A need for an efficient decision support tool for planning of office building refurbishment is emerging due to the significant increase in the number of ageing buildings in the world. In order to meet this need, all the aspects of building refurbishment projects such as waste minimisation and management, structural strengthening and floor space optimisation, estimation of residual life and construction management issues need to be integrated.
Whilst there are number of such tools reported in the literature to cover other parameters in relation to re-life of buildings, they do not include evaluation of the optimising of rentable floor space and corresponding structural strengthening needs. This paper discusses the methodology for development of decision support frame work to compare and assess options available
to the design team of a re-life project in optimising rentable floor space. The issues to be addressed during floor-space optimisation have been identified and prioritised through a Delphi process. These issues are then mapped against the life cycle of a refurbishment project and consolidated. Decision tool developed as
a matrix to map existing as well as innovative structural strengthening techniques to strengthening needs is presented to demonstrate the application of the proposed model. Click here to read more