Managed Project Learning - Essay Example

Managed Project Learning Introduction The area east of the Port Dunda’s branch of Forth and Clyde is supposedlyproposed to be used as a site for the constructions of eco-friendly housing units. What are the environmental impacts that such a project will have on the environment? Is the environment conducive enough for the construction of housing units? Is the ecosystem around this area conducive for human habitat? What challenges as far as civil engineering is concerned are likely to be faced during the implementation of this project? Are there any concerns such as transport systems, logistics, security etc. that the New Generation Housing need to be aware of? How will they build a bridge in twelve hours, six hours in the morning, and six hours in the evening? When building the bridge how will they manage traffic jam during these ours? These are just but some of the questions that this report is supposed to examine and conclusively offer advice for or against New Generation Housing companies choice of this area as being ideal for the development of echo-friendly residential housing units. Discussion There is a canal about 35 miles long known as the Forth and Clyde canal that borders the proposed eco-friendly homes construction site. This canal runs right across Scotland. A major concern for the developers will be the landscape of the area. The capacity of the landscape affects the ability of the area to accommodate any extensive development such as the New Generation Housing Company’s project of eco-friendly units. According to a study carried out in 2004 which mostly explored the implications to development caused mainly due to the development of wind farm, the area is not ideal for a large scale housing project as proposed. In the context of accessibility, is the proposed area in close proximity to services? The assessment focuses on determining whether or not services required for a person to lead a normal life are available. The services should also be close to the residential units that are to be developed. Certain facilities such as post offices, shops, restaurants should be within cycling, wheelchair or walking distance.The proposed area is very near the Glasgow City. This therefore means that the occupants of the New Generation eco-friendly houses will have easy access to very many services such as employment, hospitals, leisure, transport hubs, out-of-town retail shops, schools, stadia etc. the travel demands required in order to access most of this services have partly been met by the Pinkston road that joins with the M8. This will however need to be reconsidered since the local authority believes that the Pinkston road already serves to its intended capacity. Soil being extremely important, it has very many wide and important functions. These include support for plants, agriculture and biodiversity. Soil’s ability to store key nutrients and mineral is very important as is its ability to filter minerals and water to the surrounding area. Any sort of damage to soil is of very significant concern that any developer, resident or government should consider. Within this area east of Port Dunda’s branch of Forth and Clyde, there is approximately 10% of land considered by the local authority to be quality prime agricultural land. Areas surrounding this development site have been host to several industries such as coal mining, lint mills, quarrying, corn milling, ship building, iron founding, gravel and sand pits. The impact of these industries to the soil in this area is immeasurable. Geologists consider the soil around this area to be highly contaminated. In addition, the presence of landfill sites may have an adverse effect on the soil too. As far as transport is concerned, it will be great help if these areas are improved to further promote redevelopment of the derelict and vacant site that are within the sites proximities. Accessibility to this site will be the main contributing factor to the housing units being taken for occupation by potential tenants. The fact that the proposed development site is very close to a major transport network, it development is vital since it will be easy for house occupants to access their housing without any hindrances. The council under which this area fall has very strict laws and regulation pertaining to contaminated land. It is therefore imperative for the New Generation Housing Company to highly consider the types of materials that they will be using in the construction of the houses. The materials or their construction activities should not in any way contaminate the land, air or water. Geologists are currently evaluating the area around Clachan of Campsie which is adjacent to the proposed development site and might be designated as RIGS. These are areas that are considered to be of utmost geological and geomorphological importance and are not within the statutory protected land. The selection of a site as RIGS is based on its significance as an historic, educational or recreational importance. The aim is always to recognize and protect valuable landscape features and earth science. If designated as RIGS, the Next Generation Housing project will be impacted in two ways, negatively and positively. The negative impact might be a sudden termination of the project altogether thus causing the developers catastrophic fiscal loses. Positive impact will be due to the site proximity to important geological or geomorphic area that would be a big tourist attraction. The New Generation Housing might opt to develop commercial suites instead of residential ones in such a scenario. The residential houses that are supposed to be developed need to be approximately 100 housing units. The developers envisage the construction of about 25 3-4 bedroomed semidetached house, 25 3 bedroomed detached housing units and about 50 2 bedroomed flats of 8 and 4 storied blocks. The major headache the engineer would have in this project is ensuring the safety and eco-friendly nature of the houses they are due to construct. This is because of the climatic conditions and the environmental concerns of the area. It is perceived that at certain times, the temperatures are extremely hot and at other times extremely low. Such concerns will have to be considered while designing the housing units. Since they are supposed to be eco-friendly, the engineer must opt to employ sustainable construction practices as of opposed to standard construction practices. This implies that, he would have to consider ways of using less material that would use less energy and produce less little waste. He should consider use of solar systems for powering the house and ground pipe heating system for cooling and heating the houses. This would come in handy during both extreme cold and hot conditions. Another way of ensuring eco-friendly and self-sustaining housing units, is to consider the choice of water source for the houses. It recommended that rainwater harvesting systems be constructed to cater for the water needs of the houses. In addition, the company should consider underground water sources such as drilling of boreholes. The 6 hectare site being in proximity to the M8 motorway is expected to raise the living standards of people living in the area. The house units should therefore be of very high standards in terms of furnishing and finishing. The engineer should ensure that there are spacious enough and very well aired. This way, comfort and safety will be guaranteed. The proposed site for New Generation Housing eco-friendly project is surrounded by several features such as ground water resources, rivers, catchment areas and valleys. The major pressure faced by groundwater in this area is pollution. The pollution is mainly from agricultural activities. This means that, individual contaminations are minimal but the overall effect is significant. How does this affect or impact on the New Generation Company’s eco-friendly homes project? Erosions can weaken the strength of soil texture and value of the soil. It is important that the Next generation Company considers how to construct their housings units such that they have self-defense against the catastrophic effects of flood. This is because their proposed development site happens to lie within the red marked flood zone.Within the local area, it is considered that several factors contribute to the climate change. Weathermen and geologists consider in particular, energy consumption and transport emission as being some of the major factors contributing to climate change. These effects can however be minimized by reduction in the need for people to travel. This can be achieved through proper integration of transport and land-use, increased renewable energy generation and construction of energy efficient commercial and residential housing units. This will help reduce methane emissions by reducing wastes to landfill sites. It is therefore imperative that the Next Generation Housing Company considers these guidelines by the government when constructing their housing units. They should for instance consider the use of greener renewable energy sources to power these buildings. They should also design proper ways and measures that would guide waste disposal in a way that would not pollute the environment. As much as they would want to make the housing units eco-friendly, they should not forget human comfort and health. Within the housing units, the Next Generation Company should include plans of constructing retail outlets, hospitals and schools so as to minimize the use of cars which will be a big plus as far as waste management is concerned. They should also consider providing recycling bins and other facilities both in the business premises and residential houses whose main goal would be to reduce the dependency on open landfill sites. This would eventually reduce the emission of harmful gases such as methane. Residents should also be encouraged to minimize the use vehicles as a mode of transport but rather consider using other alternative methods such as walking and cycling to nearby destinations. This can be achieved by the company making sure that there are accessible paths and routes that can be used by pedestrians and cyclers. These paths should not only be made available but also be secure and well maintained. The footbridge that exists will need to be demolished to pave way for development of a single carriageway bridge for cars. This bridge will need to be built in a single day, twelve hours in the morning and twelve hours in the evening. To accomplish this, the engineer will need to consider the effect of the construction on the traffic. Before commencing the construction, he/she will need to find about 6000m of free land/space where they will create a diversion. This diversion will be a better way for the engineers to manage the traffic by diverting them into the diversion. This will release the traffic and construction conflict. Given that the construction is to happen in two shifts of six hours each, one in the morning and the other in the evening, the chief engineer will need to consider the number of construction workers that will be required. For successful completion of the project, 12 construction workers need to be hired. Six workers will work in the morning shift and the other six will work in the night shift. Another important consideration is time scheduling. Demolition will have to be done using cranes and broks and is expected to take utmost 1 hour. This will include the complete and careful removal of the existing footbridge. The first step will be the installation of covered walkways, catch fans, the hoardings, dust screens, shoring and scaffoldings etc. These will be used to give safe access to the sides and bottom of the bridge by construction workers as they move from one end of the bridge to the other. The scaffold screens will also be useful in protecting the public from any flying debris that might be produced during demolition. Holemasters will then be used to break holes at strategic point on the bridge with the aim of weakening it. Holes will also be broken on the bridges deck. These will solely be for providing suitable holes for lifting. The crane will then be put in place and readied for the lifting. The central span will be lifted of first, followed by the west and east spans respectively. After demolition is completed, the site needs to be prepared ready for lying of the bridge. Preparation of the site is expected to take about 4 hours. Preparation of the site will take the form of removing of the spans from the site and The Bridge is supposed to be made of steel. The materials for erecting the bridge will then need to be brought to the site. The supports for the bridge will be put in position and fastened. This should take about one and a half hour and be the last task in the morning session. During the evening session, the engineer need to ensure workers security and site lighting is in place before the rest of the work should begin. The side plates and the bottom plates should then be put in to place and stiffened by the RSA 105 x 75 x 8mm thick. The 20mm thick diaphragm will then be put at each of the bridge support with elliptical manholes. The centre diaphragm which is 15mm thick will be then erected at a maximum of 4mm centre to centre. The final phase of the bridge will be to put the top plates of steel which are grade S275 thickness in position and fastened. All these tasks are to be accomplished within a time frame of about 5 hours. The final hour will see the engineers clear the site ready for opening. During both construction and demolition, it is important that the engineer considers modalities of how to manage traffic. A working zone or site has five different parts. These include an advance warning area, a transition area, buffer area, work area and a termination area. To effectively manage the traffic, the engineer needs to first identify these parts. He will then need to know when and where to move traffic of its normal path and when to let it resume. Proper signs should be used to direct traffic. Signs such as advance warning that indicates ongoing work ahead should be erected. The engineer should also be concerned about when and where to put cones and tabular markers both at night and during the day. If efficiently and correctly planned, it would be easy to manage the traffic. There are concerns that non-occupants of the new housing scheme might use the new commissioned bridge and the link to Pinkston road. The engineers will need to consider during their construction on how they will restrict the bridge and the road for use by those accessing the new housing site. It is suggested that, protective planks be erected that make the road only one way. In this case of traffic that might build up after due to the use of the bridge, street lights will need to build at the intersection of the bridge and the M8 road. In this way, traffic will easily be controlled. Conclusion It is safe to conclude that the proposed area is environmentally ideal for the construction of the proposed 100 housing units. The development company although will have to put into consideration several factor s pertaining to sustainable construction. They will have to consider extensive use of greener renewable energy technologies such as use of solar systems, wind system or even ground pipe power systems to cater for the projects energy needs. They must also ensure that social amenities such as schools, hospitals, leisure and recreational facilities are in cross proximity. This will encourage use of alternative transport such as walking, cycling etc. thus minimizing the effect of emissions from car on the ecosystem. The housing units they are to construct should also be secure from the severe impact of extreme weather conditions experienced in this area such as storms, flooding, earthquakes and extreme temperatures. This will guarantee occupants safety and comfort. 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