Evaluating Problems in Bridge Construction: A Civil Engineering Report

This report investigates the potential problems associated with a bridge construction project, particularly during the rainy season. It delves into environmental concerns like air and water pollution, soil erosion, and climate change impacts, as well as geotechnical considerations such as soil conditions, the risk of flooding, and the impact of landslides. The report also assesses economic factors, including construction costs, material expenses, and labor costs. It offers solutions for mitigating environmental impacts, ensuring quality control, and addressing geotechnical challenges through methods like retaining walls and drainage systems. Furthermore, the report covers highway design principles, including pavement types, factors affecting road design, and safety considerations, to provide a comprehensive analysis of the project's complexities and potential solutions. The report emphasizes the importance of sustainable practices and efficient resource management to minimize costs and environmental impacts.

Introduction
In this report, the problems that might arise from the proposed project of building a
bridge during the raining season will be explained. The methods and techniques used in highway
design and design proposal of the project; design plans of the proposed project will also be
covered. Evaluating the environmental, quality, geotechnical and economic contexts of the
problems that would arise from the proposed project will also be explained.
Evaluate the environmental quality, geotechnical and economic contests of a given civil
engineering problem
The proposed project is located in a valley in which a river flow through. In which a river
flow through. The proposed construction would cause air pollutions, climate changes, water
pollutions, landfill wastes, erosion of soil and destabilization. As the vehicles of the construction
project use fuels to operate, exhaust emissions of the vehicles could cause carbon emissions,
ozone depletion, global warming, noise pollutions. The construction project would also be
subjected to earthquake loads, wind load, rain load and water loads. The construction of the
bridge is also needed to be cautious of collisions, floods, fire, earthquakes and storms. The
construction process should also be sustainable as the construction of a bridge might alter the
water flows and might lead to occurrence of islets and later might cause the disturbance in the
flow of the river.
The quality of a construction project can be defined as fulfilling the requirements of the
owner within the allowed budget and schedule of construction project. The proposed project will
only use materials that have certain standard. The maintenance of the construction project in
needed due to the climate conditions of the construction site. Climate conditions such heavy rain
or storm could delay the construction project, and reduce the durability and strength of materials
such as occurring of cracks. The approved building methods should be used and to improve the
quality of the project, supervision of the technically qualified persons, skilled workers are also
needed to be used. Documentations of activities that would be carried out for the proposed
project will be established to ensure the quality of the project.
As the proposed project is located in a valley and during rainy season, the geotechnical
contexts are important. The conditions of the soil surrounding the construction site should be
investigated. If the site area is contaminated, health and safety of the construction site, damage to
the foundations and structures and settlements can occur. The risk of flooding also exists due to
the rainy season. Landslides, subsidence, drainage, water table should also be considered.
Underground utilities and buried structures are also needed to consider.
In case of economic factors, the problems might arise from the cost of the construction
project, supervision costs, materials and supplies costs, labor and tools costs, equipment,
transportation and other costs. While controlling the quality of a project, cost of prevention of
defects, cost of detecting defects, cost of rejection and rework and cost of reliability and
warranty claim are also needed. The economics of the construction site is also affected by the

local economy. For example, due to the inflation of the local economy, the cost of materials,
supplies, fuel price would rise and the cost of the construction would rise along. Therefore,
reducing the quality of the project if the cost of the quality is exceeding the allowed budget.
Solution for a given civil engineering problem
For environmental impacts of the construction project, limiting the fuel usage of the
construction site through, reducing vehicle idle time, reducing the haul distances, using green or
alternative fuel sources and usage of hybrid equipment. Reusing or recycling the materials
instead of disposing could also reduce soil pollutions, air pollutions and ground water pollutions.
The construction project also is major source of noise and to reduce the noise pollution of the
construction site, time restrictions of the construction process should be performed, as loud
noises during early morning is not appropriate and details of noises and duration of the
construction process should be given the residents. Installation of culverts to prevent the flow of
the river and wild life should also be performed.
For the quality control in construction, to prevent the quality of the project falling from
various causes, the equipment used, materials, needs to be checked for function and quality and
supervision of the construction project. As explained above, A heavy rain might cause various
problems for the construction project. In order to prevent the quality of the project from falling
and to improve the quality, timely control of the construction project should be perform, for
example when the rains comes covering up the construction area that might get affected and pay
attention to the local weather news to predict the rain and manage the construction plans
accordingly. The installation of the drainage systems would also help in handling the flood
usually cause by the rain. The drainage system of the construction site should be sustainable to
prevent affecting the environment. The electricity wires and equipment should be prevented form
exposing to the water to prevent the accidents from occurring and in turn improving the overall
quality of the construction project.
As the weather is rainy season and the construction site, the most concern of the site
would be landslide of the surrounding valley. Therefore, installing of retaining walls, sheet pile
walls and diaphragm wall are needed. Performing remediation for the contaminated soil is also
required. Cut-off methods and dewatering methods can be used for water table and drainage
systems for the flooding. In case of underground utilities and buried structures, a proper site
investigation could prevent the accident from happening. Working during the heavy rain should
also be prevented for safety of the construction project. To prevent settlement, investigation of
the soil conditions and soil improvement and foundation types can be decided for the optimal
solutions.
In economic factors, the material cost of the project could be reduced by buying in bulk
and using materials efficiently. Hiring skilled labor, workers and supervisors should also be
perform for an efficient construction. For equipment and tools, regular maintenance and check
would improve the life of the equipment and tools and using the equipment and tools correctly
would also lower the failure of equipment and tools. Recycling, repairing, reusing,
remanufacturing materials, using sustainable construction methods and sustainable methods

could reduce the cost of the construction project. Efficiency of design, materials, waste,
construction and finishing would improve the economic factor of the project.
Methods and techniques used in highway design
Pavements is a multilayer system that reduce and distribute the load of the traffic and
provide safe, smooth and comfortable usage of the road. Pavements can be differentiated into
two types known as rigid pavements and flexible pavements. Rigid pavements are single layered
and generally lasts longer. Flexible pavements require multilayer construction and consumes
more energy than rigid pavements. However flexible pavement is safer and rather more
comfortable.
Flexible pavements consist of surface course, base course, sub-base course and sub-grade
course. Surface course is the layer which bears the loading of the traffic and mostly constructed
with highest quality materials. Surface course layer provide friction, smoothness, noise control,
shoving resistance and drainage and also prevents the entry of surface water into lower layers.
Surface course can also be divided into two layers of waring course and intermediate or binder
course. Waring course results in direct contact with traffic loads and can be removed and
replaced when worn out. The binder course provides manly distribution of loads. The base
course exists below the surface course and provides load distribution and drainage and frost
resistance. Base course mainly contains aggregates. Sub-base course exits between sub-grade
course and base course and acts mostly as a structural support and also provides, drainage,
minimize frost damage and a working platform. Sub-grade contains of wide range of material
differing in quality and mostly made up of compacted native soils to bear the loads.
The factors affecting the design of the road include traffic factors, level of service,
roadway context, and safety. The traffic volume which is the average density of the traffic that
would use the road for a certain amount of time, weight of the vehicles, height of the vehicles
and number of vehicles. The braking system and types of break should also be considered. The
context of the highway is also affecting the design of the building such as cross-section
determination, street fixtures and detail of the design elements. The safety of the vehicles using
the road is the primary concern of the design of the highway. It is required to conduct corridor
safety audits, crash records and safety signs to improve the safety of the proposed project.