Journal of Construction Research

Civil engineering academics are caught between a science-based university culture on one side, and on the other, the expectations of students and practicing engineers in industry who want practical knowledge for immediate application. The science-based culture primarily measures faculty by research projects and funding, Ph.D. students produced, and by papers refereed primarily by academic peers for publication and citation in scholarly journals. There are strong pressures to produce these outputs, which are duly quantified for tenure and promotion decisions but the system does not directly reward time spent gaining practical experience in full-time or part time jobs prior to academic employment, or later in summers or sabbaticals, or in solving problems through consultations.

This paper will address the balance between academia and practice, and focus on the residential building sector of the design and construction industry as one that is largely neglected by engineering programs. In particular, it will show where the design and construction of residential structures can provide opportunities to enhance engineering education and open new avenues for broad, interdisciplinary research that are different from those where engineering academics normally venture. In conclusion, it will focus on academics who successfully bridge the realm of academia and the world around them.

The maintenance of health in industrial communities presents special problems and priorities, which are exacerbated in developing countries by socio-economic realities. Lifestyle, communicable diseases, alcohol and drug abuse are issues, which extend far beyond the boundaries of society, impacting on individuals' performance in the workplace.

The aim of health promotion is to persuade people to adopt and maintain healthy life practices, thus preventing ill-health and promoting health and overall performance.

Given the aforementioned, a descriptive survey was conducted among general contractors (GCs) to determine: the extent of health promotion; the extent to which employees would benefit there from, and the perceived holistic benefits. The findings indicate that little or no health promotion is undertaken in South African construction. However, GCs perceive that health promotion would benefit employees, the benefits including improved health and project performance manifested in, inter alia, lower absenteeism, and improved productivity and quality.

In 1994, the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) was gazetted in Malaysia. In tandem with existing safety legislation, OSHA 1994 is designed to reduce industrial accident rates. This paper addresses the subsequent construction safety performance. The construction industry has been plagued by a poor safety record due to a confluence of factors. The paper suggests that the presence of a significant number of foreign workers contribute to high construction casualty figures. The paper highlights the confusing signals sent out to the industry by the Department of Occupational Safety and Health (DOSH) and the Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB) arising from conflicting instructions and initiatives. The paper draws upon some of the data compiled during a national study conducted in 1996–1997 that examined foreign and local site operatives in Malaysia. By referring to developments that have happened since the study the paper is made current.

When a delay occurs in a project, there are basically two options: prescribing overtime work and injecting additional resources, in order to meet the project schedule of certain activities. This paper uses economic analysis to demonstrate that a decision maker will select the most suitable alternative by considering productivity losses in overtime work and the relative unit costs between different labor and resource inputs. The paper also suggests some avenues for future empirical research in construction overtime work.

An investigation into accident trends involving plant operating within the UK construction industry over the previous decade (1989 to 1999) is presented. The work commences with a description of plant and equipment purchased within the UK construction sector, with specific reference to the size of the market and the types of plant item purchased. Pertinent European plant legislation is briefly reviewed before an analysis of health and safety statistics is undertaken (obtained from the Health and Safety Executive and the Department of Environment, Trade and the Regions). Accident rates involving plant are analyzed not only across the total workforce but also for construction "employees" and "subcontractors" separately. Principal findings reveal that the plant related accident rate for employees is four times that for subcontractors. Moreover, despite recent legislation (such as the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations (PUWER) and the Safe Use of Lifting Equipment (LOLER)), plant related accident rates across the construction workforce remain largely unchanged. Hypothesized reasons for this finding are attributed mainly to a lack of satisfactory practitioner understanding of plant legislation, combined with a failure by the industry to impose mandatory plant operator training certification. Guidance is also provided to practitioners on new UK government proposals that aim to hold companies and individuals "criminally" responsible for health and safety breaches.

In groundwater construction projects, many variables affect construction schedule and cost overruns. This paper aims to examine and evaluate the relative importance of the main factors that cause delay and cost overruns in groundwater construction projects. In order to identify these factors, a questionnaire survey was conducted. Questionnaires were sent to professionals involved in groundwater construction projects in Ghana. The data was analyzed and ranked, based on the profession of the respondents and their roles in the industry (i.e. owners, contractors and consultants). The questionnaire survey consisted of 49 factors which were grouped into nine major categories, and the level of importance of the categories was measured and ranked by the relative importance weights. The percentage agreements in ranking among the three groups were measured. The results shows that: (1) the surveyed groups generally agreed that the project financing category is the main reason for groundwater construction delay and cost overruns, whereas the labor category is the least; (2) owners, consultants and contractors substantially agree on the ranking of the major categories of delay and cost overruns factors. The paper concludes that all the three groups felt that project financing, micro-economics, natural conditions and materials factor categories play a predominant role in causing delay and cost overruns to groundwater construction projects.

Divergent goals, short-term objectives and fragmented approaches have weakened construction supply chains and thereby adversely affected their outputs and performance levels. Furthermore, relationships and satisfaction levels have also deteriorated due to these "disjointed' groupings and segregated functions. Construction clients and their contractors often appear to be polarized in some form of "opportunism" driven "adversarial" relationships, while other supply chain members seem to be "pulling" in different directions as well. In order to overcome these problems, a series of synergistic findings from research initiatives and knowledge "mining" in related topics are consolidated in this paper, so as to identify approaches for re-integrating construction supply chains. An analogy of achieving an appropriate "operational" equilibrium in construction supply chains is formulated, based on a careful identification of various sets of generic impacting "forces." This is linked to an amalgamation of identified best practices, an appreciation of "cultural" influences, and emerging relational contracting approaches. Distilling and synergizing useful relevant "knowledge" on the above from recent research exercises and related literature, a framework for relational integration of construction supply chains is conceptualized and presented in this paper.

In an earlier study, learning by doing (LBD) was found to be insignificant in the Singapore construction industry. This paper examines the development of the formal education system to uncover some of the reasons why so little learning by doing occurs in the construction industry. Under the colonial authorities, construction education was neglected. But after political independence, it developed slowly despite a massive public housing program. Much of the labor supply comes from low-wage unskilled and semi-skilled foreign workers. In the case of local construction workers, skills training takes place within the context of a deliberate general education policy of streaming to reduce the high attrition rate that resulted from the colonial and post-colonial bilingual policy. Screening channels the bulk of weaker students towards the construction sector. At the tertiary level, the rapid expansion of polytechnic education to support high economic growth raises the issue of education quality and limited opportunities for upgrading. The result is a distinctive fourtier system of production based on foreign workers, local semi-skilled workers, technicians and professionals. The stark subclass consciousness is likely to impede learning.