Rs. 38 Million SLIA housing project for eastern province

The objective of this project is to improve the living facilities by involving construction of model settlements in tsunami affected areas in Kuchchaveli Divisional Secretary's Division in Trincomalee District - Eastern Province of Sri Lanka.

General Description and Project area

In the last stage of the shelter program to re-house tsunami victims in affected areas in South, East and North of Sri Lanka, the Urban Development Authority (UDA) offered the required lands to SLIA in Kuchchaveli Divisional Secretary's Division in Trincomalee District - Perker Rd. site (voice of German Rd) - Eastern province to build 64 houses through the Architects Fund to Shelter Tsunami Victims (AFSTV).

Sri Lanka Institute of Architects (SLIA) will carry out this project with the Ministry of Urban Development and Water Supply and Urban Development Authority and support from donors sponsoring individual housing unit, group of units or total settlement.

SLIA

* Initiate and monitor the separate fund called AFSTV
* Manage and co-ordinate the construction work
* Monitor and present the progress of each project to the donors of the respective project on regular base.
* Construction of houses will be awarded to the contractor either registered with ICTAD or a government construction agency with a contractual agreement in order to ensure the successful completion.
* Monitor the construction of houses to ensure conformity with the planning guidelines, designs and standard specifications

The Ministry of Urban Development and Water Supply and Urban Development Authority

* Consultation with the government of Sri Lanka to ensure the smooth and speedy implementation of this construction project.
* UDA provide lands including infrastructure facilities such as roadways, drainage, street lighting and water supply up to the blok of land including the house within the project plan.
* Allocation of houses to recipient families will be selected in consultation with the Divisional Secretaires and other State agencies and groups associated disaster relief activities.

House types and estimated project cost

SLIA provides 4 types of design options of generic housing forms in keeping with the planning guidelines, design specifications and standards given by the UDA considering the different locations, situation of recipient families (number of members of family), technical aspects etc.

Every type of housing units have plinth area a round 500 Sqft including one or two bedrooms, a living room, kitchen, toilet and small verandah and also cost per Sqft around SLRs. 11000 including basic amenities such as water supply, electricity supply and considering the technical aspects under 3.2. This project will cover establishment of 64 houses which is selected from 4 types of houses as equally proportion.The necessary infrastructure facilities such as roadways, drainage, street lighting and water supply will be provided by UDA and other charges for facilities of construction work are included in estimate under preliminaries-Bill No-01.

Initial Budget Estimate for proposed project

The total estimated cost of the project is approximately SL Rs. 38 Million and this does not include VAT and project management charges.

Technical Aspects

It was realized that most of the buildings, which had collapsed/damaged due to tsunami, were mainly due to the poor construction practices without considering the hazard proneness of the areas to avoid this the following guidelines have to be considered.

* The stiffener columns should be introduced to 4" cement block walls at regular interval and these are tied together using beam at DPC and roof levels.
* Width of the foundation not less than 2.5 times of wall thickness
* Provide plinth height not less than 9" from the existing ground level
* Internal as well as external walls should be plastered
* Roof should be anchored to wall or R/F of corner columns

Time frame

* The commencement of implementation will be depending on the responses of the donors to select sites and method of support from donors may sponsor individual housing unit, group of units or total settlements.

* The total project will be completed within the period of Nine (9) months from the date of awarded.

However the project will commence with the preparation of a more realistic work program with the contribution of each party.

SLIA on essential milestones to be achieved for a successful tsunami building project

Government's responsibility (UDA)
Project Specifics

* Identification of Project and location
* Detailed Client's Brief including accommodation, sizes of house, number of houses, other buildings, play-grounds and other facilities to be provided

* Allocation of Land, extent, ownership, name of officer who will identify the site boundaries.
* Details of recipient families, their caste, social & cultural background.

* List of officers to be contacted in the area including their addresses and contact details.

* Identification of Donor Agency and their contact person
* Government agreed funds allocation for the project.

* Building Code & any special specification required to be provided

Site Specifics

* Preparation of survey plan including site features, identification of boundary stones, spot levels at 6.0 Metre intervals in both direction, approach road, trees, levels, drainage pattern of the site. (Survey plan with the distance of the sides of the boundaries including angles).

* Provide special Local Authority regulations applicable to the site. Coastal reservations, forest reservations, street lines, any other law enforcement to the site.

* Information about supply of electricity, water and arrangements for sewerage.

* Planning Clearance - Based on the layout plan identification of lots by pegging at the boundaries including the preparation of total survey layout plan and preparation of individual lots survey plans for handing over deeds to recipients.

* Taking over the houses jointly with the Donors and handing over to the recipients

* Approval of building/layout plans

Donor's responsibility

* Donor to agree with Government of Sri Lanka (UDA) to finance the specific housing project and to spend the stated amount of funds

* Donor to enter into a Client/Architect agreement, specified by the Sri Lanka Institute of Architects (SLIA) with the Architect/Architectural practice Identified by the SLIA and pay direct to the Architect/Architectural practice their fees at the appropriate stage as indicated in the agreement.

* Donor to agree the SLIA to monitor the progress of the project.

* The Donor to identify the officer designated to communicate with the Architect.

Architect's responsibility
Design

* Verification of site boundary
* Preliminary settlement plan
* Design of housing types
* Design of community infrastructures
* Soil Investigation (if required)
* Schematic designs for:

** Structural
** Electrical
** Water supply and sewerage
** Road network/Culverts, Boundary walls
** Storm water drainage

* Estimation of costs
* Planning/Building approval from UDA
* Community Level stake-holders consenses
* Design development documents consisting of Plans, Sections, Elevations, specifications
* Environmental Effects and Mitigatory Measures
* Revised Estimated cost

Contract documentation

* Sub Division plans with Assmt. No. of houses
* Preparation of the following full set of documents

** Architectural Working Drawings
** Structural Design Drawings
** Electrical Design Drawings
** Plumbing and Sewerage Design Drawings
** Storm Water Drainage Drawings
** Road Design Drawings
** Specifications
** Conditions of Contract and other documents
** Pricing preambles and Bills of Quantities

* Authority to Agree on the Provision of Electricity, Water to Site
* Check Design with the relevant codes/Standards

Bidding and negotiation

* Obtain Guarantees
* Pre-Bid Meeting
* Work programme
* Closing and opening the Tender
* Tender Evaluation Report
* Draft the letter of Award
* Negotiations with the Contractor.
* Letter of Acceptance and Award of Contact
* Signing of Contract

Contract administration

* Handing over site to contractor
* Check Bank Guarantee, Insurance, Bid Bond, Performance Bond etc.
* Appoint the technical staff and Resident Engineer
* Check setting out
* Progress Review Meetings
* Certification of progress Payments
* Check Quality of work/obtain Test Certificates
* Handing over the building to the Donor and issue the Certificate of Practical Completion
* Obtain As-built drawings
* Inspections during the Defect Liability Period
* Issue the Final Certificate.

Architecture, architects and housing

In most of the developing countries the social housing was considered to be an obligation by the state since the 1960s. Even before, at the inception this took the form of worker housing in urban centres especially in countries which were under the colonial rulers.

Even the ambitious housing programmes of the recent past were extensions of the social housing strategies of the past through which standard type houses were built in increasing numbers.

For example the Hundred Thousand Houses Programme (HTHP) of Sri Lanka advocated the use of type plans either through direct construction component or the self-help component. Up to late 1970s the developing countries were encouraged by the developed countries to follow this strategy where housing was considered as another consumer item only.

But since 1970s the politicians of the developing world were persuaded by the professionals (mainly non-architects) in the developed world and the international lending institution to follow a path of 'Minimal Intervention and Maximal Support by the State' which the politicians were too eager to grab. Surely the politicians were certain of reaching more number of families with this new strategy.

They paid no heed to the deterioration of urban fabric through unplanned subdivision of land or urban sprawl which eventually disturbed the social integrity and the priorities of the rural people.

Since it is quite obvious and widely accepted now that there is no need to formalise the housing process of the rural sector, let us concentrate only on the issue of urban housing in this paper. Housing is in fact not a problem in the rural areas where traditions are alive.

Recent attempts by architects

In order to establish the directions for a successful housing strategy for the less privileged urban families we will study several attempts made by architects in other countries, especially in the less privileged areas.

Attempts made by architects towards finding solutions to this problem could be categorised into 3 types.

1. Solutions through innovative designs by architects.

2. Major decisions in design and construction taken by the future occupants of the houses while architects play the role of a catalyst.

3. Architect and the future inhabitants play equally important roles in the design and construction process.

PREVI project in Lima, Peru

In early 70s some governments in the developing world were receptive to the ideas of the professionals in the field of housing and they still believed that the architects were in the best position to plan out the settlements for the masses. Out of the several approaches of the states it is quite interesting to study the example from Peru.

This was in the form of an international competition called PREVI (Project Experimental De Vivenda) and it was intended to select several internationally known architects to plan out a settlement of 1500 families and to use the house plans and ideas thus generated in the other mass housing projects in Lima Peru.

The architects selected to do this exercise included Christopher Alexander, Aldo Van Eyck, James Sterling, Maki, Kurokawa & Kikutaki.

Out of the 1500 houses that were to be built originally, only 502 houses were constructed in 23 different design schemes by foreign and Peruvian architects.

(This perhaps demonstrates the inevitable outcome of architects' involvement in housing the poor.) Land was set aside for 2000 more houses later which were to be based on the best ideas and technologies adopted in the first built.

Although there were attempts by Christopher Alexander to use innovative materials and technologies in his houses ultimately it was decided to use various forms of concrete blocks to construct houses designed by all the architects. There were sincere efforts made to incorporate the values of the Peruvian ways of use by trying to maintain the accepted relationship of public and private areas.

Aldo Van Eyck maintained that what the dwellers want now could change in the future. The compounds had hexagonal plans and they were arranged around a common courtyard contrary to the row-houses of Christopher Alexander. This shape discouraged the outward additions to a certain extent.

Out of the different schemes Maki's one has allowed for future additions to a greater extent and about 60% of the houses have undergone major changes and it is said that even he would not be able to recognise his design now.

Even Alexander's houses were not exception when considering the changes made by the occupants later. At least 25% of them have been changed by the occupants.

The houses were occupied in 1976 and Dorit Fromm who visited the scheme a decade later has found that many of the architects would hardly recognize their designs which have been greatly added to and adapted by the inhabitants. She says "All over the PREVI project, most home owners did not choose their houses for appearance or style, but for location, size and price. Residents bought the house that they could afford; then altered to suit themselves."

This project is a clear example which strengthens the concept that design and construction of houses for the masses should not be product-oriented but process-oriented.

This is a State-sponsored housing project which was aiming at finding a replicable solution to large-scale housing projects which would be socially, culturally and aesthetically acceptable and affordable to the low income earners.

The exercise was to be carried out through a team of Government & Non-Governmental organizations, the school of Architecture, the Architectural consultants and the users, The organisations involved were Housing & Urban Development Corporation (HUDCO), the Architects of the Slum Department, All India Women's Conference, Central Building Research Organisation and the Management and Construction Departments of the School of Architecture, Delhi.

Although much emphasis was given to the use of innovative technology, economical use of materials, correct construction supervision and project Management methods, the architectural design was given its due importance at the design of individual housing units and the housing clusters and the construction of same to form the settlement.

Architects at HUDCO and the other senior architectural consultants played a very vital role in designing the several types of housing units in keeping with the ways of life, the affordability and the cultural and social practices of the future occupants. Prior to implementation, the designs were forwarded to the community so that the members could make their suggestions for necessary alterations to suit their needs.

In planning this project, several basic criterias which were the findings of Vastushilpa Foundation of Ahmedabad, India were treated as important. They are:

I. Narrow long plots may be appropriate for new housing but for cluster housing square or broad frontage plots may be more efficient; such plots also permit better ventilation and planning.

II. Instead of an open space in each plot it would be better to allow 100% buildable area with open public space both in the front and back. The back space should be a lane about 2 metres wide.

III. The cluster should enclose a defined semi-private area for community use of the families living within the cluster.

Most of the state-sponsored mass housing programmes of the developing countries in the recent past adopted this method with varying degrees of interference by the governments. Sri Lanka was too enthusiastic and optimistic about the success of this programme. In fact in the rural areas the only role the State had to play was to give ownership of land to the landless poor and provide them with very meagre housing loans.

Although the National Housing Development Authority which was the planning and implementation agency of this programme organised to provide technical advice to the rural house builders, in most cases this was really not necessary since the rural folk had the knowledge of building with the locally available materials.

In the case of the State-sponsored housing programmes for the urban poor in Sri Lanka the situation was more complex because the land was scarce, land values were high, provision of basic services networks were costly and the community does not possess an urban building tradition.

Here the intervention of the State through its officials in the spheres of Planning and Engineering was more. Most of the decisions on the land subdivision were taken by the politicians & planners. The planning of the networks of services were done by the engineers.

- Architect Vol. 101

No. 12

New safety standards urged for US skyscrapers
 

by Catherine Hours

Federal safety investigators called recently for tighter fire standards and evacuation policies in US skyscrapers after the destruction of the World Trade Center in the September 11, 2001 attacks.

The importance of improved safety measures was highlighted by engineers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) that followed a three-year probe into the collapse of the twin towers. Their report recommended updating `century-old' standards for fire-resistance testing, installing fire-protected and structurally hardened elevators and improving emergency response training for the occupants of tall buildings.

"We believe these recommendations are both realistic and achievable within a reasonable period of time, and should greatly improve the way people design, construct, maintain and use buildings," said the lead NIST investigator, Shyam Sunder.

It should also result in "safer and more effective building evacuations and emergency responses," he added.

Although the report's 30 recommendations are not binding, Sunder urged the building and fire safety communities to give them `immediate and serious consideration.'

In a previous presentation of its findings in May, the NIST panel had concluded that the twin towers would probably be standing today if the impact of the planes used in the September 11 attack by Al-Qaeda hijackers had not destroyed fireproofing material.

The 10,000-page report by the NIST, a branch of the US Commerce Department, was compiled by 200 engineers and technicians and cost 16 million dollars in federal funding.

Despite its comprehensive scope, the investigation has not been without its critics.

"We feel that this investigation should have been ... more bold in their identification of 'issues and findings,'" said a statement issued by the Skyscraper Safety Campaign, a lobby group made up of relatives of some of the 2,749 victims of the trade center attack.

"There should have been less influence by the construction industry on the investigation," the statement added.

AFP