Ameer Ahmed Abdul Ameer Alraie

The corona virus pandemic greatly affected Al- Najaf construction sector and its economy. This study examines the impact of pandemic on the sector and assesses the mitigation measures used. A questionnaire was given to 66 construction industry experts, covering 38 variables related to contracts, finance, chain supply, risks, and safety. Results, analyzed using the relative importance index, ranked finance as the top priority, followed by safety, risk, and other factors. Operational aspects, supply chain, and contracts were of lesser concern.

This research reviews the previous literature to identify factors causing the COs to develop a categorized questionnaire based on project cycle/stages. Data were collected through field surveys by completing 45 questionnaires during the Autumn of 2018. Analysis results indicated that the COs in construction sites were the result of 24.10% planning, 24.70% design, 11.30% bidding, 36.20% implementation, and 3.70% handover. However, top-ranking causative factors show that the unavailability of project materials in the market is 2.60%, the economic situation of the country and the lack of financial returns is 2.55%, owner capacity in cost estimation is 2.35%, obstruction and delay in giving responses and approvals is 2.30%, indirect cost is 2.29%, and the contractor’s experience or technical competence which is not compatible with the project is 2.29%. The top-ranking factors which belonged to the design stage were implementation, planning, design, and bidding stages.

School buildings projects in Iraq has been and continues to suffer from a significant shortfall in numbers with regard to the increase in the number of students and the incorrect method of distribution according to areas and spaces, as well as the presence of construction and design problems of those schools which obstruct its performance of functions as that there was no valid and fixed evaluation for this kind of project process. This Paper is studying and analyzing the fact of the school projects in Iraq, all types of primary, secondary, and high schools in particular, in terms of the current and future needs and the numbers and kinds are currently available, then study and analyze design approach used for schools, the common methods of implementation, the extent to which the functional aspect of the schools and the cost and amounts of schools allocated to it through a field survey. In the study of the reality of the school buildings in the central and southern governorates of Iraq to ten governorates, there was a significant shortage of primary and secondary schools and the lack of buildings and their suffering from double and triple work and existing schools are not conforming to the specifications and held by students and the lack of safety and ventilation and lighting required and good environment has been developed treatments required to improve the school buildings in Iraq.

School buildings projects are characterized by a special nature because of plentiful, diversity, different designs and spread across the country. School buildings need to continuous expansion with the natural increase in the population and the actual need of the country to raise the level of education. The most important requirements are the advancement of the educational process infrastructure, which in-cludes the provision of school buildings and facilities. School buildings projects are exposed to multiple risks, including the provision of adequate financial allocations and the induction of suitable designs ap-propriate to the social and financial fact, the creation of strategic and interim planning of the projects and find out the available options for implementation. In this search A mathematical model was implemented using the C # language code and evaluation of the school buildings in two ways first The evaluation of the school in particular from the structural aspects of design, functionality, contracting, cost, operation, maintenance, demolition, restoration and other areas. and second Evaluation of schools in the area in gen-eral and determining the number of students, Number of Classes.

Resource allocation and leveling are of the top challenges in project management, due to the complexity of projects. This research aims to develop an optimization model for resource smoothing, so that. The proposed model is formulated using C++ program for resource smoothing. The project management software MS-Projects is adopted hereto perform resource leveling to facilitate achieving the optimal solution. The proposed model utilizes a system that depends on Genetic Algorithms (GAs) procedure built in C++ program to find the optimum solution. This research reach concludes that it is possible to smooth resources using Genetic Algorithms program and compares then with MS-Project when the GA results are better than MS-Project. Three case studies have been applied in this research and the application results come identical with research objectives, to form the conclusion. Then comes the recommendations regarding adopting and using the research results in construction planning and project management. Further suggestions related to the research subject are proposed for future works.

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