56 / JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT IN ENGINEERING / SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1999

PEER-REVIEWED PAPER
INCORPORATING MAINTAINABILITY IN
CONSTRUCTABILITY REVIEWPROCESS
By Phillip S. Dunston,
1
Associate Member, ASCE, and Craig E. Williamson
2
ABSTRACT: Life cycle cost or total cost analysis of a facility begins with the initial design
concept and ends with the decommissioning of the facility. Decisions made during the design
and construction phases routinely consider only the construction costs when analyzing the
constructability of the project. Often the impacts of such decisions on the maintenance re-
quirements for the facility are not fully appreciated and are therefore not formally addressed.
The concept of maintainability addresses this concern and is a logical extension of the
constructability concept. As such, maintainability may be incorporated as a part of the formal
constructability review process (CRP). This article describes a model format for incorporating
the best practices for maintainability into the CRP. The added life cycle value of incorporating
maintainability into the CRP can only be assessed by analysis of accurate and complete
maintenance cost data. Insights from such an analysis may facilitate more accurate estimates
of the total costs of facilities.
INTRODUCTION
Life cycle costing techniques stipulate that the total
cost analysis of a facility must begin with the initial
design, construction, and operation, including mainte-
nance, and continue through the decommissioning. De-
signs are routinely scrutinized in the light of construct-
ability in an effort to minimize costs in the construction
phase. Failure to properly use constructability standards
that intelligently incorporate modern materials and pro-
cedures in the design and construction of building facil-
ities will produce problems for the facility maintenance
crews charged with the upkeep of these buildings. Thus,
constructability decisions must address the issue of
maintainability.
Optimal constructability has been dened by the
Houston Business Roundtable (1995) as, the optimum
use of construction knowledge and experience in plan-
ning, design/engineering, procurement, and eld opera-
tions to achieve overall project objectives. This de-
nition is accurate for the initial building process from
design to construction, but it does not address the main-
tainability of the design and operable functionality of the
1
Asst. Prof., Dept. of Civ. Engrg., Box 352700, Univ. of Washing-
ton, Seattle, WA 98195-2700.
2
Proj. Mgr., KPFF Consulting Engineers, 1520 Fourth Ave., Ste.
500, Seattle, WA 98101.
Note. Discussion open until March 1, 2000. To extend the closing
date one month, a written request must be led with the ASCE Man-
ager of Journals. The manuscript for this paper was submitted for
review and possible publication on May 18, 1998. This paper is part
of the Journal of Management in Engineering, Vol. 15, No. 5, Sep-
tember/October, 1999. ASCE, ISSN 0742-597X/99/0005-0056
0060/$8.00 $.50 per page. Paper No. 18371.
facility after the construction process is complete. An-
other denition from Grifth and Sidwell (1995) ex-
plains the concept more broadly as, basically, being
more searching within construction design, so as to de-
velop the effective facets and eliminate the detrimental
aspects. This approach more completely denes total
cost for the project.
For the purposes of this article optimal maintaina-
bility is dened as follows:
The design characteristic which incorporates function,
accessibility, reliability, and ease of servicing and repair
into all active and passive system components, that max-
imizes costs, and maximizes benets of the expected life
cycle value of a facility.
The costs of design and construction are minor com-
pared to the total costs of a structure. A large propor-
tion of (the) total cost will occur during (the) in-service
life, typically from 50% to as much as 80%, (and) the
earlier design, development, construction, and manufac-
turing activities may be as little as 25% of what will
subsequently be needed to operate, maintain, and over-
haul the new asset (Grifn 1993). The relative costs of
the life cycle phases are illustrated in Fig. 1.
CONSTRUCTABILITY AND MAINTENANCE
The constructability review of a design is an important
step in assessing how a project will be built. Experience
in the physical construction process is critical to learning
the features of different construction elements and their
responses to environmental stresses. The ability to iden-
JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT IN ENGINEERING / SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1999 / 57
FIG. 1. Life Cycle Costing Prole (Adapted fromGrifn 1993)
FIG. 2. Optimum Design Input (Adapted from McGeorge
1988)
tify shortcomings in a systems design or a materials
function before it is placed into use is important in con-
structing a facility that is buildable and will function as
intended.
Maintenance problems in facilities are heavily attrib-
uted to design limitations, inadequate inspection, mate-
rial limitations, and lack of construction knowledge (As-
saf 1995). Failure to acquire and communicate expert
knowledge on the design requirements, system/compo-
nent incompatibilities, and performance limitations of a
product is a commonly cited source of subsequent prob-
lems for maintenance personnel. The task of the designer
to recognize shortcomings can be difcult if there is a
lack of understanding of the function of the material or
system. Design decisions and substitutions made during
construction increase the likelihood of such difculties
due to inadequate information and product research.
Contractors and inspectors also may not understand the
performance criteria of a particular system or material.
Therefore, they may not recognize the inadequacy of
materials and systems to function as desired. Being
proactive instead of reactive to conicts helps in reduc-
ing construction costs, which in turn may reduce sub-
sequent maintenance costs. Likewise, recognition and
development of updated maintenance techniques and
maintenance schedules are key to mitigating problems
and are too often overlooked as a necessary expense in
the long-term operation of a facility.
Lack of owner funding can often result in poor ma-
terial system performance. Owners must recognize that
insufcient funding of design and construction will im-
pact future maintenance capabilities. Lack of funding is
a common reason for the selection of alternative material
systems that may not meet performance standards. De-
signers must be able to demonstrate that increases in
design and construction costs due to designing for main-
tainability can be offset by reduced maintenance costs.
MAINTENANCE INVOLVEMENT IN
CONSTRUCTABILITY REVIEWPROCESS
There are critical elements in the design and construc-
tion process that offer opportunities to signicantly im-
pact maintenance, and thus, total costs in the facilities
that use maintainability considerations in the CRP. Con-
ducting periodic, documented, well-organized construct-
ability reviews during the predesign and design phases
of the project allows key managers from all departments
to be involved in order to ensure the proper input of
concerns from their departments operations. Between
review meetings, the designers research the effectiveness
and justication of documented requests and either in-
corporate the ideas or offer alternatives that may provide
the desired results at less cost.
Development Phasing
Periodic constructability reviews may be conducted at
different stages of completion of the design phase. Typ-
ical procedures incorporate these reviews at the project
concept report phase, 30%, 60%, and 90% plans; spec-
ications; and estimate phases (Philip 1995). At 30%,
the most benet is derived for the least cost of accom-
modating a new design input. On the other hand, at 90%,
the least benet is derived for the greatest cost of ac-
commodating a new design input. Fewer or less detailed
reviews are sometimes appropriate because there is a
point at which the timing, number of reviews, what is
generated from them, and how they inuence construc-
tion costs become counterproductive from a total cost
basis. Fig. 2 was adapted to illustrate the impact of the
level of design effort on the total cost of a facility
(McGeorge 1988). Constructability reviews are aimed at
58 / JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT IN ENGINEERING / SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1999
moving beyond the typical level of effort, denoted by A,
to approach the optimum level, O, which should yield a
lower total cost, C
O
, compared to the typical cost, C
A
.
The experience of maintenance personnel and the typical
percent cost ranges shown in Fig. 1 indicate that incor-
porating maintainability in the review process can facil-
itate this desired lowering of total cost.
Organization
Conducting these meetings in a formal, organized
fashion is critical to reduce the time key managers must
commit to attending these meetings. Sometimes it may
be necessary to conduct additional smaller meetings be-
tween lower tier supervisors and subconsultants within
the design team so they can tackle difcult issues in
more detail and report the outcome back to the main
design team.
Communication
Communication of changes made to the design during
the review process is critical to eliminate duplication of
work, coordination between systems, and conrmation
of the changes. A master le that can be distributed to
the owner, the owners representative departments
(maintenance, custodial, etc.), all design consultants, and
if used, the construction manager, and the contractor, is
essential during the review process. Proper management
of communications consists of selecting the mode and
timeliness of information transmittal and determining the
appropriate recipients of information. Communication
options include telephone, fax, teleconferencing, and
computer networking. A local area network can be es-
tablished and accessed from each ofce, as well as from
modem-equipped, security access-controlled remote per-
sonal computers, specically for the purpose of distrib-
uting information within a company or among members
of a project team. The list of recipients of information
or the list of participants in meetings should consist of
parties who are impacted by the design decisions, able
to provide relevant information for design decision mak-
ing, or able to actively participate in implementing a
design decision. The time spent in review meetings
should be signicantly reduced by using the appropriate
communication alternatives, and meeting time should be
dedicated to solving more complex issues that require
face-to-face resolution.
Personnel
Identifying the key personnel that attend the review
meetings is dependent upon the items to be discussed in
the review. A critical individual that should be in all
meetings is a manager from the maintenance department.
These individuals provide insight to the effects of
changes made to the systems and particularly how the
systems will interface. If a system that is being consid-
ered is unfamiliar to the owners regular maintenance
staff, then it is critical that the design team consult the
system manufacturer and in-place system users to pro-
vide information relevant to the education and training
required for the proper operation and maintenance of the
equipment and systems being considered.
Construction
Once the design is complete and the project is bid, the
owner, designer, contractor, and construction manager
must work closely during the construction phase to mit-
igate any difculties that the construction process may
reveal. Review processes have the best intentions to
eliminate errors and omissions, but real world conditions
often differ from what is often anticipated, as do the
owners desires as a project develops, particularly if the
original scope of work was not well dened. Frequently,
in fast track projects, the details on systems are still
evolving as the design is ongoing. The designer may not
have time to fully specify the system but proceeds with
the knowledge that a change order will be effected to
incorporate the complete system during the contract. A
key element in the successful implementation of changes
is to keep the members of the constructability review
committee informed of progress as the project is under
construction. Reviews and inputs to the changes should
be requested via whatever communications system is
used to ensure the effectiveness of the interfacing sys-
tems.
Mock-Ups
Sample mock-ups of systems that are to be installed
on the project are a critical element in translating the
designers intent and revealing the contractors under-
standing of the plans and specications as they were bid.
A good rule-of-thumb to follow is to make sure the crit-
ical elements of the system are included in the mock-up.
A sample of the building envelope is a good demonstra-
tion of a system that lends itself to complicated details
and interfaces that can be worked out in a sample mock-
up. Utilizing specied window, sealant, moisture barrier,
and facade elements in the sample can help to identify
constructability problems and indicate how they can be
eliminated before major work begins. Inspection by
maintenance personnel may also reveal issues that were
not noticed during the earlier review sessions. This also
gives the labor crews, owner, contractor, and designer
something to reference back to as the project progresses
to demonstrate the standard that is expected throughout
the project. This mock-up must be a specication re-
quirement to avoid claims of additional expenditures by
the contractor.
Jobsite Walk-Throughs
The intent of jobsite walk-throughs is to identify pos-
sible conicts with installations, access limitations that
may not have been apparent on the plans, service and
maintenance oversights, conformance to codes that the
designer, contractor, or inspector may not have been
aware of, and to address any concerns the operators of
the facility may have that was not apparent when re-
viewing the plans. Periodic and frequent walk-throughs
should be conducted to familiarize these personnel with
the project as it is being built. It is much easier and less
JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT IN ENGINEERING / SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1999 / 59
FIG. 3. Data Flow Diagrams for Design Information: (a) Traditional Design/Construction Feedback; (b) ProposedDesign/Con-
struction Maintenance Feedback
costly to make a change before the nishes are in place
than afterward. Again, however, good judgment must be
practiced by key individuals to lter necessary perfor-
mance or conict changes versus self-serving requests.
Commissioning
As each system is completely installed the contractor,
via contract obligation, must be required to indepen-
dently test and demonstrate the satisfactory operation of
every system (Grifth and Sidwell 1995). It is prudent
to contractually require the system contractor to establish
and coordinate time for the system manufacturers rep-
resentative to be on-site to insure proper installation and
start-up. Additionally, the contract should require the
system contractor to coordinate with the owners main-
tenance personnel after initial commissioning to provide
operational training and troubleshooting of the system.
The added cost to make the personnel available for train-
ing at this time may be recovered in the reduced main-
tenance costs resulting from the crews familiarity with
the system. Independent commissioning of systems also
virtually guarantees identication of problems by isolat-
ing them in the start-up phase.
Operation and Maintenance Manuals
One of the last sets of documents that are typically
required by contract to be delivered to the owner is the
operation and maintenance manuals. Most often the
manuals are a repeat of the material submittal and fre-
quently of little or no value to the maintenance staff.
Early submittal of the manuals for review by the con-
structability committee can help eliminate useless infor-
mation. Evaluation of the manuals for relevance to the
systems desired function must be evaluated. Frequently
however, manufacturers provide a standard document
that has been utilized over the years without having
made signicant changes that describe updated improve-
ments or modications relevant to the system installed
in a specic project. Training sessions from the contrac-
tor and/or manufacturers representative must be re-
quired to avoid any confusion with the operation and
maintenance manuals instructions.
OPERATIONAL LESSONS AS
MAINTAINABILITY DATA
Incorporating maintainability into the constructability
process will have signicant impacts toward improving
design and construction processes. Development of a
best practices database model that employs the values of
lessons learned throughout the design and construc-
tion phases will allow for improved operation and main-
tenance of facilities, as well as allow improved assess-
ment of future facilities. The two data ow diagrams
shown in Fig. 3 illustrate the more traditional approach
to design development versus the proposed feedback of
information into the design CRP that incorporates main-
tenance concerns. The proposed model would lend itself
to development of a living database that could be
adapted to a specic type of construction and would
evolve with the technology advances in construction
methods and materials. Fig. 3(b) illustrates the paths by
which the best practices information may be made avail-
able to support the project development process begin-
ning with the owners conception of the project through
completion of the contract documents. For simplicity, the
contractor entity was purposely omitted from the dia-
grams.
The design guidance captured and stored in the pro-
60 / JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT IN ENGINEERING / SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1999
posed system should be stated in a manner that avoids
violation of proprietary interests. An initial compilation
of such information for designing building envelope sys-
tems has demonstrated that meaningful suggestions can
be captured and phrased to focus upon material proper-
ties and construction methods (Williamson 1996). Fur-
thermore, the common concern for liability associated
with documenting lessons learned can be avoided if the
recommendations are not documented with the specic
cases from which they are derived and if the database
platform is supported by the industry community as de-
scribed in the following section.
DATABASE PLATFORM
In order for the proposed database model to be em-
braced by the industry, a Web-based platform is the best
option. Likewise, industry support and contribution to
the database would also be a requirement for it to be
effective. Clients would be able to contact the host com-
puter via their respective browsers and either query or
submit to the database via the interface program resident
on the Web server. In effect, the system would become
a sort of digital library where information is not only
obtained but contributed. This concept is similar in func-
tion to the problem-solving advice sections that may be
found in construction trade journals. A voluntary indus-
try quality panel would serve as arbiter of the accuracy
and value of recommendations submitted to a discussion
module and have the authority over the content of the
database. This routine vigilance provides the basis for
considering it to be a living database.
The preferred host for such a system would be a long-
standing institution such as a university or professional
society. The initial cost may be supported by concerned
industry participants, professional societies, and/or grant
agencies promoting quality engineering goals. Long-
term maintenance might be absorbed by the host insti-
tution.
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
The use of a formal CRP is vital for the successful
implementation of the concerns of all parties that work
to deliver a facility. Incorporating the benecial con-
cerns, or lessons learned, of the review process in the
best practices database after completion of a project may
signicantly benet the design and construction of future
projects by reducing the total cost of the project from
design through operations and maintenance.
Projects that have used the CRP typically have real-
ized reduced costs for the contractors, as well as the
facility owners. However, the effects of incorporating
maintainability into the CRP have yet to be fully real-
ized. The authors investigation revealed evidence that
there are few projects in the building construction in-
dustry that have focused on the maintenance concerns
and have been designed and built to produce a sufcient
data set for study of this concept. Currently available
off-the-shelf software for facilities maintenance and
management could be used to more fully document
building maintenance and operations expenditures and
the data linked with historical construction data to es-
tablish a base of information for future study.
The complete development of a database that incor-
porates all possible systems of a facility into a construct-
ability and maintainability review process that can be
accessed and utilized via electronic media is the rec-
ommended goal for future research. Development of spe-
cic databases for individual systems of a facility, both
active and passive, must be analyzed for incorporation
in the database. Additionally, a computer software re-
view program that uses a Web-based operational envi-
ronment must be developed for the database to be em-
braced by the industry. The database software program
is envisioned to be a continuously developing and grow-
ing data set that realizes the benets of innovation, as
well as the prudence of collective industry experience.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors wish to recognize the assistance of David
Allen of the McKinstry Company and Rick Cheney of
the University of Washington Physical Plant Ofce dur-
ing the course of gathering information for this study.
APPENDIX. REFERENCES
Assaf, A.-H., and Al-Shihah, M. (1995). The effect of faulty con-
struction on building maintenance. Building Research and Infor-
mation, Vol. 23, 175181.
Grifn, J. J. (1993). Life cycle cost analysis: A decision aid. Life
cycle costing for construction, J. W. Bull, ed., Blackie Academic
and Professional, London.
Grifth, A., and Sidwell, S. A. (1995). Constructability in building
and engineering projects, I. H. Seely, ed., Macmillan, London.
Houston Business Roundtable. (1993). Model plan for constructa-
bility. Rep. from the Houston Business Roundtable, Houston.
McGeorge, J. F. (1988). Design productivity: A quality problem.
J. Mgmt. in Engrg., ASCE, 4(4), 350362.
Philip, N. (1995). Constructability of transportation projects, Mas-
ters thesis, University of Washington, Seattle.
Williamson, C. E. (1996). Designing maintainability into the con-
structability review process for the building envelope, Masters
thesis, University of Washington, Seattle.