Academic Research

Usingbuilding permitsto monitor disaster recovery: A spatio-temporal case study of coastal Mississippi following Hurricane Katrina, Stevenson, J. R., Emrich, C. T., Mitchell, J. T., & Cutter, S. L. (2010). Using building permits to monitor disaster recovery: A spatio-temporal case study of coastal Mississippi following Hurricane Katrina.Cartography and Geographic Information Science,37(1), 57-68. The pace of disaster recovery varies considerably from one place to another. Even when places suffer impacts from the same event, recovery studies often lack the spatial and temporal resolution to fully understand such local variability in the recovery process and patterns. This paper discusses the novel use of building permits and a spatial scan statistic to identify the spatial and temporal dimensions of recovery in coastal Mississippi following Hurricane Katrina. Our work identifies significant space-time clusters of recovery activity and indicates that the amount of damage experienced and the amount of pre-event housing strongly influence the timing and location of building permit clusters. This analytical method and the use of publicly available data are valuable for a better understanding of long-term recovery processes. Does housing drive state-level job growth?Building permitsand consumer expectations forecast a state's economic activity, Strauss, J. (2013). Does housing drive state-level job growth? Building permits and consumer expectations forecast a states economic activity.Journal of Urban Economics,73(1), 77-93. National and state-level building permits significantly lead economic activity in nearly all US states over the past three decades, and produce substantially more accurate out-of-sample forecasts of state-level job and income growth than other traditional indicators including the leading indicator index, housing prices and wealth. We demonstrate that building permits have substantially declined before every recession since 1970, and that differences in permits across states before the last seven recessions explain the relative severity of a states job and income losses during these recessions. Hence, we can use permits to predict which states will suffer the greatestjob lossesin a recession. We show further that housing reflects expectations of future economic activity as permits are closely related to movements in consumer expectations, and both lead thebusiness cycleby four quarters. Differences across regions in consumer expectations and permits are also highly correlated, and both can forecast interstate differentials in job and income losses across regions, particularly during recessions. Causes of delay in building construction projects in Egypt, Abd El-Razek, M. E., Bassioni, H. A., & Mobarak, A. M. (2008). Causes of delay in building construction projects in Egypt.Journal of construction engineering and management,134(11), 831-841. Delay in construction projects is considered one of the most common problems causing a multitude of negative effects on the project and its participating parties. This paper aims to identify the main causes of delay in construction projects in Egypt from the point of view of contractors, consultants, and owners. A literature review was conducted to compile a list of delay causes that was purged based on appropriateness to Egypt in seven semistructured interviews. The resulting list of delay causes was subjected to a questionnaire survey for quantitative confirmation and identification of the most important causes of delay. The overall results indicated that the most important causes are: financing by contractor during construction, delays in contractors payment by owner, design changes by owner or his agent during construction, partial payments during construction, and nonutilization of professional construction/contractual management. The contractor and owner were found to have opposing views, mostly blaming one another for delays, while the consultant was seen as having a more intermediate view. Results analyses suggest that in order to significantly reduce delay a joint effort based on teamwork is required. Furthermore, causes of project delay were discussed based on the type and size of the project. Residentialbuilding permitsin urban counties: 19901997, McDonald, J. F., & McMillen, D. P. (2000). Residential building permits in urban counties: 19901997.Journal of Housing Economics,9(3), 175-186. This paper presents simple empirical models of residential building permits for urban counties in the United States for the period 19901997. Building permits, as a percentage of the housing stock, are greater the larger are population growth, the proportion of units that are old (built before 1940), and the proportion of units that are new. A higher initial vacancy rate reduces building permits. Restriction ofBuilding PermitsAs a Means for Controlling the Rate of Community Development, Allen III, H. W. (1969). Restriction of Building Permits As a Means for Controlling the Rate of Community Development.Urb. L. Ann.,2, 184.Are the challenges in the processing ofbuilding permitsa precursor for development of illegal structures in Ghana, Agyeman, S., Abeka, H., & Assiamah, S. (2016). Are the challenges in the processing of building permits a precursor for development of illegal structures in Ghana.US-China L. Rev.,13, 337. Procuring building permit in Ghana possess a great challenge despite government effort in addressing this problem through the introduction of new land regulations, integration of the land agencies and emergence of the one-stop shop. The delays now serve as a precursor for issuance of false permits by so called middlemen and the development of unauthorized structures by some unscrupulous developers. This paper takes a retrospective look at inherent challenges in the acquisition of building permits in Ghana and how that contribute significantly to mushrooming of illegal structures in most of the major towns in the country. The intrinsic challenges which this paper identified through descriptive research using structured interviews include: lack of integrated central database management system for permit agencies and analogous institutions involved in the permit processing system, too many processing steps, increased cost of construction and loss of value due to bureaucratic delays, lack of coordination between the land agencies and the local authorities, inappropriate feedback systems among others. Redesigning the current permit system by integrating all the agencies involved in the building permit acquisition process to a central database management system for sustainable development is a highly favored option.