Francis, T J; Geens, A J and Littlewood, J (2011) Assessing the effectiveness of maintenance practice, in caring for historic buildings. In: Egbu, C and Lou, E C W (eds.) Proceedings of 27th Annual ARCOM Conference, 5-7 September 2011, Bristol, UK.
Abstract
Building maintenance constitutes a significant component of the construction expenditure of many advanced nations and critical to the sustainability of most built assets; yet there appears little retrospective analysis of just how effective is the delivery of this support service to the care of U.K. historic buildings, or what quality standards are implicitly accepted by those tasked with responsibility for the function. Despite numerous reports having been produced on maintenance practice, over the past three decades, standards of service delivery appear highly variable. This present study reports on assessments made of a sample of eighty case-study buildings (all designated of historic or heritage value). The buildings were evaluated by a detailed observation process as part of a stock condition survey and then condition rating their principal elements and components, against pre-determined criteria. The research method used observations, digital photography and a standard pro-forma template from which it generated quantative data that assessed the quality of maintenance care provided. Analysis of results emanating, indicates wide ranging disparities in the standard of delivery afforded to certain facilities. The aggregate average score of the sampled buildings reported herein, was only 52.3% (expressed as a percentage). Whilst the sample studied cannot claim to be comprehensive, it has generated data that indicates maintenance practice can be improved considerably.
| Item Type: | Conference Paper (Paper) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | asset management; building conservation; condition surveys; maintenance management |
| Index terms: | disparity, built asset, conservation, effectiveness, historic building, asset management, aggregate, survey, maintenance management, quality standard, building maintenance, service delivery |
| Subjects: | environmental policy, materials science, construction type, data collection methods, quality assurance, social justice, asset management, service delivery, performance management, maintenance engineering |
| Topics: | Construction Technology, Sustainability, Business Strategy, Project Management, Research Practice, Engineering Principles, Ethics, Quality Management |
| Descriptive scope: | 3 PCE |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here