Investigating the accident causal influence of construction project features: An effort towards improving construction project delivery

Manu, Patrick; Ankrah, Nii; Proverbs, David; Suresh, Subashini

Abstract

The significance of the early planning of health and safety (H&S) to safe construction project delivery is a widely recognised fact, and central to that is the need for construction project participants to address originating accident causal factors that arise from the pre-construction stage. Among such accident causal factors are construction project features (CPFs) which are organisational, physical and operational attributes of construction projects. Despite reports highlighting the accident implications of these features, detailed insight of the extent of their contribution to accident causation, and their H&S risk implications remain elusive. As a first step towards bridging this knowledge gap, a qualitative inquiry was conducted to provide understanding of how CPFs contribute to accident causation. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with experienced construction professionals including a health and safety consultant. The interviews confirmed method of construction, nature of project, site restriction, project duration, procurement system, design complexity, level of construction, and subcontracting as having accident implications. Regarding how these features contribute to accident occurrence, the interviews indicate that CPFs act as underlying causal influences by introducing certain accident causal factors which are associated with them into the construction phase to give rise to accidents. These findings buttress an alignment of the accident causal influence of CPFs with past system models of construction accident causation, and provide useful insight for developing an instrument for measuring the extent to which CPFs contribute to accident causation, and their H&S risk implications. It also offers pre-construction project participants an early opportunity to begin to consider and devise measures for mitigating the accident causal influence of CPFs.

• Presentation Conference Type: Conference Paper (unpublished)
• Conference Name: Joint Association of Researchers in Construction Management (ARCOM) and Lean Construction Institute Doctoral Workshop
• Start Date: Mar 2, 2011
• End Date: Mar 2, 2011
• Publication Date: Mar 2, 2011
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Keywords: accident, causal, construction project, improving
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/964555
• Publisher URL: http://www.arcom.ac.uk/
• Additional Information: Title of Conference or Conference Proceedings : Joint Association of Researchers in Construction Management (ARCOM) and Lean Construction Institute Doctoral Workshop