Structural Engineering Civil engineering

Hierarchy of Members in a Structure:

Is a branch of engineering that deals with providing
- Slabs people with a liveable built environment consistent with
- Beams the standards and expectations of modern living through
- Columns the applications of mathematics, science, and human
- Foundations experience.

Orientation to Civil Engineering Some of the contributions of civil engineering are visible
and obvious: buildings, bridges, highways, railways,
Human Specific Civil airports, and dams and levees.
Needs Nature of Engineering
Needs Field Area In short, civil engineering deals with people’s everyday
Breath Clean Air Environmental needs and more.
Engineering
Drink Safe Water Water B. CIVIL ENGINEERING’S HISTORICAL
resources and
environmental INHERITANCE
engineering
“The first engineers were irrigators, architects, and
Sleep Liveable Structural and
military engineers. The same man was usually expected
Shelter Construction
to be an expert at all three kinds of work. This was still
Engineering
Move Ways to Transportation the case thousands of years later, in the Renaissance,
around Travel and when Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Durer were not only
Construction all-around engineers
Engineering
But outstanding artists as well. Specialization within the
Safe from Earthquake Geotechnical
engineering profession has developed only in the last
Disasters Mitigation and Structural
two or three centuries.”
Engineering
Flood Water
Mitigation resources and
Environmental After 4000 B.C.,
Engineering
Wind Structural When humans began to abandon the nomadic way of
Mitigation Engineering life, the need for water, permanent shelter, religious
Fire Structural monuments and burial sites, and fortification emerged.
Mitigation Engineering
Early river valley civilizations, such as those around the
Tigris and Euphrates (Mesopotamia), Nile (Egypt), Indus
A. INTRODUCTION (India), and Hwang-ho (China), required canal systems to
irrigate surrounding land so that farmers could raise
Civil engineering is the oldest engineering discipline.
sufficient food to support the population.
From the pyramids in Egypt, the Roman aqueduct
Kings or rulers desired houses larger than huts of stone,
and roads, to the great walls and the grand canal of
clay, or reed; and priests wanted homes for the gods at
China,
least as grand. To protect the growing wealth of these
Ancient civil engineers left their imprint on human early settlements, walls and moats needed to be
history on a grand scale. While the basic needs for civil constructed. These were the challenges that occupied
engineering have not changed throughout the ages, the the first engineers.
content and level of expectation of civil engineering work
have certainly changed with the time because the tools
available to civil engineers are changing with the time.
C. THE ANCIENT ENGINEERS
Some early writing on stone and brick in Mesopotamia
and Egypt has survived, but other written accounts
of ancient engineering in those areas have perished. The
same can be said about the documentation of the
ancient engineering feats of the Persians, Indians, and
Chinese. Because of the limited number of written
accounts, relatively more is known about ancient Greek
and Roman engineering.
Around 100 B.C., several Greek writers created lists
of the seven most magnificent engineering feats of which
they were aware. The typical list included:
1. Great Pyramid at Giza, Egypt
2. Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Mesopotamia
3. Statue of Zeus at Olympia, Greece
4. Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, modern Turkey
5. Tomb of King Mausolos of Karia at Halikarnassos,
(Greece)
6. Colossus of Rhodes, Mediterranean
7. Pharos Lighthouse of Alexandria, (Egypt)
D. ANCIENT STRUCTURAL SYSTEMS AND SUCCESS
FACTORS
In the ancient world, building styles depended on locally
available materials: clay, stone, and wood. Buildings of
antiquity utilized one or a combination of four devices to
support roofs or upper stories:
1. Corbel—an ‘‘arch’’ that requires no false work or
shoring. Stones are layered in courses from two sides,
overhanging each previous course until the two sides
meet in the middle.
2. Post and lintel—a system of vertical columns crossed
by horizontal beams.
3. Arch and vault
4. Truss - a type of triangulated stiff framework made
from straight struts and ties.
- Mesopotamia had lots of clay but no stone or wood and,
thus, preferred the corbel or arch and vault construction.
- Egypt had stone and clay, while Greece and China had
stone, clay, and wood; these civilizations favoured post-
and-lintel construction.
- Europe had abundant sources of wood and
consequently developed the truss.
Underpinning the success of ancient engineers were
three factors:
1. Intensive and careful use of existing principles and
tools, such as the water level and
astronomical observation.
2. Unlimited labour and the power to organize and
command it.
3. A different perspective of time.
E. ENGINEERING IN MEDIEVAL TIMES
The term ‘‘medieval’’ literally means ‘‘between ages’’
and is used to describe the time in Western Europe
between the end of the Roman era and the beginning of
the Renaissance in the 15th century.
Much has been said of the fall of the Roman Empire,
usually dated 476. While civilization continued in the
eastern Mediterranean, Iran, Iraq, India, and China as
before, the fall of the Western Roman Empire was no
small event. Due to the lack of a strong central
government, Roman roads, aqueducts, and harbours
fell into ruin over a vast area. In the West, communities
demolished Roman buildings to make fortifications and
dismantled roads and bridges to slow down marauding
Goths, Germans, and Vikings. Literacy almost vanished,
science became superstition, and engineering
deteriorated to rule-of-thumb craftsmanship.
Meanwhile, in the 7th century a religious revolution led
by Muhammad ibn-Abdallah took place in Arabia. Within
one century Islam had spread from Spain to Turkestan.
These invaders were quicker to master the arts of those
whom they conquered than the Germanic people who
overran the Western Roman Empire. Starting in
approximately 750 for a century and a half, the caliphs
(rulers) in Baghdad employed scholars to translate
Western wisdom into Arabic. For the two previous
centuries the Persians had done the same at
Jundishapur, translating Greek and Sanskrit into their
language. Thus, the Middle East became the intellectual
centre of the Mediterranean-facing world.
In terms of building, the Arabs continued using the
system of fortifications, walls with battlements and
towers, developed by the Romans and Byzantines.
The mosque was a distinctly Muslim style of building that
used domes and arches.
Another uniquely Muslim development was the
minaret—a tall, slender tower from which the public are
called to prayer.
The need for and interest in irrigation and canal building
continued.
Dark Ad
In Europe during what was once called the Dark Ages,
between the 6th and 10th centuries, engineering
and architecture stopped being recognized as
professions.
Design and construction were carried out by artisans,
such as stone masons and carpenters, rising to the role
of master builder. Knowledge was retained in guilds and
advances in technology came slowly.
For many centuries in Western Europe, construction in
stone became rare while wood and plaster were
common, resulting in the half-timbered medieval
building style. Churches were constructed in
the Romanesque style. These were rather plain, massive
stone buildings with small windows and many round
arches.
The 12th and 13th centuries were a period when conflicts
between the major monotheistic religions, Christianity
and Islam, and schisms within them were an everyday
reality. There were frenzied outbreaks of religious
hysteria and fanaticism, including massacres of
‘‘heretics.’’ European feudal lords fought incessantly.
However, engineering began to regain some of the
ground lost after the fall of Rome.
Scholars pondered the nature of motion, force, and
gravity; and Medieval builders made advances in
structural forms. In addition to the semi-circular arch of
the Romans, the Islamic pointed arch was introduced.
Another advance was the use of the truss to support
roofs. Unfortunately, no one could analyse these
structures so Medieval roof trusses had unnecessary
members that contributed to visual clutter but nothing
to the trusses’ load-carrying capacity.
Cathedral of St. Peter of Beauvais in France
The most significant engineering achievement of the
time, however, was the development of the
Gothic cathedral.
The word ‘‘Gothic’’ meant barbarous to the Italians (due
to the name of one of the early invading ethnic groups,
the Goths), but the style spread over most of Europe.
Gothic cathedrals were characterized by soaring
vaulted interiors and large stained-glass windows. In
anticipation of modern skyscrapers, the structure of the
Gothic cathedral was a skeleton, represented by piers
and flying buttresses. The walls were used to keep out
the weather, not as structural support.
Vaults were developed that enabled clear spaces of over
100 feet high. Lacking scientific principles, medieval
builders relied on trial and error.
Cathedral of St. Peter of Beauvais in France
The roof of Beauvais Cathedral with a ceiling of 154 feet,
the tallest of all Gothic cathedrals, collapsed twice.
These massive undertakings could take several
generations to complete.
Castle
The other noteworthy building type of this period was
the fortified castle.
Feudal warfare encouraged castle building. Until the
advent of gunpowder, these edifices were so successfully
engineered that they could withstand sieges for months
and often were captured only through treachery.
One of the best preserved European style castles, Krak
des Chevaliers, was built in modern-day Syria for the
Knights Hospitallers of St. John in the 12th century A.D.
Ironically, the finest Medieval Muslim palace remaining
today is the Alhambra, in Granada, Spain.
Water Wheels
Medieval times also saw advances in the use of water
wheels. The ancients had used water wheels for
raising water and for milling grains. The notebook of a
13th-century craftsman shows a water-powered sawmill.
In the later middle Ages, water power also was applied
to the bellows of smelting furnaces, to trip hammers for
crushing ore or bark in tanneries, and to grinding and
polishing armour and other metal wares.
Canal Building
Improvements also were made in canal building. Canals
enabled people and goods easier movement than did the
existing rutted, unpaved roads; and the development of
the lock changed everything. The origins of the canal lock
are uncertain, but this innovation dates to the late 14th
century in The Netherlands or Italy. In the 1450s the
engineer Bertola da Novate put forward-looking ideas
about locks into practice:
“The dukes and republics of North Italy kept Bertola, the
ablest canal builder of his time, busy all his life digging
canals for them. Sometimes they quarrelled over who
should have priority on his services. His only trouble was
that his workmen sometimes could not understand his
advanced concepts.” - [de Sprague, p. 381]
F. ENGINEERING IN THE RENAISSANCE
AND THE AGE OF ENLIGHTENMENT
Renaissance
The term ‘‘Renaissance,’’ which means rebirth, applies
to Western Europe in the 15th through 16th centuries.
In a narrow sense, the name refers to the revival of
learning that took place in that period. Fashionable
people had at least a veneer of scholarship. Study of
classical antiquity, the writing and architecture of Greece
and Rome, became vogue. However, many other
sweeping changes also were taking place: the
Reformation, world exploration, the downfall of the old
astronomy that put Earth at the centre of the universe,
and the creation of the first patent systems for
encouraging innovation.
Engineering again grew to be respected, and engineers
became famous and, sometimes, well paid. They were no
longer anonymous craftsmen; they promoted
themselves and were not shy about arguing with
employers or rivals.
Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence, Italy
other accomplishments. Brunelleschi first competed for
the award in 1407, received the order to build in 1419,
and finished the task in 1436.
The entire cathedral is 351 feet high, and the dome is 105
feet high (approximately ten stories) and 143 feet in
diameter. The City of Florence also gave Brunelleschi the
first known patent, for a canal boat fitted with cranes
capable of moving heavy cargo. Like others of the same
period—Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo Buonarroti,
Andrea Palladio—Brunelleschi had to serve as both a civil
and military engineer.
Most early Renaissance engineers achieved fame
through word of mouth. Later in the 15th century,
the printing press helped to disseminate engineering
knowledge.
An Italian engineer, architect, painter, philosopher,
musician, poet, Leon Battista Alberti, wrote a book in
Latin on rules of thumb for the proportions of structures,
such as bridges. This work originally was published in
1452 and circulated in manuscript form among Alberti’s
friends. Later, however, it was translated into Italian,
French, Spanish, and English. In 1472, Roberto Valturio
published a book that surveyed the state of military
engineering. In the 1580s, Palladio, who had perfected
the bridge truss, wrote about that subject and others in
“I quattro libri dell’ architectura” (The Four Books
of Architecture).
Through the Spanish Inquisition (starting in the 15th
century and lasting several hundred years) and Counter
Reformation (16th to mid-17th centuries), a dim light
shone on science, as demonstrated by the threats of
torture to which Galileo Galilei was subjected for
proposing that the Earth did indeed rotate around the
sun, rather than the other way around.
This was the Age of Enlightenment (18th century) and
many unforeseen changes were taking place.
In an Enlightened Europe there was a strong appetite for
attack on the church. The church began to lose power
to nations; the Jesuits were expelled from Portugal,
France, Spain, and Naples.

One of the earliest engineers of the Renaissance was the

Florentine Filippo Brunelleschi. He
mastered perspective drawing and competed for and
won the commission to build the famous dome on
Florence’s cathedral, Santa Marıa del Fiore, among
G. THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION
At the close of the 18th century, the first stirrings of the
Industrial Revolution were beginning to be felt.
In England, earlier than in the rest of Western Europe,
the transition from an agrarian, handcraft-based
economy to a machine-dominated economy was
underway. The trend had earlier roots, but mechanized
labour, inanimate power— particularly steam—and
inexpensive raw materials accelerated dramatic changes.
Workers were moving away from home-based (cottage)
industry and shops to mills and factories. In England the
countryside was under assault as scores of towns
emerged around country plants making anything from
cast iron to cotton cloth. In the country, industry could
flourish away from the influence of guilds and
government regulations.
Up until the late 18th century, military engineers
had undertaken the construction of public infrastructure
in support of expanding industry.
John Smeaton ( FATHER OF CIVIL ENGINEERING )
However, in 1768, an Englishman named John Smeaton
is credited with being the first person to call himself a
civil engineer.
By describing himself as a ‘civil engineer,’ Smeaton
identified a new and distinct profession that
encompassed all nonmilitary engineering.
Smeaton’s work was backed by thorough research, and
he became a member of the prestigious Royal Academy
of Engineering.
In 1771, he founded the Society of Civil Engineers (now
known as the Smeatonian Society). His objective was to
bring together engineers, entrepreneurs, and lawyers to
promote the building of large public works, such as
canals (and later railways).
……………………………………………………………………………………..
The Industrial Revolution brought with it new materials
and methods for producing and using them.
Cast and wrought iron are good examples. As early as
1780, cast iron columns began to be substituted for
wood posts supporting the roofs of cotton mills in
England.
Bricks and timber (lumber) were produced using
industrial methods and glass began to replace oiled
paper as window coverings. Structural innovations
accompanied these developments enabling spectacular
early applications in bridges and railroad tracks.
The Iron Bridge over River Severn in England
Iron Bridge, designed by Thomas Farnolls Pritchard, is an
outstanding monument to both civil engineering and the
Industrial Revolution.
In 1779, Iron Bridge, the world’s first cast iron bridge,
opened for traffic over the River Severn in
Coalbrookdale, Shropshire, England.
The bridge was cast in the local foundries by a man
named Abraham Darby III. His grandfather, Abraham
Darby, was the first to use less expensive iron, rather
than brass, to cast strong thin pots for the poor. Under
his son and grandson, the Coalbrookdale foundry
flourished. In 1777, Abraham Darby III began erecting
378 tons of cast iron to build the bridge, which spans
100 feet (30 meters).
The development of mills and factories in the
countryside attracted workers by tens of thousands.
Because good roads and rail systems did not yet exist,
canals connecting locks, wharves, boatyards, limekilns,
and warehouses were constructed at a frantic pace.
The first public railroad opened in 1825. The race was on
to shrink distance and speed up time.
The use of iron and glass continued to shake up
traditional construction methods. According to Kostof,
‘‘Not since the Roman invention of concrete had a
building technology so radicalized architecture.’’
Actually, Kostof continues to say that architects were not
so thrilled about the appearance of cast iron and tended
to conceal or decorate it in the sort of public buildings
they specialized in designing. Its characteristics,
however, were impossible not to appreciate. Iron was
less expensive than stone and possessed exciting
mechanical properties: It withstood fire better than
wood and it could be prefabricated, shipped to the site,
and assembled with relative ease.
As early as 1813 an iron and glass dome was built over a
granary in Paris. Fifteen years later iron and glass roofs
were used to span commercial arcades and shopping
streets for Parisian pedestrians.
England’s most innovative uses of iron were railroad
stations and bridges. Civil engineers embraced these new
materials and created magnificent, awe-inspiring new
structural forms.
For a time, the Scott Thomas Telford, first president of
the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) in the
United Kingdom, lived near Iron Bridge; he must have
been fascinated by what he saw.
Suspension Bridge over the Menai Straight in Wales The
Paddington Station in London
He later used cast iron in many innovative bridge
designs, including a chain suspension bridge over the
Menai Straight in Wales.
French immigrant to the United Kingdom, Marc Brunnel,
and his son, Isambard Kingdom Brunnel, also pushed the
limits of civil engineering design and construction with
projects such as the first tunnel under the River Thames
for the new underground rail system in London.
Isambard Kingdom Brunnel went on to design railroads,
bridges, train stations, and a ship—he also owned the
Great Western Railroad. Brunnel’s design for Paddington
Station in London (1849 - 1854) resulted in a flexible
covered space without columns.
……………………………………………………………………………………..
As the Industrial Revolution rolled along, many social
changes were taking place.
One significant development was the rise of the
professions. New societal needs, commerce, educational
opportunities, and exciting developments in technology
converged.
Institutions and societies were created to lend credibility,
codify conduct, and provide a place where meetings of
minds could occur. The following years are important in
the development of civil engineering and architecture
as professions
Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) —launched 1818
Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) —launched
1834
American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) —launched
1852
American Institute of Architects (AIA) —launched 1857
In the United States, other civil engineers were designing
and building canals, railroads, municipal water systems,
and bridges.
The Croton Aqueduct (Reservoir) in New York City
The Croton Aqueduct was a 41-mile (66-kilometer) water
distribution system constructed for New York City
between 1837 and 1842.
It brought water from the Croton River into reservoirs in
Manhattan. During the 1830s, New York City desperately
needed a fresh water supply to combat both disease and
fire. After numerous proposals and a plan abandoned
after two years, construction began in 1837 under the
expertise of John Bloomfield Jervis.
LONGEST SUSPENSION BRIDGE (The Brooklyn Bridge)
The field of civil engineering grew with the times. A
German immigrant to the United States, John
Roebling, designed the first suspension bridge using steel
cables—the Brooklyn Bridge. Planning for the bridge
began in 1867 and construction was completed in 1883.
The Brooklyn Bridge stretches 5,989 feet (1,825 meters)
over the East River and connects the New York City
boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn. At the time of its
completion, it was the longest suspension bridge in the
world.
H. MODERN CIVIL ENGINEERING
Civil engineering has continued to evolve.
The 20th century saw increasing specialization and
advancements in theoretical understanding, materials
and methods, and technologies.
Just as the Greeks compiled a list of The Wonders of the
Ancient World, the American Society of Civil Engineers
has compiled a list of wonders of the modern world.
The Millau Viaduct in France
The Millau Viaduct, a large cable-stayed road-bridge
spanning the valley of the River Tarn in
southern France, was completed in 2004. Designed by
structural engineer Michel Virlogeux and British
architect Norman Foster, it is the tallest vehicular bridge
in the world. One mast’s summit is 1,125 feet (343
meters), only 125 feet (38 meters). The bridge won the
2006 International Association for Bridge and
Structural Engineering (IABSE) Outstanding Structure
Award
Taipei 101, Taipei, Taiwan

Taipei 101, completed in 2005 in Taipei, Taiwan, was the

world’s tallest building until being surpassed by Burj
Khalifa.

Designed by C.Y. Lee & Partners and constructed by

Samsung Engineering & Construction, Taipei
101 incorporates many innovations necessary to build
skyscrapers in earthquake and high wind zones. The
building is 101 stories above ground (1,670 feet, 509
meters) and five stories underground.

A steel-tuned mass damper (TMD) weighing 662 metric

tons and consisting of 41 layered steel plates welded
together to form a 5.5-meter diameter sphere is
suspended from the 92nd and 88th floors. The TMD acts
like a giant pendulum to counteract the building’s
movement, reducing sway by 30 to 40 percent.

Burj Khalifa, Dubai

Burj Khalifa, formerly called Burj Dubai, has held the

record for the world’s tallest building at 2,717 feet
(828 meters) since 2010.