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Abstract
Residential projects represent the largest section of the construction industry in Oman. It is widely claimed that designers in Oman tend to unnecessarily overdesign structures, thereby aggravating construction costs. The aim of this research was to investigate the existence and extent of structural overdesign through the investigation of 31 villas which were approved by Muscat Municipality between 2000–2010. The specified villas were structurally redesigned based on the British Code of Practice using the same geometry and material strengths recorded in the drawings. The required reinforcement resulting from the redesign work was compared with the provided reinforcement as per the drawings. The results showed clear cases of extra reinforcement in almost all villas. The difference between required and provided reinforcements in the villas ranged from 2.3– 104.8%, with an average of 48.5% and a standard deviation of 24.0. The required and provided weights of reinforcement per square meter of the built-up area ranged from 25.7–71 and 40.9–87.9 kg/m2, respectively. The largest differences between the required and provided reinforcement were in the slabs, followed by the footings. A field survey of consultants and municipality engineers indicated that the most notable reasons for overdesign are the absence of authorized agents specialized in reviewing structural design, a lack of an engineering licensing system in Oman, and the phenomenon of experienced engineers leaving design offices for better paying jobs elsewhere. Finally, the cost implication of overdesign is minor compared to the overall cost of building.
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References
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References
Al-Negheimish AI, Shuraim AB and Al-Tayyar AS (2002), Structural design practice for residential buildings in Riyadh: An overview. The 6th Saudi Engineering Conference, King Fahad University of Petroleum and Minerals, Dhahran 3: 47-62.
American Concrete Institute ACI318 (2008), Building code requirements for structural concrete and commentary. 318-08, 604 Farmington Hills, MI, USA.
Arafah A, Al-Zaid R, Al-Haddad M, Ahmed AE, Al Sulaimani G and Wafa F (1999), Basic studies towards the development of a RC building code in Saudi Arabia. The Arabian Science and Engineering 24(1): 3-18.
Loading for Buildings, Part 1 Code of practice for dead and imposed loads BS6399-1, (1996), British Standard Institution, London. Ministry of Economy, Sultanate of Oman (2011), Statistical Year Book No. 39.
Muscat Municipality, Directorate General of Technical affairs (2011), report on building permits.
Sadek AW, Al-Fadala S and Al-Mutairi N (2006), Improving the design of residential buildings in Kuwait. Emirates Journal for Engineering Research 11(2): 59-65.
Spread Sheets for Structural Design to BS8110, (2012), Reinforced Concrete Council (RCC) British Cement Association. UK. Retrieved from http://www.structural-engineering.fsnet. co.uk/rcc.htm.
Structural Analysis and Design Software, STAAD.Pro (2007), Research Engineering International, Bentley Systems, Inc., Exton, Pennsylvania, USA. Structural Use of Concrete—Part 1 (1997), Code of practice for design and construction. BS8110:97, British Standard Institution, London.
Zhao YG, Ono T and Yoshhara K (2004), An investigation on column overdesign factors avoiding weak story mechanisms of steel structures. The 13th World Conference on Earthquake Engineering. Vancouver, BC, Canada, August 1-6, Paper No. 3448.