The aim of this PhD research was to propose an approach to public housing management (HM) by LAs that may bring about maintenance and lead to better housing quality in Ghana. To do that, four research questions were addressed. (1) How is housing management by LAs organised, and how have challenges therein affected the quality of public housing? (2) What factors can be distinguished to

describe the organisation of and assess performance in HM? (3) What lessons can be learned from the organisat...

The realisation of an urban design involves many players, such as designers, critics, politicians, journalists, public relations specialists and residents. In order to consult with each other they make use of drawings, but also frequently of words, to be able to interpret the drawn objects in the plans. But are these urbanistic notions used by everyone in the same way? And have there been noticeable changes in their usage or meaning over time? This urbanistic and linguistic doctoral research ...

The use of outriggers in tall buildings is a common practice to reduce response under dynamic loading. Viscous dampers have been implemented between the outrigger and the perimeter columns, to reduce vibrations without increasing the stiffness of the structure. This damped outrigger concept has been implemented for reducing vibrations produced by strong winds. However, its behaviour under strong earthquakes has been not yet properly investigated. Strong earthquakes introduce larger amount of ...

The ne-xt facades conference is the official International Mid-term Conference of the European COST Action TU1403 ‘Adaptive Facades Network’, an international scientific cooperation with the aim to harmonise, share and disseminate technological knowledge on adaptive facades on the European level. During the mid-term conference first results are presented to stakeholders from industry and design and to the public. The goal is to share knowledge and discuss novel facade concepts, effective ...

In June 2018, professionals and scholars, from various fields dealing with public open spaces, put politics up for discussion. In the conference series x–LArch at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, BOKU/Vienna, issues are raised that are relevant for the profession of landscape architecture and have a direct impact on our environment, be it urban or rural. In the 2018 conference entitled ‘Park Politics’, practitioners and academics were invited to present findings an...

This new book on the Rietveld Schröder House (by Gerrit Th. Rietveld, 1924) sheds light on the thorough restorations of its exterior (1970s) and interior (1980s), and the principles for the furnishing when it opened as a museum house for the public, in 1987.

Since the restorations, carried out by architect Bertus Mulder (b. 1929), the house is once more a shining manifesto of De Stijl and modernist living. Few realize that this is one of the first examples of a restored modern heritage build...

What constitutes the invisible layers of an architecture school? The EAAE Annual Conference of 2019 is titled ‘The Hidden School’, aiming to discuss an architecture school’s true character, the substance and the quality of architectural education in the broadest sense, and that which is beyond the stated curricula, yet — whether concretely manifested or subliminally perceived — embodies the culture of the school.

The conference, hosted in 2019 by the Faculty of Architecture in Zagre...

One of the long-standing issues in corporate real estate (CRE) management is the alignment of an organization’s real estate to its corporate strategy. In the last thirty years, fourteen CRE alignment models have been developed. In these models the objective is to become ‘more aligned’ and in some of them the target is maximum or optimum added value. Extensive research into these models provided valuable insights into building blocks, components and variables that are needed in the align...

Energy simulation models for buildings are widely used by policymakers, researchers and consultants as a tool to advice on the reduction of residential energy consumption. Previous studies have shown that there is a gap between theoretical building energy simulation results and actual energy use. The discrepancy between theory and practice is problematic, as for instance expected energy savings are often not achieved.

This thesis shows that analysing specific household types and building char...