Unit - 17

Industrial lectures

Q1) Explain major types of construction process?

A1)

Major Types of Construction Projects

In planning for various types of construction, the methods of procuring professional services, awarding construction contracts, and financing the constructed facility can be quite different. The broad spectrum of constructed facilities may be classified into four major categories, each with its own characteristics.

1 Residential Housing Construction

Residential housing construction includes houses and high-rise apartments. During the development and construction of such projects, the developers usually serve as surrogate owners and take charge, making necessary contractual agreements for design and construction, and arranging the financing and sale of the completed structures. Residential housing designs are usually performed by architects and engineers, and the construction executed by builders who hire subcontractors for the structural, mechanical, electrical and other specialty work.

The residential housing market is heavily affected by general economic conditions. Often, a slight increase in total demand will cause a substantial investment in construction, since many housing projects can be started at different locations by different individuals and developers at the same time. Because of the relative ease of entry, many new builders are attracted to the residential housing construction. Hence, this market is highly competitive, with potentially high risks as well as high rewards.

2 Institutional and Commercial Building Construction

Institutional and commercial building encompasses a great variety of project types and sizes, such as schools and universities, medical centers and hospitals, sports facilities, shopping centers, warehouses and light manufacturing plants, and skyscrapers for offices and hotels. The owners of such buildings may or may not be familiar with construction industry practices, but they usually are able to select competent professional consultants and arrange the financing of the constructed facilities themselves. Specialty architects and engineers are often engaged for designing a specific type of building, while the builders or general contractors undertaking such projects may also be specialized in only that type of building. Because of the higher costs and greater sophistication of institutional and commercial buildings in comparison with residential housing, this market segment is shared by fewer competitors. Since the construction of some of these buildings is a long process which once started will take some time to proceed until completion, the demand is less sensitive to general economic conditions than that for housing construction.

3 Specialized Industrial Constructions

Specialized industrial construction usually involves very large-scale projects with a high degree of technological complexity, such as oil refineries, steel mills, chemical processing plants and coal-fired or nuclear power plants. The owners usually are deeply involved in the development of a project, and prefer to work with designers-builders such that the total time for the completion of the project can be shortened. They also want to pick a team of designers and builders with whom the owner has developed good working relations over the years.

Although the initiation of such projects is also affected by the state of the economy, long range demand forecasting is the most important factor since such projects are capital intensive and require considerable amount of planning and construction time. Governmental regulation such as environmental protection can also influence decisions on these projects.

4 Infrastructure and Heavy Construction

Infrastructure and heavy construction include projects such as highways, tunnels, bridges, pipelines, drainage systems and sewage treatment plants. Most of these projects are publicly owned and therefore financed either through bonds or taxes. This category of construction is characterized by a high degree of mechanization, which has gradually replaced some labor intensive operations.

The engineers and builders engaged in infrastructure construction are usually highly specialized since each segment of the market requires different types of skills. However, demands for different segments of infrastructure and heavy construction may shift with saturation in some segments. For example, as the available highway construction projects

are declining, some heavy construction contractors quickly move their work force and equipment into the field of mining where jobs are available.

Q2) Construction Projects Participants?

A2) The Owner (The Client)

The owner is the individual or organization for whom a project is to be built under a contract. The owner owns and finances the project. Depending on the owners’ capabilities, they may handle all or portions of planning, project management, design, engineering, procurement, and construction. The owner engages architects, engineering firms, and contractors as necessary to accomplish the desired work. Public owners are public bodies of some kind ranging from agencies from the country level to the municipal level. Most public projects or facilities are built for public use and not sold to others. Private owners may be individuals, partnerships, corporations. Most private owners have facilities or projects built for their own use or to be sold, operated, leased, or rented to others.

In order to achieve success on a project, owners need to define accurately the projects objectives. They need to establish a reasonable and balanced scope, budget, and schedule. They need to select qualified designers, consultants, and contractors.

Q3) Explain the Design Professionals

A3) Examples of design professionals are architects, engineers, and design consultants. The major role of the design professional is to interpret or assist the owner in developing the project’s scope, budget, and schedule and to prepare construction documents. Depending on the size and sophistication of the owner, the design professional can be part of the owner’s group or an independent, hired for the project. In some cases, design professional and construction contractor together form a design-build company.

Architect: An architect is an individual who plans and design buildings and their

Associated landscaping. Architects mostly rely on consulting engineers for structural, electrical, and mechanical work.

Engineer: The term engineer usually refers to an individual or a firm engaged in the design or other work associated with the design or construction. Design engineers are usually classified as civil, electrical, mechanical depending upon their specialty. There are also scheduling, estimating, cost, and construction engineers.

Engineering-Construction Firm: An engineering-construction firm is a type of

organization the combines both architect/engineering and construction contracting. This type of company has the ability of executing a complete design-build sequence.

Q4) Explain the Construction Professionals?

A4) The constructions Professional are the parties that responsible for constructing the project. In traditional management where the owner, design professional, and contractors are separate companies, the contractor would be termed a prime contractor. The prime contractor is responsible for delivering a complete project in accordance with the contract documents. In most cases, the prime contractor divides the work among many specialty contractors called subcontractors as shown in Figure.

Q5) Explain the Project Manager?

A5) The project manager is the individual charged with the overall coordination of the entire construction program for the owner. These include planning, design, procurement, and construction. Among his/her duties:

Construction Manager: The construction manager is a specialized firm or organization which administrates the on-site erection activities and the consulting services required by the owner from planning through design and construction to commissioning. The construction manager is responsible for design coordination, proper selection of materials and methods of construction, contracts preparation for award, cost and scheduling information and control.

Q6) Explain Contract Management?

A6) Management of contracts is one of the important aspects of construction management. Contractors engaged for the specific purpose usually execute civil engineering construction projects. Even when large-scale turnkey contracts of large projects are awarded to big contacting agencies, sub-contractors execute the works.

In some instances, the owner of the project does not have control over these subcontractors, as they are normally accountable only to the main contractor, resulting in delays and poor-quality output.  Problems of contract management in civil engineering constructions in India can be minimized to a great extent, if management of contracts is taken up even before drafting the contract documents. In fact, this should be done while carrying out the planning and investigations of the project and estimation of items of work at tender stage. Therefore, it should be ensured that what is likely to be asked for, is possible to be performed, well before formulation of the contract documents. A good contract document should therefore have fairness or equity to either parties to the contract, clarity or un-ambiguity of all items of work, avoidance of redundancy due to lack of knowledge or in attention to details and general and detailed specifications.

Q7) Explain Consultancy Services?

A7) It is absolutely necessary to ensure optimum involvement of consultants in construction projects, as the decision makers cannot be master of all the jobs. A sound advice and proper guidance is required for the execution of the project in right direction. Hence evolution of a system where the contribution of the consultant is optimized and the scarce resources are utilized to their fullest potential is very important. Today, consultancy services are available in India for proper site selection, for planning and design of project, for financial resources, for legal aspects, for environmental impact assessment and rehabilitation, and for realization of benefits of projects.

Q8) Explain Project Control?

A8) Time and cost over-runs in Indian projects often discouraged owners from undertaking such projects. Control of mega-projects must be catered-for in the planning stage itself. The parameters to be measured or assessed, the method and frequency of reporting, and the levels at which corrective decisions are to be taken, should all be planned in advance. Client owners of projects in India will benefit immensely by drawing their attention to some important aspects of project control such as:

1. Resource Scheduling – The completion of a construction project is mainly governed by resource constraints. It is essential to develop a systematic method for the allocation of resources when the resources are limited and conflicting demands are made for same type of resource. This can be attained through proper resource smoothing or resource levelling. Procurement of resources must relate closely to the project schedule for operations and other resources.

2. Financial Control – It ensures that permissible limits are not exceeded in the total estimates for each project. Expenditures or liabilities are not incurred until funds are made available. The funds should be utilized in those duly authorized projects for which they are allotted and no others. Finally, it ensures that funds allotted in any particular year are spent within limits. Therefore, it is essential to maintain correct and meticulous account of expenditure and liabilities to exercise effective financial control.

3. Budget Formulations and Periodic Review - Determining the planned the progress of each contract along with the requirement of stores is essential before the budget projection for capital works is made.

4. Expenditure reporting and monitoring - Financial control over construction projects is exercised by all levels of engineering authorities from the expenditure return. From these returns, deviations if any are detected by analysing the trends of expenditure, vis-à-vis allotments. Thereafter remedial actions are initiated to ensure that the final expenditure in the financial year is contained within the budgetary allocation for the year.

A9)

There are many approaches to achieve successful project design and construction. The Delivery Methods are driven by the project's scope, budget, and schedule. Some of these methods include Traditional (Design/Bid/Build), Integrated Delivery Process (where all stakeholders have a financial incentive to work together to produce the desired results), CM (also called CMc, or Construction Manager), Design-Build, Bridging, Lease/Build and Lease Buy Back. The selection of a delivery method will in turn influence the team composition, schedule, budget, and management plans to be followed throughout the process.

A10)

Project scope is the work that must be performed to meet a client's program goals for space, function, features, impact, and level of quality. Scope management sets the boundaries for the project and is the foundation on which the other project elements are built. From the beginning it helps identify the work tasks and their requirements for completion.

Effective scope management requires accurate definition of a client's requirements in the Planning and Development stage and a systematic process for monitoring and managing all the factors that may impact or change the program requirements throughout the project design and construction phases through delivery of the finished project.

A Project Management Plan (PMP) documents key management and oversight tasks and is updated throughout the project as changes occur. The plan includes definition of an owner's program goals, technical requirements, schedules, resources, budgets, and management programs. It also provides a vehicle for including efficiencies in the design and construction phases of all buildings. It will also serve as the basis for completed construction documents and outline the commissioning plan for finished execution.