Building Construction

Building construction encompasses structures that are built to house people, processes, or animals. The structures are usually designed by architects and engineers or builders and built by either the government or private owners. The different types of buildings include: institutional, educational, light industrial warehouses, commercial, religious, governmental, recreational, space and others. Construction Engineering and Management personnel are the ones who determine the cost of structures, how long it will take to build structures, the processes required to build structures, and they manage the construction processes.

The building construction process begins with geotechnical engineers providing data on the soil and then if the soil is strong enough to support a structure construction begins with the excavation of soil and the building of foundations.

In order to build structures a variety of different materials are used and some of them are prefabricated off-site and delivered to job sites ready for installation.

Building construction involves many complex processes that have to be integrated into one structure and that also have to meet safety requirements for structural integrity. CEM personnel must interpret the drawings provided by design engineers and convert them into physical structures.

Once the foundations are complete buildings start to take on individual shapes as each floor is constructed in a sequential pattern.

Most buildings have smaller members in the upper floors than in the lower floors since the upper floors do not have to carry as much weight as the lower floors. Many high-rise buildings are designed to be narrower at the top to reduce the loads on the lower floors.

Once the shells of buildings, which are called the skeletons, are complete then the outside of buildings, which are referred to as the skin, are applied to enclose the structure in a water and wind proof layer using different materials such as glass, bricks, stone, concrete, or stucco.

Not all buildings are rectangular or round. In recent years architects have been experimenting with unusual shape structures that reflect nature or other objects.

Once the external components of buildings are complete the interiors are built to reflect the desires of the owners.

CEM personnel also get involved in the reconstruction and restoration of buildings to return them to their previous appearance.

CEM personnel are involved in every stage of the building process and sometimes they provide input during the design stage to help designers determine whether what they are designing may be built with the construction techniques and processes currently available.