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This study aims to develop a machine learning model to detect structure fire fatalities using a dataset comprising 11,341 cases from 2011 to 2019.

Exploratory data analysis (EDA) was conducted prior to modelling, in which ten machine learning models were experimented with.

The main fatal structure fire risk factors were fires originating from bedrooms, living areas and the cooking/dining areas. The highest fatality rate (20.69%) was reported for fires ignited due to bedding (23.43%), despite a low fire incident rate (3.50%). Using 21 structure fire features, Random Forest (RF) yielded the best detection performance with 86% accuracy, followed by Decision Tree (DT) with bagging (accuracy = 84.7%).

Limitations of the study are pertaining to data quality and grouping of categories in the data pre-processing stage, which could affect the performance of the models.

The study is the first of its kind to manipulate risk factors to detect fatal structure classification, particularly focussing on structure fire fatalities. Most of the previous studies examined the importance of fire risk factors and their relationship to the fire risk level.

Fire is the fundamental element of most people’s lives, and when not controlled, the same fire can lead to several catastrophes in homes, offices, schools, lives and other public places with severe repercussions. Hence, this study aims to examine the adequacy and extent of the application of fire suppression systems in residential and commercial property in Ghana.

This study adopts a sequential mixed-mode design comprising quantitative and qualitative research strategies to analyse factors to produce findings. The target population for this study includes shop occupiers, end users of office buildings, and residents in the Accra Central of Ghana. Systematic random sampling was used for the quantitative research, and a sample size of 385 was obtained using a multi-stage and cluster sampling method. A structured survey and semi-structured interviews were used to collect the primary data. The quantitative data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics, whereas the qualitative data were analysed using content analysis.

From an empirical literature review and the analysis, the three main factors contributing to fire breakouts are equipment malfunction, improper use of heat sources and human mistakes. According to the respondents, fire suppression systems were also inadequate, as most of the suppression systems prescribed in the building code were unavailable. Regarding the ability to manually operate fire suppression systems, most property occupiers stated that they are generally unaware of these suppression systems.

This study will aid policymakers in developing interventions for fire safety enforcement by ensuring that fire safety regulations are consistently followed by design team members and property developers, resulting in a positive effect on public building structures performing their required functions. It is also critical to provide end users with education and training on how to operate the fire suppression system as well as effective handling of firefighting installations in the event of a fire.

The findings of this investigation contribute to knowledge and comprehension of the effect of fire suppression systems on building users and may serve as a precursor to the development of a “As Built” certification system for ascertaining the adequacy of fire suppression systems for new and existing residential and commercial property.

This study is based on the consumer purchase intention (CPI) in real estate. The purpose of this study is to investigate the link between CPI and preferred individual investment capacity in buying real estate properties. This study investigates if commonly known factors of CPI such as attitude, social power or subjective norms, perceived behavior power or control, location, surrounding environment and socialization can influence a consumer’s preferred investment amount when buying a house, either for own use or for rental purpose.

A total of 334 respondents participated in this study. The survey data was analyzed using factor analysis technique, ordinary least square technique and Poisson pseudo maximum likelihood technique.

This study finds that location, surrounding environment, property/construction papers, roads, mosque/temple and fire services significantly influence the preferred investment amount of a real estate investor.

This study suggests that a link exists between CPI and real estate investment decision through factors such as location, surrounding environment, legal documentation and communication facility. These identified CPI factors require serious consideration by the real estate developers and their financing partners.

States have intervened with legislation to improve cashflow within construction project supply chains. The operation of the UK’s Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996 leads to payment obligations stated either as a contract administrator’s certificate (or equivalent) or an adjudicator’s decision. The purpose of the intervention would be defeated unless there are speedy ways of transforming these pieces of paper into real money. The combination of the legislation, contractual provisions and insolvency law has produced a minefield of complexity concerning enforcement of payment obligations stated in these documents. Unfortunately, the knowledge and understanding required to navigate these complexities have been sorely lacking. The purpose of this paper is to plug this gap.

Legal research methods and case study approaches, using relevant court decisions as data, were adopted.

The enforcement method advised by the court is the summary judgment procedure provided under the Civil Procedure Rules. An overdue payment obligation, either under the terms of a construction contract or an adjudicator’s decision, amounts to a debt that can be the subject of insolvency proceedings. Although the insolvency enforcement method has been successfully used on some occasions, using it purely as a debt collection weapon would be inappropriate and likely to be punished by the court.

The paper contributes to knowledge in two ways: (i) it maps out the factual situations in which these payment challenges arise in language accessible to the construction industry’s professions; and (ii) comparative analysis of payment enforcement methods to aid decision-making by parties to construction industry contracts. It is relevant to the other common-law jurisdictions in which similar statutory interventions have been made.

This study aims to identify the critical success factors of public private partnership (PPP) power projects in Ghana and further evaluates the most significant critical success factors (CSFs) influencing both the public and private sector participation in PPP power projects.

Ranking-type Delphi survey in two rounds was conducted to establish a comprehensive list of critical success factors of PPP power projects. Using purposive and snowball sampling techniques, experts were targeted for the Delphi survey. Mean score ranking, Cronbach’s alpha coefficient and Kendall’s concordance were used for analysis.

From the list of 37 critical success factors, 9 CSFs were deemed to be extremely significant. The five topmost CSFs were as follows: shared authority, trust and communication between public and private sectors; necessity of power project; debt guarantee to enable private partner to raise funds from the local or international financial markets; appropriate risk allocation and risk sharing; and thorough and realistic assessment of cost, projections and benefits.

The CSFs identified and prioritized in this study have the propensity to trigger policy development towards the PPP power sector in Ghana and developing countries that shares similar context. This is because the study has wide implications for financing, politics, procurement, regulations, legal and capacity building.

The purpose of this paper was to first identify and then model the impact of critical success factors (CSFs) of public–private partnership (PPP) power projects.

Review of empirical literature came out with 20 CSFs which were ranked by experts and industry practitioners through a two-round Delphi questionnaire survey.

These CSFs were grouped into CSF groups (CSFGs) using component analysis, and they served as the input variables for fuzzy analysis. The six components were collaboration and transparency, guarantee and permits, socio-political support, expected profitability, technical feasibility and risk allocation (RA). Overall success index of PPP power projects in Ghana was 5.966 and showed there is high impact of CSFGs on project success. Fuzzy analysis also confirmed RA as the most significant CSFG.

The model developed can serve as a multi-dimension CSF framework that can be used as a success attainment tool for PPP power projects. For policy developers and stakeholders, the model serves as a pointer to issues which the government/public sector must focus on to attract huge investments from the private sector in the power sector.

Concerns regarding the dysfunctional behaviours of public officials have sparked renewed interest in public service ethics and spirituality. While national and organizational systems have been established to eliminate dysfunctional behaviours such as corruption, sexual harassment and misuse of confidential information, the practice continues to have a demoralizing impact on developing countries. The study aims to intend to investigate the empirical relation between the application of spirituality and ethics in reducting dysfunctional behaviours within Ghana's Public Sector.

The study conducted a qualitative case analysis that utilized 28 semi-structured interviews and four focus groups. Interviews and group discussions with public sector staff, managers and policymakers were used to collect qualitative data. This approach facilitated an in-depth investigation into their views on dysfunctional actions and the possible impact of workplace spirituality and ethics in the Ghanaian public service.

The study uncovered a persistent recurrence of dysfunctional behaviours, such as fraudulent activities, resource misuse, unofficial work and inappropriate use of official time. There was uncertainty regarding the effectiveness of integrating ethics and spirituality to curtail dysfunctional behaviours. Nevertheless, the results supported adopting spiritual and ethical rejuvenation in the public service as a universal solution to overcome these behaviours.

This study enhances comprehension of dysfunctional behaviours in Ghana's public service by providing insights into how spirituality and ethics can transform it. The potentials of workplace spirituality and ethics can lead to a strong public service that embodies accountability, integrity and effectiveness, thereby serving as a pivotal device for Ghana's holistic advancement.

Previous students' housing studies have neglected the need to study all-inclusive student housing and quality of services delivery among students with disability. This study explores the expectations in students' housing among university students living with disabilities (SWDs) in Ghana.

The study adopted a mixed-methods approach, involving 423 SWD selected from five public and three private universities across Ghana. Grounded on the Gap Model, the study employed exploratory factor analysis to extract factors of service quality delivery and universal building design for SWD living in off-campus students' housing.

The study uncovered that, expectations of SWD regarding building design specifications hinges more on inbuilt universal design than external building environment designs. SWD are more interested in safety, health, managerial assurances and security. In all, five factors provided a huge gap in services quality delivered by off-campus students' housing.

The Gap Model technique offers a framework that provides an insight for students' housing investors, managers, researchers and local authorities that provides an insight on the needs of SWD in student housing, thus making it possible to attain satisfactions amongst SWD.

Unlike health-related studies that deals with expectations of all-inclusive buildings for persons with disability in hospitals, this study uniquely uncovered the expectations of services delivery and building design support to SWD in the Ghanaian context.

This study aims to explore occupants’ perceived importance and satisfaction with high-rise students’ housing facilities’ fire safety considerations (FSCs). The specific objectives are to explore the FSCs for high-rise students’ housing facilities and assess the level of importance and satisfaction with the FSCs provided in high-rise students’ housing facilities in controlling fire outbreaks.

The study uses an exploratory sequential design with an initial qualitative phase followed by a quantitative data collection phase. Twenty FSCs were identified through the qualitative phase via semistructured interviews. Their importance and satisfaction were revealed through survey questionnaires with 168 respondents who stayed in or were involved in the operation of high-rise students’ housing facilities. Data from the qualitative phase were analyzed thematically, and those obtained from the quantitative phase were analyzed descriptively and inferentially.

The study’s findings revealed that all the 20 FSCs identified via the qualitative phase and confirmed through the quantitative phase were perceived to be very important in fighting fires in high-rise students’ housing facilities. However, only 9 out of the 20 FSCs received some satisfaction among the respondents in fighting fires in the facilities.

This study offers insight into a rare study area, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. In addition, it grants insight into the occupants’ perspective regarding which FSCs they consider essential and their level of satisfaction with such FSCs in fighting fires in high-rise students’ housing facilities.

The proposed use of unlatched, reverse swing flappy doors is becoming widespread in the design of residential common corridor smoke control systems. This article explores the conceptual arguments for and against the use of these systems.

This article relies on industry experience, with reference to relevant building design practices, standards and research literature, to categorise arguments. These are collated into four common areas of concern relating to compartmentation, reliability, depressurisation and modelling practices. A final comparison is made between different common corridor smoke control system types for these four areas.

The article highlights several concerns around the use of flappy door systems, including the enforced breaches in stair compartmentation, uncertainties around system reliability, the reliance on door closers as a single point of failure, the impact of day-to-day building use on the system performance and the false confidence that modelling assessments can provide in demonstrating adequacy. The article concludes in suggesting that alternative smoke control options be considered in place of flappy door systems.

Discussion on the use of flappy door smoke control systems has been ongoing within the fire engineering community for several years, but there is limited public literature available on the topic. By collating the common arguments relating to these systems into a single article, a better understanding of their benefits and pitfalls has been provided for consideration by building design and construction professionals.