of the proposed functional stress–strain principle is demonstrated through case studies of two infrastructure facilities in a post-earthquake scenario: a medical facility and a power facility.

Engineering meets institutions: an interdisciplinary approach to the management of resilience

Resilience management stretches across the decoupled domains of community, corporate, and public governance. As a result, fostering resilience needs a governance structure that supports collective actions and integrates fragmented fields with different institutional frameworks. In this study, we carry out a review of three different perspectives on resilience -engineering, social, and organizational- in order to explore resilience management in the context of governance of infrastructure systems. We discuss the common practices to address resilience of engineering systems, the need and current trend for integration of institutions into these practices through formal (e.g., policies and regulations) as well as informal mechanisms (e.g., trust, norms, and shared cognitive structures). To illustrate our theorizing, we provide three illustrative case studies. The cases highlight the barriers and enablers across the three perspectives and highlight the inter-organizational context of management of resilience. We uncovered organizational dynamics such as the necessity of establishing critical functionality through organizational capacity for stakeholder engagement, the need for diverse organizations to address institutional complexity in management of resilience, and the importance of decoupling in aligning the outcomes of resilience management practices with policies. We suggest an agenda for future research on managing practices associated with management of resilience.

The Need for Indices to Assess the Health of the Construction Industry

The Architectural/Engineering/Construction (AEC) industry comprises a large portion of the global economy, contributing significantly to gross domestic product (GDP) and employment. Entangled with crucial upstream and downstream industries, the AEC also plays an important role in the global supply chain; and monitoring the trajectory of the industry is therefore important for the individuals who are directly or indirectly involved in the industry. Nevertheless, analysts are deprived of tools specifically devised to evaluate the health of what we will now refer to generally as the construction industry. The available indices are essentially finance-driven and generic, disregarding the specific characteristics of the construction industry. Construction is known as a high risk, capital and asset intensive industry, involving large-scale projects with longer payback periods. This paper reports on the preliminary results of ongoing research at Purdue University, which would lead to the development of specific construction industry health indices. This research investigates the existing indices applied within the industry to identify gaps in the current literature and, most importantly, proposes a multi-dimensional definition of health for the industry. The interim outcome of the research is a methodological prototype that can be applied by decision-makers to develop indices that indicate current health of the industry. The final developed prototype could be applied to enhance protocols for strategic planning.