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The purpose of this paper is to present the development of an ontological model consisting of terms and relationships between these terms, creating a conceptual information model for the Built Cultural Heritage (BCH) domain, more specifically for preventive conservation.

The On-To-Knowledge methodology was applied in the ontology development process. Terms related to preventive conservation were identified by means of a taxonomy which was used later to identify related existing ontologies. Three ontologies were identified and merged, i.e. Geneva City Geographic Markup Language (Geneva CityGML), Monument Damage ontology (Mondis) and CIDOC Conceptual Reference Model (CIDOC-CRM). Additional classes and properties were defined as to provide a complete semantic framework for management of BCH.

A BCH-ontology for preventive conservation was created. It consists of 143 classes from which 38 originate from the Mondis ontology, 38 from Geneva CityGML, 37 from CIDOC-CRM and 30 were newly created. The ontology was applied in a use case related to the New cathedral in the city of Cuenca, Ecuador. Advantages over other type of systems and for the BCH-domain were discussed based on this example.

The proposed ontology is in a testing stage through which a number of its aspects are being verified.

This ontological model is the first one to focus on the preventive conservation of BCH.

Urban renewal is a multifaceted activity that involves numerous actors, software, and types of data. Design communication tools play an important role in this process. Visual information helps to outline, understand, and choose sustainable solutions for problems in the design, while visual tools should be able to diminish professional differences and establish a common language. Recent 3D geo-technologies offer a great variety of new tools that significantly enrich visualisation possibilities and allow for flexible switching between different 3D representations. However, studies have indicated that particular representations create different perceptions in professional compared to non-professional individuals. This paper discusses the specifics of urban renewal processes in the Netherlands and investigates recently developed 3D geo-information technology, and more specifically multiple 3D representations, that can support this task. The concept of LOD, which uses five levels of information, was evaluated as a very promising approach to agree on abstractions and representations in the different renewal phases. The study did not reveal a lack of digital possibilities for visualisation, but instead showed that the simultaneous visualisation of the proposed alternatives should be a priority. This investigation did reveal that different levels of interactivity could be used for the presentation and communication of project alternatives.

The study, within the Increasing Resilience of Cultural Heritage (ResCult) project, aims to support civil protection to prevent, lessen and mitigate disasters impacts on cultural heritage using a unique standardised-3D geographical information system (GIS), including both heritage and risk and hazard information.

A top-down approach, starting from existing standards (an INSPIRE extension integrated with other parts from the standardised and shared structure), was completed with a bottom-up integration according to current requirements for disaster prevention procedures and risk analyses. The results were validated and tested in case studies (differentiated concerning the hazard and type of protected heritage) and refined during user forums.

Besides the ensuing reusable database structure, the filling with case studies data underlined the tough challenges and allowed proposing a sample of workflows and possible guidelines. The interfaces are provided to use the obtained knowledge base.

The increasing number of natural disasters could severely damage the cultural heritage, causing permanent damage to movable and immovable assets and tangible and intangible heritage. The study provides an original tool properly relating the (spatial) information regarding cultural heritage and the risk factors in a unique archive as a standard-based European tool to cope with these frequent losses, preventing risk.

This paper critically analysed 195 articles with the objectives of providing a clear understanding of the current City Information Modelling (CIM) implementations, identifying the main challenges hampering the uptake of CIM and providing recommendations for the future development of CIM.

This paper adopts the PRISMA method in order to perform the systematic literature review.

The results identified nine domains of CIM implementation including (1) natural disaster management, (2) urban building energy modelling, (3) urban facility management, (4) urban infrastructure management, (5) land administration systems, (6) improvement of urban microclimates, (7) development of digital twin and smart cities, (8) improvement of social engagement and (9) urban landscaping design. Further, eight challenges were identified that hinder the widespread employment of CIM including (1) reluctance towards CIM application, (2) data quality, (3) computing resources and storage inefficiency, (4) data integration between BIM and GIS and interoperability, (5) establishing a standardised workflow for CIM implementation, (6) synergy between all parties involved, (7) cybersecurity and intellectual property and (8) data management.

This is the first paper of its kind that provides a holistic understanding of the current implementation of CIM. The outcomes will benefit multiple target groups. First, urban planners and designers will be supplied with a status-quo understanding of CIM implementations. Second, this research introduces possibilities of CIM deployment for the governance of cities; hence the outcomes can be useful for policymakers. Lastly, the scientific community can use the findings of this study as a reference point to gain a comprehensive understanding of the field and contribute to the future development of CIM.

Building information modeling (BIM) is a striking development in the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industry, which provides in-depth information on different stages of the building lifecycle. Real estate valuation, as a fully interconnected field with the AEC industry, can benefit from 3D technical achievements in BIM technologies. Some studies have attempted to use BIM for real estate valuation procedures. However, there is still a limited understanding of appropriate mechanisms to utilize BIM for valuation purposes and the consequent impact that BIM can have on decreasing the existing uncertainties in the valuation methods. Therefore, the paper aims to analyze the literature on BIM for real estate valuation practices.

This paper presents a systematic review to analyze existing utilizations of BIM for real estate valuation practices, discovers the challenges, limitations and gaps of the current applications and presents potential domains for future investigations. Research was conducted on the Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar databases to find relevant references that could contribute to the study. A total of 52 publications including journal papers, conference papers and proceedings, book chapters and PhD and master's theses were identified and thoroughly reviewed. There was no limitation on the starting date of research, but the end date was May 2022.

Four domains of application have been identified: (1) developing machine learning-based valuation models using the variables that could directly be captured through BIM and industry foundation classes (IFC) data instances of building objects and their attributes; (2) evaluating the capacity of 3D factors extractable from BIM and 3D GIS in increasing the accuracy of existing valuation models; (3) employing BIM for accurate estimation of components of cost approach-based valuation practices; and (4) extraction of useful visual features for real estate valuation from BIM representations instead of 2D images through deep learning and computer vision.

This paper contributes to research efforts on utilization of 3D modeling in real estate valuation practices. In this regard, this paper presents a broad overview of the current applications of BIM for valuation procedures and provides potential ways forward for future investigations.

This article aims to explore valuable insights into the construction progress monitoring (CPM) research domain, which include main research topics, knowledge gaps and future research themes. For a long time, CPM has been significantly researched with increasing enthusiasm. Although a few review studies have been carried out, there is non-existence of a quantitative review study that can deliver a holistic picture of CPM.

The science mapping-based scientometric analysis was systematically processed with 1,835 CPM-related journal articles retrieved from Scopus. The co-authorship analysis and direct citation analysis were carried out to identify the most influential researchers, countries and publishers of the knowledge domain. The co-occurrence analysis of keyword was assessed to reveal the most dominating research topics and research trend with the visual representation of the considered research domain.

This study reveals seven clusters of main research topics from the keyword co-occurrence analysis. The evolution of research confirms that CPM-related research studies were mainly focused on fundamental and traditional CPM research topics before 2007. The period between 2007 and 2020 has seen a shift of research efforts towards digitalization and automation. The result suggests Building Information Modelling (BIM) as the most common, growing and influential research topic in the CPM research domain. It has been used in combination with different data acquisition technologies (e.g. photogrammetry, videogrammetry, laser scanning, Internet of Things (IoT) sensors) and data analytics approaches (e.g. machine learning and computer vision).

This study provides the horizon of potential research in the research domain of CPM to researchers, policymakers and practitioners by availing of main research themes, current knowledge gaps and future research directions.

This paper represents the first scientometric study depicting the state-of-the-art of the research by assessing the current knowledge domain of CPM.

The purpose of this paper is to review ontologies and data models currently in use for augmented reality (AR) applications, in the cultural heritage (CH) domain, specifically in an urban environment. The aim is to see the current trends in ontologies and data models used and investigate their applications in real world scenarios. Some special cases of applications or ontologies are also discussed, as being interesting enough to merit special consideration.

A search using Google Scholar, Scopus, ScienceDirect and IEEE Xplore was done in order to find articles that describe ontologies and data models in AR CH applications. The authors identified the articles that analyze the use of ontologies and/or data models, as well as articles that were deemed to be of special interest.

This review found that CIDOC-CRM is the most popular ontology closely followed by Historical Context Ontology (HiCO). Also, a combination of current ontologies seems to be the most complete way to fully describe a CH object or site. A layered ontology model is suggested, which can be expanded according to the specific project.

This study provides an overview of ontologies and data models for AR CH applications in urban environments. There are several ontologies currently in use in the CH domain, with none having been universally adopted, while new ontologies or extensions to existing ones are being created, in the attempt to fully describe a CH object or site. Also, this study suggests a combination of popular ontologies in a multi-layer model.

Current facility management (FM) practices are inefficient and ineffective, partially because of missing information and communication issues. Information and communications technologies (ICT) are asserted to provide a promising solution for managing and operating facilities. However, the impact of ICT applications on current FM practices needs to be validated and the perception of FM professionals on ICT-based FM needs to be understood. Therefore, this paper aims to investigate the impacts and the perception of ICT application on FM practice and further develop an ICT-based integrated framework for smart FM practices.

To achieve the objective, the research starts with reviewing several promising ICT for FM, including building information modeling, geographic information systems, unmanned aerial vehicle and augmented reality. On this basis, a conceptional framework was synthesized in consideration of the benefits of each technology. A survey questionnaire to FM professionals was conducted to evaluate the proposed framework and identify the challenges of adopting ICT in the FM industry. Furthermore, return on investment and strength, weakness, opportunities and threats analysis have been used in this paper as evaluation methods for ICT industry adoption.

The survey results are validated by FM professionals for the future engagement of the integrated ICT applications. Also, the proposed framework can assist the decision-makers to have comprehensive information about facilities and systematize the communication among stakeholders.

This research provides an integrated framework for smart FM to improve decision-making, capitalizing on the ICT applications. Apart from this, the study sheds light on future research endeavors for other ICT applications.

The transformation of cities from the industrial age (unsustainable) to the knowledge age (sustainable) is essentially a “whole life cycle” process consisting of planning, development, operation, reuse and renewal. During this transformation, a multi‐disciplinary knowledge base, created from studies and research about the built environment aspects is fundamental: historical, architectural, archeologically, environmental, social, economic, etc., and critical. Although there are a growing number of applications of 3D VR modelling applications, some built environment applications such as disaster management, environmental simulations, computer‐aided architectural design and planning require more sophisticated models beyond 3D graphical visualization such as multifunctional, interoperable, intelligent, and multi‐representational. Advanced digital mapping technologies such as 3D laser scanner technologies can be enablers for effective e‐planning, consultation and communication of users' views during the planning, design, construction and lifecycle process of the built environment. These technologies can be used to drive the productivity gains by promoting a free‐flow of information between departments, divisions, offices, and sites; and between themselves, their contractors and partners when the data captured via those technologies are processed and modelled into building information modelling (BIM). The use of these technologies is a key enabler to the creation of new approaches to the “Whole Life Cycle” process within the built and human environment for the twenty‐first century. This paper aims to look at this subject.

The paper describes the research towards BIM for existing structures via the point cloud data captured by the 3D laser scanner technology. A case study building is used to demonstrate how to produce 3D CAD models and BIM models of existing structures based on designated techniques.

The paper finds that BIM can be achieved for existing structures by modelling the data captured with 3D laser scanner from the existing world. This can be accomplished by adapting appropriate automated data processing and pattern recognition techniques through applied science research.

BMI will enable automated and fast data capture and modelling for not only in design and planning, building refurbishment, effective heritage documentation and VR modelling but also disaster management, environmental analysis, assessment and monitoring, GIS implementation, sophisticated simulation environments for different purposes such as climate change, regeneration simulation for complexity and uncertainty and so on. As a result, it will increase the capability for fast production of virtual reality models and comprehensive and sophisticated simulation platforms.

The paper provides useful information on BMI for existing structures.