COIMBATORE INSTITUT OF TECHNOLOGY

(Government Aided Autonomous Institutions)

Coimbatore-641014

DEPARTMENT: B.E.Civil Engineering

TOPIC: Challenges faced by Civil Engineers in Modern Era
MEMBERS: C.Shreeshahi(1701106)
R.Vishal(1701119)
ABSTRACT:
• The presentation widely deals about what challenges
do civil engineers face in the modern world, how they
endeavour their challenges with innovative solutions
and the problems which are going to face in future.
PROBLEM STATEMENT:

• Due to the increase in number of

problems in construction field, it
leads to construction failures
when left unstated and
unidentified.
• As the standards of living is
changing rapidly, the problem
and challenge factors increases
proportionally.
Objectives of this presentation widely includes
• The challenges faced by Civil engineers
• Their efficient ideas in overcoming.
• The aftermath when it is left unsolved.
• Challenges which would arise in future.
 INTRODUCTION
Civil engineering field has a ocean like scope dealing about
Construction and environment. Henceforth, the engineers has
to deal with same quantity of challenges in their field to
satisfy the people needs and save them from any upcoming
disasters.
Therefore one has to figure the problems he/she is going to
face during their construction and it’s possible outcomes.
Let’s see about them one by one and their corresponding
solution.
 SYNOPSIS
• Estimating sea levels
• Enhancing construction site safety.
• Reducing traffic congestion
• Utilising available resources
• Managing groundwater
• Managing housing crisis
 ESTIMATING SEA LEVELS
• Main Sea Level is quite important in construction of dams,
canals, pipelines, reservoirs and sewage lines.
• But, determining main sea level is quite challenging in this
warming world.
• As the melting of polar caps have started to melt rapidly , the
determination of average Main Sea Level(M.S.L) is being a
great challenge for the engineers.
SOLUTIONS:
The key solutions for reducing global warming are:
• The heat liberated from the buildings can be relatively
reduced.
• Using low heat cement in manufacture of concrete.
• Roads should be necessarily designed in such a way that they
absorb more amount of heat and liberate lesser amount of
heat.
• Shape of chimneys should be hyperbolic and taller in height.
 ENHANCING SITE SAFETY
• Construction site safety is one of the ongoing problem and it
has been persisting for a very long time.
• The number of deaths in the construction sites has never
changed as the safety measures provided aren’t adequate
enough to be compatible to the working environment.
• Further, the safety measures followed in construction of a
building doesn’t meet-up the minimum requisites for a safety
building
SOLUTIONS
• Awareness about the type of work the worker is going to carry
and the level of his/her experience.
• Training about the standard of safety and security practices
• Communication among the co-workers about the goals and ideas.
• Documentation of legal documents for special operations in order
to avoid accidents and public scrutiny.
• Proper equipment and safety gear to avoid fatal errors.
• Supervision of employees who avoid safety procedures in the site.
• Innovation of new practices and extra resources for employees’
safety.
• Transparency of the happenings in the construction site to public
and workers.
 REDUCING TRAFFIC CONGESTION
• Traffic congestion is one of the key problems in cities as the
population is increasing widely and the migration of people
has increased day-by-day.
• In order to avoid the clashes of huge volume of vehicles, civil
engineers , especially transportation engineers has to regulate
the flow of vehicles.
• But, the increase in size, number of vehicles and number of
accidents has complicated and poses to be a challenge for
designing roads and traffic control measures.
SOLUTIONS:
• Adaptive traffic signals.
• V2I smart corridors
• Autonomous vehicle technology
• Real time traffic feedback
• Tracking pedestrian traffic
• Car sharing and multi-modal solutions
• Replacing vehicles with drones.
 UTILISING AVAILABLE RESOURCES
• Utilising the available resources existing in the vicinity of
construction site is a great challenge for today’s engineer as
the quantity of natural resources is decreasing everyday
which are non-renewable.
• Utilising the available resources present in the area is also
vital as to reduce the transportation charges of materials from
one region to another and in turn reduces the man power and
energy used up for transportation.
SOLUTION
• Adapting green building concept in construction.
• Identify limitations, such as site access, weather conditions, and so on.
• Reassign resources in response to circumstances.
• Track resources utilisation to avoid excessive resourcing or under-
utilisation.
• Identification of available sources which could be readily broken down
or transported in the area.
• Understanding the types of resources that are needed.
• Understanding the availability and optimum utilisation of resources.
• Understanding the potential for developing resources for new uses.
• Understanding of the lead time required to ensure that resources are
available when needed.
• The ability to redeploy resources if works need to be accelerated, or
if works are completed.
 MANAGING GROUNDWATER
• Since the depth of foundations and the population per unit
area has been rapidly increasing, the groundwater level and
main water table level is getting depleted severely. The
increase in number of landfills has contributed to penetration
of wastes with the groundwater.
• Hence the management of groundwater level and it’s purity is
posing to be a great challenge for the civil and environmental
engineers.
SOLUTION
• Wellhead protection
• Water volume estimation
• Water origin analysis
• Well-field optimisation
• Effective rain water harvesting
• Contamination risk assessment
• Travel time calculation
• Catchment zone analysis
• Capture zone delineation
• Managed aquifer recharge
MANAGING HOUSING CRISIS
• Meeting the housing demand for the increasing population
and standards of people has never ended as there isn’t
efficient housing planning to provide the adequate housing
for people.
• Especially in India, the horizontal development of buildings is
widely adopted by several rich people which results in the
shortage of area for the remaining people.
• In our country, the area is very much lesser compared to the
demand.
SOLUTIONS
• Low cost housing by using low cost materials.
• Usage of locally available materials and alternative
construction materials instead of the mainstream ones.
• Sustainable development and tall buildings can be
constructed by steel structures.
• Government can increase the FSI value.
• Vertical development of buildings can be made mandatory to
any construction.
 OU
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