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Standardizing the development, planning and construction of public building projects can contribute to timely and efficient project delivery. This is especially relevant when there are urgent needs for capacity. The purpose of this paper is to share the experiences from the development of standardized concepts for school extensions and prison building in Norway.

The research questions posed in this paper are on the interaction between public entities project delivery models and standardizing building types and the construction method. To investigate the research questions, the paper presents the findings from two case studies: school and prison development and construction projects. It is based on a literature review, semi-structured interviews, document studies and quantitative data on time and cost for the planning and construction phases.

Standardization and use of modularized building systems can contribute to shortened delivery time by reducing the duration of both the planning and construction phase. The most significant time reduction resulted from less time spent on quality assurance of cost estimates prior to the funding of the projects. Project costs increased in the school case, but were reduced in the prison case. An important challenge faced in both cases is a shallow pool of capable suppliers; the actors have approached the challenge with different strategies, yet neither actor has been successful in their attempts.

The paper provides empirical data to add to the collective knowledge on the project management aspects of using standardized project delivery models and standardized (modular) building. However, by emphasizing the interaction between project delivery models and standardization of the planning and execution of the projects, additional insight into the benefits and challenges are highlighted.

The study investigated the perceived causes of structural failure of public buildings, frequency of stability checks, stability checking procedures, measures to enhance public building stability checks and the roles of facility managers in the Accra Metropolis of Ghana.

Following a comprehensive literature review, the study employed a structured questionnaire survey and gathered the opinions of sixty-seven facility managers on the facility management practices. Following statistical pretesting of the dataset for reliability, distribution and agreement among the responses, the study analysed the dataset using mean scoring and weighted analysis.

The analysis showed that external building inspectors rarely inspect stability checks of the studied public buildings in Accra. It is also found that both reactive and proactive stability checking protocols are implemented in public buildings in Accra, but inadequate knowledge of facility managers limits technical stability checks. The study further revealed that stability checks of public buildings can be enhanced through incorporating site and location conditions into the design early upfront, active engagement of facility managers in the design and construction of public buildings, adequate budgetary provisioning for planned maintenance of public buildings, and encouraging appropriate use of public buildings.

This paper, to the best of the authors' knowledge, represents the first attempt to comprehensively examine the causes of structural failure of public buildings, frequency of stability checks, stability checking procedures, measures to enhance public building stability checks and the roles of facility managers in Ghana, from the perspective facility management.

The lack of ‘ubuntu’ (African group solidarity) between project stakeholders in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) public building sector has been surrounded by controversy and strongly held opinions. The work reported in this paper attempts to indicate some salient issues affecting the relationships between project stakeholders. The Botswana public building sector is used as a main case study and follow‐up studies are carried out involving another eight SADC countries. The paper addresses two propositions. First, that the lack of ‘ubuntu’ between project stakeholders is primarily due to an inappropriate project organizational structure. Second, that a default traditional construction procurement system (TCPS), provides a poor relationship management system. Information is obtained on the research areas through questionnaires to construction firm executives, contract managers, site managers, trade foremen and skilled tradespersons on the dominant procurement system used in Botswana. Furthermore, senior technical officers of Public Works Ministries of another eight SADC countries are interviewed as a follow‐up to the Botswana study. The primary conclusion to be drawn is that the building procurement system purported to be in use in the SADC public building sector differs significantly from that recommended in the theory, resulting in poor relationships between project stakeholders. This is primarily due to the use of inappropriate building procurement systems. In general, the TCPS in the SADC public building sector is used as a ‘default system’. This has led to a situation where project management is a ‘fire fighting’ activity, where group solidarity between project stakeholders is out of reach. Salient steps are proposed with a proviso that the SADC public building sector should establish appropriate methods of selecting building procurement systems as a prerequisite in formulating appropriate project organizational structures which will bring the spirit of real co‐operation between project stakeholders towards project success.

Many public-sector building projects in developing countries are prone to variations owing to the changes made to their original project scopes, and economic depressions and stagnations. Cost and time-overruns are consequences of such variations. Thus, variation management in these projects is important. Hence, this paper aims to analyse the methods of managing variations in public-sector building projects in Sri Lanka.

The study adopted a mixed research approach. Seventeen expert interviews and a questionnaire survey were conducted to identify the causes and consequences of the variations, and the strategies that will help manage those variations. Manual content analysis and mean weighted rankings (MWR) were used to analyse the collected quantitative and qualitative data, respectively.

The employer, consultant, contractor and several other factors are mostly responsible for the variations in public-sector building projects in Sri Lanka. Cost and time-overruns, rework and demolition and disputes are the major consequences of such variations. The study findings reveal that a detailed employer’s brief, clearly defined project objectives, a comprehensive design and set of specifications, and preliminary investigations are the strategies that will mostly minimise the variations in public-sector building projects in Sri Lanka.

The study proposes strategies to avoid or minimise the adverse impact of variations, which the industry practitioners can adopt for variation management in public-sector building projects. The study theoretically contributes to knowledge by revealing how variations in public-sector building projects in Sri Lanka can be managed by identifying their causes and consequences.

One of the possible systems of project delivery is design & build (D&B), which is widely used in many countries. In the Polish public procurement market, the D&B system has been applied for a relatively short time, only since 2004, and despite the possibility, so far public clients have applied the D&B system only occasionally. This paper describes the current status of using the D&B method in the public procurement sector in Poland. Five hundred and fifty eight completed public-sector projects have been subject to analysis. Items analysed include the design/builder method of award, and types and value of contracts. The results provide insights for owners, the advantages and disadvantages of the D&B system, and highlight the need to change the method of selecting the contractor for the D&B system.

It is widely accepted that one criterion for determining if a construction project is successful is whether it is completed within the expected budget. There have been advancements in the management of building projects throughout time but cost overruns remain a key concern in the construction sector internationally, particularly in emerging economies such as Ghana. This study aims to answer the question, “What are the critical success factors (CSFs) that can assist reduce cost overruns in public sector infrastructure projects in the Ghanaian construction industry?”

This study used a quantitative survey method. The questionnaire was pre-tested by interviewing 15 contractors to ascertain the validity of the content. Factor analysis and multiple regression were adopted to analyze the data.

This study discovered that the critical factors that can reduce cost overruns in construction projects in Ghana are directly linked to five themes: early contractor involvement in the project planning stage, adequate funding, good project team relations, competent managers/supervisors and project participant incentives/bonuses. This study identifies indestructible, empirically measurable important success criteria for reducing cost overruns in public building projects in Ghana.

When well thought through from the project initiation stage to completion, these critical successes can also be used to deal with damaging economic effects such as allocative inefficiency of scarce resources, further delays, contractual disputes, claims and litigation, project failure and total abandonment.

The uniqueness of this research resides in the fact that it is, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, a first-of-its-kind investigation of the CSFs for reducing cost overruns in public building projects in developing countries.

The purpose of this paper is to utilise a “Wuli-Shili-Renli (WSR)” system approach to create models for complex smart building energy management and evaluate the establishment of a building energy management platform.

The complexity and diversity of the data and demands of the energy management platform mean that it is necessary to analyse comprehensively. This paper uses a WSR system approach to handle, and optimise, the relationship between demands and participants and improve the whole platform. Then, this paper establishes comprehensive evaluation models to analysis the current energy management platforms by using the best integration platform as the baseline.

The WSR conceptual model clarifies the relationship between the elements and elements of the energy management platform clearly and provides the appropriate analytical methods with which to resolve key platform construction issues. The comprehensive evaluation based on a WSR system approach can take into account the systematic effect, so it is more accurate.

The correlation degree between the layers of the energy management platform is rarely reflected.

This paper improves the modelling method used in the WSR system approach and demonstrates that the comprehensive evaluation based on the WSR system approach analyses the energy management platform for public buildings in a synthetic approach.

The aim of the study was to develop a practical construction time model for public building projects in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

This research work used regression analysis and also exploratory scatter and residual plot techniques. Simple and multiple regressions were used for the investigation of the best fit time model. The analyses were carried out using IBM SPSS statistical software, version 20.

The result revealed that the Bromilow time-cost principle was moderately applicable. However, the cubic regression model (CUB) was found a better time-cost relationship. On the contrary, the study has shown a poor relationship between actual time and gross floor area. Furthermore, multiple linear regression analysis (MLR) consists of three statistically significant variables were found a better fit time model.

The study is limited to only six project scope factors. Further research is recommended to include more building projects of similar type and implications of other factors to improve the reliability of the models.

The developed model was not intended as a replacement for detailed construction scheduling techniques. The resulting model is applicable for front-end predictions of construction duration.

The main parties involved in the building projects should apply the model for benchmarking a precise construction time during the early planning phase.

Despite the quantity of collaborations, the vocational network of the housing production in Ankara during its first five years (1923–1928) remains dispersed. The aim of this study is to identify all the actors of housing production and their collaborations which shaped Ankara's urban development as the new capital city.

The study engages with the literature and archival documents to identify the actors of the housing production, i.e. architects, master-builders, public institutions, private companies, contractors and entrepreneurs, and their resultant vocational network in the housing production in Ankara during 1923–1928.

Due to different agendas, such as speculation, financial interests or patriotism, the construction industry in Ankara had become an arena where many paths intersected, forming an intertwined vocational network. The profession of contractor became popular, and local architects, engineers and even individuals of various other professions began to work as mediators for foreign companies and public institutions, which required support especially in large-scale projects.

The dispersed information revealed that the actors of the housing production remained mostly anonymous, or only the famous architects were commemorated; however, others could be found within the lines of the established literature on Ankara and/or in archival documents. This research not only focuses on “salient” actors but also highlights the “silent” actors of the housing production and prepares charts to clarify the vocational network in Ankara during its first five years to contribute to the future studies on Ankara and its housing.

Rework is known to contribute to waste and value losses in building design and construction. Studies estimate its magnitude between 2 and 25 per cent of construction contract sums. Rework‐related waste could, however, be higher if the whole life cycle of building facilities is considered. Rework occurrences are increasing in Uganda and yet the National Development Plan 2010/11 – 14/15 intends to construct additional public buildings. With insufficient information regarding rework causality and magnitude, wastage arising from rework during the implementation of the National Development Plan could be substantial. The problem of rework occurrence in Uganda will require determining rework causality and magnitude. This paper seeks to address these issues.

An exploratory study on rework in public building construction was undertaken through a case study to understand its causality and the timeframe over which it occurs. This preliminary research is characteristically qualitative with the aim of investigating rework causality in public building construction in Uganda. The case study was based on a project that rehabilitated and constructed new buildings in 15 nursing schools across Uganda. Semi‐structured interviews, contract documentation and archival records were used as sources of information on rework causality. Selective coding and subsequent categorisation of rework data was undertaken to support analysis of rework causality.

The findings supplement limited previous research that shows rework as a phenomenon existing into the operation and maintenance stage of building facilities. Rework‐related costs during this stage for the case study, referred to as operation‐related rework costs, were on average 0.25 per cent of construction contract sums. Significant causes of rework were ineffective stakeholder management, insufficient works supervision and use of non‐compliant building materials.

The paper highlights the need for improved design management, effective stakeholder management and a whole life value philosophy in order to reduce rework in public building construction.