Construction Design & Management Regulation

The term of CDM is very strange to me, it is very less popular in my country. After attend the lecture, I understand that CDM is similar to Occupational Safety Health Act (OSHA). Then I start to pay my attention on it because safety and health issue is the most important issue in the construction industry. 

This regulation is concerned about the employment of CDM coordinator under certain circumstances which responsible for governing the health and safety issues of construction project. In my opinion, CDM is away better than OSHA because under CDM, CDM coordinator must be appointed at the design stage to manage the safety and health issues. 

This knowledge can help understand more about designer risk under health and safety issues. This has improve my skill of health and safety management under RICS professional competencies framework.

Capital Investment Appraisal

I'm familiar with the capital investment appraisal because I had learnt it before but familiar is not enough. After going through the seminar with Sam, I found what's the problem of me, I know the theory but never put it in the real practice and this integrated project give me a chance to further discuss with my teammate. This module assignment has lead me to discover the importance of net present value (NPV) and internal rate return (IRR). Project with high NPV and IRR represent a potential investment because it provide confirmation on profitability and recover the budget in short time. 

This lecture and seminar help me to improve my cost management skill as required under RICS professional competencies framework.

Refurbishment

Refurbishment is the topic of this week. After going through the lecture, I found that local people prefer refurbishment instead of demolish and rebuild . This incident had shown that local people had high sustainable awareness and tend to reduce the environment impact and maintain the original outlook of the building. 

In my country, Malaysia, people prefer to demolish and rebuilt rather than refurbishment, one of the main reason is people emphasized on the profitability of business. The main issue that deciding refurbishment or demolish and rebuild is the current condition of the building. A old building with lots of defect required lot of sources to refurbish and not mention about high safety and health risk. However, in my opinion, some historical building should be greatly encouraged to refurbish to lengthen the lasting period. Historical building used to memorial our ancestor and culture and also act as an attractive point in the city. In this lecture, I learnt the factors to be considered for making  decision of refurbishment or demolish and rebuild.

Sustainable

This week our lecturer, Ms. Liew had talk about the green development and sustainable development. Through the lesson, I just realized the differences between both development. Sustainable entities are those that meet present needs without   compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. 

Green development entitles are those building built by green technology and green design. That means green doesn't always mean sustainable, and what's "green" isn't always that good. From this lesson I had learnt that we must be smart in green other wise the result will still go bad or even worse. I doesn't mean is bad to go green, but we have to do it right. I used to buy organic vegetable to support "green" because it has less chemical and pesticide even thought it is an expensive option and I was really surprised when I have been told that the extra sources that deliver organic vegetable will bring more harm to the environment and I found that I made a huge mistake from the beginning. After that I decided only choose organic vegetable from local which consume less fuel and other sources. I will also spread the information to my family to prevent them turn good intentions into misdeeds. 

Market Appraisal for Land Development

Market Appraisal

Market appraisal is the topic of week 5. Market appraisal can be categorized into two kinds, which is PESTLE and SWOT. I myself is more familiar with the SWOT analysis which stands for Strength, Weakness, Opportunity and Threat. I used this analysis method frequently in my previous projects, because it is more simple to come up with a list but later on I found that it is far too easy to miss important external factors. Coming up with the results of each factor is not enough, for the SWOT to be successful it is essential to carry out further analysis of all the possible threats and disadvantages from external to make sure that they have been planned for in advance.

PESTLE (Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Legal, Environmental)  that I have learnt in this lecture and seminar stands for the analysis of the external factor which can exactly remedy the inadequate of SWOT. I found that it is a good idea to combine the two to help provide us with the best analysis, for example, it is good practice to perform the PESTLE and then use the results in the opportunities and threat section of the SWOT. I believe the combination of both analysis can help me make better strategic decision in my proposal. Besides that, this market appraisal will help in improving the decision making skill and exposed me to the skill of assessing the environmental risk factor associated with a development which are the essential skills in RICS Professional Competencies Framework.

Site Technical Issues

The geological history of the project area is very important especially when you propose a project in a place that you are not familiar. Study the geological history and old map of the project site is the way to find out the hidden risk. This is the thing I never thought before, and from now on I will "jump out of the box" to find out the risks and key issues, I believe this kind of way of thinking can benefit myself in future career.From this lecture, I have learnt that we can not do the site analysis by observing the current project site condition only, walking around the site location might help us understand more about the site situation but the historical of the area is very important too. My first image to Sheffield is safe, beautiful and friendly, and I was surprised when I have been told that Sheffield had a serious flood in 2007. 

Aerial view of the flooded village of Catcliffe near Sheffield

After doing further research on internet, I found that the local Environment Agency has widened and de-silted many of the city’s rivers working on the management of peak river flows upstream to reduce the risk of flood. In my opinion, every building development on the land has to take the flood issue into their consideration to kill the potential risk before it raise up, and this will be one of the issue I will mention in my proposal.

Matilda Street Site Visit

Building shown in photo above is located at Matilda Street, 10 minutes walking distance from Sheffield Hallam University, which is the building we use in our development  project assignment. During on the way to the site, me and my teammate lost our way and took another 10 minutes on searching the right way, therefore, we had observe the surrounding of site and we found that the site is located at a low crowded location. The surrounding general area has a mix of uses including student accommodation, this is a important issue that we need to take into consideration while we choose the type of development.

A basic survey has conducted by us on site, few works has been delegated between us:

• Measure the internal and external dimension of building by using measure laser and ruler.
• Draw a simple dimension of building and record the building details and conditions
• Take photo 

As this assignment is about to maximize the investment potential, which are either refurbishment or demolition and rebuilt, the existing condition of the building has become the first priority for redevelopment of this building. Through the inspection, many defects have been found out such as water leakage from pipe, damaged ceiling, cracking on column and wall. These factors need to take into consideration to find out the best way to optimize the investment potential. 

Cracking on External Wall

Please feel free to comment or visit my pallet wall presentation about the proposal of redevelopment of building at Matilda Street by scanning the QR code shown below for having more detail information or through 

Website: http://padlet.com/cwhao1991/m1s1qi9l2zsx

Bubble Diagram

During the second lecture, Dave Weatherall had introduce an easy and simple drawing method to us which is bubble diagram. It is a simple drawing that consists of roughly drawn bubbles which can be easily produced by hand.

Example of a Bubble Diagram

I never heard of bubble diagram until I attend the lecture, it allow me to plan my design in the fastest and cheapest way. Before I begin to actually draw my proposal floor plans, it is a good idea to create simple bubble diagrams for my floor plans. This will allow me to play around with the locations of rooms and how they interact with one another. The bubbles can be used to represent different kinds of spaces in a plan, varying in shape to represent features of greater or lesser importance and size. 

In future, I can create an approximate bubble diagram of a space while working with a client. I can use the bubbles to approximately represent the space and lay out other information while client discuss about various features desired. Using these bubbled plans, I can start to develop more precise plans on my development proposal.

Please feel free to comment or visit my pallet wall presentation about the proposal of redevelopment of building at Matilda Street by scanning the QR code shown below for having more detail information or through 

Website: http://padlet.com/cwhao1991/m1s1qi9l2zsx

New Learning Style in UK

The first study week in UK is very excited, every staff and lecturer in Sheffield Hallam University is very friendly and trying  hard to make us feel comfortable, and i do, i do feel like home and can't wait to get into UK culture. 

In the first lecture, lecturer had give a brief about the Integrated Project subject and our module assessment.In the same time, lecturer is leading us to experience the new learning style in UK. I found interesting while lecturer introduce the use of blog and padlet wall, it is a new experience to me, i had use to visit to some blog  but i never be one blogger myself, it is a good method to give reflection and feedback on our study materials. 

In the seminar, tutor has further explain the advantages of padlet wall. It is a brilliant invention to me, i can put things on the Internet was as simple as pasting post-its on a wall. Padlet is a virtual surface that has all the benefits of being digital and the simplicity of a notepad. In simple terms… you get a blank page and put anything you want on it, anywhere – photos, videos, text, websites, lists etc etc. 


I feel that I can make use of the blog to enhance my reflective skill and learning in this subject. The interaction happen to me and my blog visitor, that means i can get more feedback and comment from others; unlike email, the communication only happen between me and my tutor, very limited.  I also believed that this can help to improve my skill of communication and information management which as listed under professional competencies required by Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS).

Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors

Please feel free to comment or visit my pallet wall presentation about the proposal of redevelopment of building at Matilda Street by scanning the QR code shown below for having more detail information or through 

Website: http://padlet.com/cwhao1991/m1s1qi9l2zsx