Major Construction Sites Research Articles

In the Spotlight: Bat Activity Shifts in Response to Intense Lighting of a Large Railway Construction Site

Artificial light at night (ALAN) is a major form of anthropogenic pollution, disrupting nocturnal wildlife behaviour and ecosystem function. Large construction sites are typically located at the intersection of urban and natural areas, introducing intense lighting into previously dark natural habitats. This study examines the responses of bats to intense nighttime lighting at a major construction site associated with a linear transport infrastructure (LTI) project. We used passive acoustic monitoring to record bat activity and species richness at the construction site and in adjacent urban and natural areas with different lighting levels. Generalist species, such as Pipistrellus kuhlii and Nyctalus leisleri, were attracted to illuminated areas, likely due to increased prey availability. Conversely, sensitive species, such as those from the Myotis and Plecotus genera, along with Barbastella barbastellus, avoided illuminated areas, particularly the construction site. Species richness was significantly lower at the construction site compared to other environments, reflecting ALAN’s barrier effect on movements and habitat accessibility for more sensitive species. The findings highlight the ecological impacts of introducing ALAN to previously unlit natural environments, underscoring the urgent need for implementing ALAN mitigation strategies in urban planning and construction practices to protect biodiversity in urbanising areas.

건설현장의 불안전상태·행동이 사고재해율의 빈도·강도에 미치는 영향

Although the government is strengthening safety inspections and reforming the system, the number of construction accident victims (work accident victims) and the accident rate has been increasing over the past five years (2018~2022). This requires analyzing which areas to focus on through construction disaster data.
 In this study, we intend to analyze construction accidents using the Risk Assessment theory. According to the Risk Assessment theory, Hazard was classified into the frequency and intensity of accident rates. The research problem is, First, how unstable state and unstable behavior at construction sites will effect the factors that cause frequent accidents (the frequency of accident rates). Second, unstable state and unstable behavior at construction sites will affect the type of disaster (intensity of accident rate) in which disaster occur strongly.
 A survey was conducted between June and July 2023 on 189 managers and workers working at domestic construction sites to find out the effect of unsafe state and unsafe behavior on frequency and intensity at construction sites. The questionnaire consisted of 4 general characteristics, 7 independent variables (unstable state, unstable behavior), and 7 dependent variables (frequency, intensity). The analysis method was found to be good as a result of the validity and reliability analysis of the survey item, and frequency analysis and correlation analysis were conducted using the Jamovi program, and hypothesis verification was conducted through regression analysis.
 As a result of the study, the hypothesis on the unstable state of the construction site was rejected by the significant probability p value, and all hypothesis on the unstable behavior were adopted. The research conclusions are as follows. First, controlling for anxiety behavior by major construction sites reduces the frequency of accidents rates. Second, controlling for anxiety behavior by major disaster type at construction sites reduces the intensity of accidents rate. Third, controlling unstable behavior at construction sites reduces the frequency and intensity of accident rates. This means that continued research into unstable behavior at construction sites is needed.

Village Lunatics

Village Lunatics

Two thirteenth-century hospitaller castles in Provence

Apart from border areas with Islam or the pagans, few constructions of military orders are known to have all the attributes of a castle. This was however the case of the castle or fortified palace of Manosque and its reproduction, on a smaller scale, at Puimoisson. These two constructions, located in the Haute-Provence, were commissioned by the Hospital during the thirteenth century, the first on the basis of a fortified palace of the Counts of Forcalquier, the second erected ex nihilo. Although these two castles were completely razed to the ground following the French Revolution, their construction and occupation between the thirteenth and eighteenth centuries have left a great deal of written evidence: charters, accounts, minutes of visits. The use of accounts documents certain phases of the construction of the Manosque palace and allows us to formulate hypotheses on the organization of the spaces. By comparison, this major construction site sheds light on the more modest, and as yet unstudied, side of Puimoisson. In conclusion, these two long-forgotten buildings are placed in the current of fortified architecture that spread throughout Provence in the thirteenth century.

Impact of emotional intelligence on the stress and safety of construction workers' in Saudi Arabia

PurposeIn a country like Saudi Arabia, where the construction industry is witnessing an impressive growth in the post-oil era, it is important to examine the occupational health and safety behaviors of construction workers (CWs).Design/methodology/approachThe present study aims to investigate the impact of emotional intelligence (EI) on workers' stress and safety behaviors. Data were collected from CWs (n = 265) at a major construction site in the city of Jeddah. Two questionnaires comprising 25 and 32 questions were used to measure their EI and stress levels, respectively. Furthermore, structured interviews were conducted with the managers and supervisors to inquire about the safety behavior of their respective workers. Descriptive statistics, simple and companion regression were used for data analysis.FindingsThe findings indicate that EI plays an important role to enhance the safety behaviors of the CWs besides reducing their workplace stresses. Furthermore, workers' stress levels are found to negatively impact their safety behaviors, indicating that any reduction in occupational stress can reciprocally enhance their safety compliance. The findings are further discussed with the concerned stakeholders to recommend a seven-point therapeutic role of EI for the safety of CWs.Originality/valueResults of the study can be used by managers and supervisors of the Saudi construction industry to reduce workplace accidents and improve the productivity of their organizations.

Fiscal Integration in an Experimental Union: How Path-Breaking Was the EU's Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic?

Fiscal Integration in an Experimental Union: How Path-Breaking Was the EU's Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic?

How Tower Cranes Work

Tower cranes are a common fixture at any major construction site. They’re pretty hard to miss they often rise hundreds of feet into the air, and can reach out just as far. The construction crew uses the tower crane to lift steel, concrete, large tools - like acetylene torches and generators, and a wide variety of other building materials (Figure 1). When you look at one of these cranes, what it can do seems nearly impossible: Why doesn’t it tip over? How can such a long boom lift so much weight? How is it able to grow taller as the building grows taller? If you have ever wondered about how tower cranes work, then this article is for you. Here, you will find out the answers to all of these questions and more!

A Pseudo-outbreak of Aspergillosis at a Tertiary Care Hospital: Thinking Beyond the Infection Control Risk Assessment.

In the modern era of carefully monitored renovations, construction-related Aspergillus outbreaks have decreased. We investigated an increase in clinical cultures growing Aspergillus species, determining that contamination of the mycology lab caused a pseudo-outbreak. A major construction site was appropriately sealed, but unrecognized staff traffic may have facilitated laboratory contamination. Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol 2016;1-4.

Building to beat Ebola: the Royal Engineers in Sierra Leone

The 2014 Ebola outbreak in west Africa raised fears of a global pandemic. Specialists from the UK Corps of Royal Engineers were deployed to Sierra Leone to design and construct emergency treatment units, in support of the UK Department for International Development. Whereas projects of this scale typically take several years to plan and deliver, the exponential spread of the disease required that the design, tender and construction programmes were extraordinarily accelerated. Extensive innovation and gruelling programmes ensured that all six treatment units were open and receiving patients within 3 months. This paper outlines the clinical principles underpinning the design of Ebola treatment facilities and chronicles the experience of running multiple major construction sites simultaneously in the developing world during a humanitarian disaster.

The Single Body of the City: Public Slaves and the Question of the Greek State

AbstractsPublic slavery was an institution common to most Greek cities during the Classical and Hellenistic periods. Whether they worked on the city’s major construction sites, performed minor duties in its civic administration or filled the ranks of its police force (the famous Scythian archers of classical Athens), public slaves may be said to have constituted the first public servants known to Greek cities. Studying them from this perspective can shed new light on the long-running debate about the degree to which thepolisfunctioned as a state. Direct democracy, in the Classical Athenian sense, implied that all political prerogatives be held by the citizens themselves, and not by any kind of state apparatus. The decision to delegate administrative tasks to slaves can thus be understood as a “resistance” (as defined by the French anthropologist Pierre Clastres) on the part of the civic society to the development of this apparatus.

0257 Mortality and morbidity health impact assessment of expected exposure to PM10 due to the major construction site for a large international exhibition0257 Mortality and morbidity health impact assessment of expected exposure to PM10 due to the major construction site for a large international exhibition

ObjectivesTo assess the short-term impact of expected exposure to PM10 due to a major construction site (Jan 2013–Jan 2015) on the health of the population residing in the seven towns...

IG I3 4 : l’Acropole en chantier

IG I3 4 : construction site Akropolis This article is not a new edition of the so-called Hekatompedon inscription : it merely strives to connect its exceptional nature and its reglementary and penal dispositions with the situation current on the Akropolis in middle 480s. Despite the gaps, this double decree is an eloquent witness to the difficulties of cohabitation between a major construction site and a religious activity, of which it was important to protect its integrity.

Validity Assessment of Self-Reported Construction Tasks

This study assessed agreement between workers’ and observers’ daily estimates of exposure to construction work tasks. The ultimate aimwas to develop a valid method and instrument for the collection of self-reported data on duration of exposure to a priori identified work tasks for use in characterizing exposure in settings with substantial task variability. Forty-nine shop workers and 52 construction site sheet metal workers were observed for up to 3 full workdays. Observers sampled approximately 25% of each worker's day, recording the work performed from a prespecified list of tasks. Each participant completed a daily questionnaire, indicating the tasks he or she performed that day and time spent on each task. Shopworkers tended to specialize in particular tasks, while at the construction site, the workers’ tasks reflected substantial day-to-day variability. Agreement between worker and observer estimates was generally better for major shop tasks (with intraclass correlation coefficients [ICCs] ranging from 0.52 to 0.85), than for major construction site tasks (with ICCs ranging from 0.36 to 0.64). Workers tended to overestimate the amount of time spent at tasks of longer duration and to underestimate time spent at short-duration tasks. Rank order analysis of time spent on task revealed fairly high agreement. Agreement was acceptable for shop-based work, which has less day-to-day variability than construction site work. Overall, however, the data suggest that, for highly variable work, the use of task as the unit of exposure does not improve recall over assessment approaches focusing on questions about posture and material handling.

Feasibility of Studying the Effect of Major Construction on the Health of Residents at the Zip Code Level

TAB2-PD-07 We conducted a feasibility study in one zip code (02111; Chinatown, Boston, MA) in which 4 large buildings (20–30 stories) were built between 1999 and 2004 and adjacent to which a major highway construction project was in progress. Information about major construction project start and end dates were obtained from a variety of sources. Three sets of health data (outpatient, inpatient, and mortality) were obtained from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health for the years of 1998 to 2004. The outpatient data were analyzed using ICD-9 disease codes to aggregate selected pulmonary and cardiac-related categories that could reasonably be expected to be aggravated by pollution, especially particulates, released from construction sites. During the years under study, there were a total of 540 outpatient data entries and 127 of those were in the ICD-9 codes that we selected to include in the study. Analysis of the outpatient data showed that since 1998 (baseline year, no buildings under construction), the total number of outpatient cases increased from 11 to a peak of 25 in 2002, when there were 2 building construction sites. Cardiovascular cases displayed the largest increase in incidence, increasing from 2 in 1998 to a peak of 16 in 2002. The result is consistent with an association between major construction sites and morbidity of residents living adjacent to them, however, given our single zip code cannot be considered more than a preliminary indication. Analysis of inpatient and mortality data is underway, which could either buttress or contradict outpatient data analysis. Our analysis is a small-scale pilot study and was conducted in order to assess feasibility. We propose that a larger-scale study is possible, using the same data across multiple zip codes. Such a larger study would be able to compare morbidity and mortality between zip codes with more and less major construction and over time across construction activity start and end dates within zip codes.

A case study on strain gauge measurements on large post-tensioned concrete beams of a railway support structure

Non-destructive testing by means of strain gauges may be a straightforward operation under laboratory conditions. When applied on a construction site it becomes a wholly different matter. This paper is concerned with the use of strain gauges as a control mechanism on the effectiveness of the post-tensioning of large concrete beams, used as part of the roof of a cut-and-cover tunnel for the high-speed train link passing under the Antwerp Central Station. The emphasis of this paper is placed on the practical execution of the measurements and the specific problems encountered when working on site. To validate the method used, a comparison is made between calculated and measured values of concrete stresses caused by the tensioning operations, proving that the measuring method is more than adequate. This case study shows the usefulness of strain gauges applied to the surface of concrete beams, as a practical, fast and accurate way of performing non-destructive strain measurements on major construction sites for civil engineering projects.

Skilled labour shortages and wage ‘roll-out’ effects in an energy-rich region

This paper analyses the wage ‘roll out’ effect of a period of rapid resource based development in the Latrobe valley region in Australia. Wage level adjustments are seen to correlate closely to categories of skilled labour shortage on major construction sites. More significantly, these wage adjustments are seen to spill over into all blue collar occupational categories in the region, including industries off the construction sites. The wage ‘roll out’ effect is related to the structure of the regional economy through the application of a survey-based input-output table and through the analysis of labour market recruitment and migration patterns.

SKILLED LABOUR SHORTAGES AND WAGE ‘ROLL‐OUT’ EFFECTS IN AN ENERGY‐RICH REGION

ABSTRACT This paper analyses the wage ‘roll out’ effect of a period of rapid resource based development in the Latrobe Valley region in Australia. Wage level adjustments are seen to correlate closely to categories of skilled labour shortage on major construction sites. More significantly, these wage adjustments are seen to spill over into all blue collar occupational categories in the region, including industries off the construction sites. The wage ‘roll out’ effect is related to the structure of the regional economy through the application of a survey‐based input‐output table and through the analysis of labour market recruitment and migration patterns.

Ship-mounted seawater 2500 m 3/d flash evaporation plant for Abu Dhabi. economical drinking water for arid regions

Buckau-Walther AG (Krupp Group) handed over a ship-mounted seawater desalination plant to the Water and Electricity Department of the Government of Abu Dhabi on February 16, 1982, in Bremen. This followed a 12-month construction period and two weeks of trials. Named the “Rumaith”, this is the first self-propelled floating seawater desalination plant built for commercial use. The plant, consisting of a self-propelled pontoon-like hull carrying two centrally positioned desalination units of 1250 m 3 each, will supply islands, coastal towns and major construction sites in the United Arab Emirates with drinking water and will also be deployed in the event of break-down of stationary desalination plant, to provide an emergency water supply and to alleviate plantation water shortages. After handover, the vessel, accepted by German Lloyd for class + 100 A4K, was pulled by tug to Abu Dhabi in the Arabian Gulf in 40 days. As general contractor, Buckau-Walther AG had the vessel built by a shipyard in Bremen.