Suffering in the building sector

Suffering in the building sector

Among the news of the day in the Netherlands: the building sector (I can't honestly call that shambles an industry) will suffer from the effects of the corona. Yawn: is there any crisis that doesn't affect the building sector in a profound way? How long will it take us (and especially the politicians) to realize that the building sector is unsound? One cannot rely on cheap labour and volume of activity for ever, and we shouldn't support them in prolonging the agony.

Buildings are a necessity, not a luxury. We'll always need them and hopefully always ask for improvements, either from an environmental or from an economic perspective. In other words, the built environment is full of promise and opportunity, and could become a stable sector that is not that sensitive to crises. You don't hear the super markets complain that much or that often because people need them daily. Are the buildings we use, also daily and moreover constantly, less important to our safety and wellbeing?

It's high time that the building sector accepts that it's in urgent need of reform; that they need new production methods and better organization. It is unacceptable that in the age of data and computation building projects cannot be completed within time and within budget. We're either failing to plan and organize them properly or producing in outdated, inadequate ways - most probably both. The main problem is that too many stakeholders and actors have to accept the need for change and do something about it. Given the complacency and conformism of most, I cannot help being pessimistic. Too much has to change and we haven't had the brain or the guts to start yet.

Dangerologists

Dangerologists

These are dangerous times, not just for the real dangers for health and the economy but also because of the numerous dangerologists that have been coming out of the woodwork and reminding the public that they had foreseen the disaster in this book, that interview, this blog or than vlog. Sometimes they merit a nod for their predictions but mostly they deserve to be dismissed without further discussion.

Predicting possible disasters and pointing out potential dangers is easy. Everything we do is precarious, from walking on the pavement to flying to another continent, from staying with what we have to radically changing lives and environments. The ant that escapes the soles of our feet knows all about the precarity of life. We know it, too, when we manage to listen to our bodies and their anxieties at the edge of a cliff or in uncomfortable temperatures. The smallest irregularity, the tiniest miscalculation may be enough to bring on disastrous results.

The only thing dangerologists can do for us is open our eyes to systematic errors of judgement, help us identify behavioural and cultural blind spots beyond the basic precarity of life. Walking on stairs is inherently dangerous but should we just be extra careful when doing so or do we need to improve stair design? Is our usual hygiene insufficient for preventing viral infections, is the high density of people in many places inherently dangerous, is the high mobility of our times to blame for the rapid worldwide spread of disease? Much of that seems so bleeding obvious that I don't care to listen any longer.

Why one shouldn't believe in BIM maturity levels

Why one shouldn't believe in BIM maturity levels

One of the holy cows of BIM theory is the notion of maturity levels. Inspired by them, I suggest that there are also car driving maturity levels:

1.  Sitting in the driver's seat in a stationary car with the engine turned off, not touching anything 
2.  Sitting in the driver's seat in a stationary car and operating the windshield wipers
3.  Driving a car in a straight line only 
4.  Driving a car safely under any circumstances 
5.  Driving a car in a way beneficial to society and the economy 

Ludicrous? Well, no less than some of the BIM maturity levels that are currently been taken for granted. 

On a more serious note, I'm not sure what to make of these levels. The appeal of levels and categorization in general is understandable. The problem with categories is that they should be meaningful, that they should make the world easier to describe in a truthful and reliable manner - not develop arbitrary, possibly distorting filters for reality. 

Do BIM maturity levels represent stages in the development of BIM skills and knowledge, similarly to the capability maturity model, where maturity refers to the degree of formalization and optimization in the processes of an organization, from ad hoc or even chaotic to repeatable and efficient? 

I don't think that the adoption of BIM is a similar progression. One doesn't have to start from 2D CAD before moving on to nD BIM. The setup of the BIM maturity levels actually reveals the limitations of the mainstream approach to BIM deployment, including fixations on analogue practices like the production of 2D drawings and the gathering of information around these drawings, which are actually harmful to understanding BIM, as they sidetrack learners to outdated means and workflows. 

BIM maturity levels make too much of the difference between 2D and 3D representations, as if 2D building drawings do not convey 3D information or as if one could make 2D models in BIM. That some of the views of a model are 2D projections should not matter, in the same way that it does not matter that other views are tables. I won't go any further into dimensions in BIM; that chapter has been closed for me with a recent paper in Automation in Construction (Dimensionality in BIM: Why BIM cannot have more than four dimensions? doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.autcon.2020.103153).

What I miss is other indications of maturity and progress, such as the correct use of symbols, properties, parameters etc, the completeness and consistency of models and other syntactic, semantic and pragmatic measures. Surely these are the most significant for the successful use of BIM. The only positive aspect of BIM maturity levels is that they emphasize the significance of a shared, central model - and then spoil it by suggesting that one can do BIM without one. 

Social distancing and design

Social distancing and design

We are constantly reminded to keep others at a distance of 1.5 or 2 metres. Most people try to do so, some ignore the advice to the irritation of the rest and others behave as if everybody is a threat, even at a great distance. Beyond personal reactions, the overall effect is spectacular: in contrast to other times, public space is heavily underused, with lots of space for everyone. It's a joy to be out and about with such low densities of people and vehicles.
I wonder what will remain after the scare is over. Will we revert to the old habits and tolerances, squeezing into every bit of space available to go as fast as possible to our destination? It seems probable that we will forget. I remember cycling through the Dutch countryside during a previous epidemic and coming close to or under flocks of birds. Wondering if they were infected, I gave them a wide berth, trying to hold my breath as long as possible. I no longer do so.
Even more important than user behaviour is the design and management of the environment. We naturally try to keep an appropriate distance at all times, as Edward T. Hall and others have observed. Unfortunately, the affordances of many environments force us to come closer than desired to others. Sometimes a distance of a few centimetres from a stranger is all we achieve in a bus, train or metro, as well as in a air terminal, cinema theatre or classroom. When the pandemic is over and current measures are relaxed, we might be forced to accept the same congested situations once again. Will we react with the indignation such poorly designed and managed environments deserve? Will we demand safe and comfortable distances at all times? How will authorities and designers react? In many respects, such a pandemic is a wake-up call: to invest not only in adequate care when something goes wrong but also in designing environments that can prevent the worst. We deserve public transportation and public space that are generous, comfortable and safe. They come at a cost but that cost seems a wise investment.

Energy and comfort

Energy and comfort 

Energy remains a popular subject at my place of work. Many researchers and even more students have ideas that could turn buildings from inefficient and wasteful into net producers of energy. This could change everything and solve all our problems. 

There is nothing wrong with these ambitions until you realise that they could be serving as an alibi for spending increasing amounts of energy. This is evident in the lifestyles these designs serve. Through the naked window panes of Dutch houses a passerby cannot help catching a glimpse of the inhabitants and their attire: light, essentially summer clothes, with short sleeves, while the temperature outside is close to zero. Are these people so tough or are they used to high temperatures indoors? 

Could it be that the solution to energy problems lies not in new technologies but in lowering the thermostat from twenty-plus degrees to eighteen and putting a jumper on? Unfortunately, that's a rhetorical question of the type only old farts ask, so we have to avoid it. Let's remind ourselves that there's nothing wrong with our current levels of comfort or raising them even further. After all, they keep us healthy, just like frequent air travel allows us to see the wonders of the world. Economising is an outdated idea, out of tune with the circular patterns of consumption that drive the economy today. 

Simple calculations

Simple calculations 

New year, new decade (yes, I know that it actually starts next year but everybody keeps ignoring this convention), so lots of numbers to tell us what happens, for example this little overview:
https://nos.nl/artikel/2316671-nederland-werd-in-jaren-10-drukker-en-ouder-inkomens-groeiden-met-8-procent.html
The beauty of such numbers is that one can make simple calculations that tell more than the numbers themselves. For example, the population of the Netherlands appears to have grown by 700.000. It's a substantial number but it's growth in a decade, so it's 70.000 per year. If we link this to the much-advertised housing shortage in the country, it doesn't seem that bad. Assuming that a dwelling is shared by two persons (the household size in the Netherlands being 2,2 persons on average), we need to build an extra 35.000 homes per year. This doesn't seem beyond the capacities of both the building construction industry and the country (in terms of space). In fact, the same overview states that 366.000 dwellings were actually built in the decade. So, what's the problem?
In the same overview, the total number of dwellings in the Netherlands is reported at 7,8 million. According to data from the same source (https://opendata.cbs.nl/statline/#/CBS/nl/dataset/82905ned/table?ts=1578310186602), the number of private households in the country is just over 7,9 million. It's not a bad match: it suggests that we need to build just 100.000 dwellings more. I appreciate that the number is not insignificant (it's the output of the Dutch construction industry in three years) but it's a far cry from the dramatic pronouncements one usually reads about the housing shortage in the Netherlands. By increasing production to 40.000 or 45.000 dwellings per year, the problem could be easily solved soon - unless of course the urgency to build more has reasons other than providing shelter to the inhabitants of the country.

What architects don't draw (and certainly don't design)

What architects don't draw (and certainly don't design)

I'm collecting photographs of things that don't seem right in buildings. Most are of pipes and cables just attached on the building, marring its appearance, creating places difficult to clean or maintain or even hazards. 

Others are of details clearly not designed, resulting into strange, dysfunctional, unreachable or uncleanable parts. 

 

My problem with such failures is how they happen and why. It appears that even with 3D software, integration and interoperability in BIM etc., there is a lot that we fail to see. Even worse is that we often don't care - and I'm referring to everybody here, from architects and engineers to clients and contractors. We're used to improvised solutions at the last moment, even on site - we are even proud of this capacity, as if any old solution just so as not to halt design or construction is to the benefit of the building. 

I believe that the answer to the problem is quite easy technically but currently impossible socially: there are not enough people interested in changing the production processes in the built environment. If these don't improve, no change in designing can be expected. So, I'll just keep collecting the photographs in the hope that the sheer volume of stupidity they present is enough evidence for some future generation.