Nowadays, infrastructure projects seem to become more complex and the project manager’s ability to control projects decreases. Therefore, it is crucial to adapt project management to cope with the emerging complexity. Flexibility options are explored to deal with the increasing complexity. To grasp complexity, a selection of the Technical, Organisational and External framework was used. Eleven flexibility enablers are studied to operationalise them and make them applicable for project managers. In this explanatory research, a case study has been done to explain the possibilities for flexibility enablers to cope with the found complexities. The results of the individual case study and the cross-case study provided input for a proposal on how flexibility enablers facilitate the management of project complexity. A selection of related complexity elements and flexibility enablers have been used to develop a flexible project management tool. The tool provides insights into the selected complexities, creates awareness on flexibility perspectives from the project team, allows to choose the operationalised flexibility enablers, and reflects on the changes made to keep improving. The tool is meant to be used throughout the project and supports incorporating flexibility to be a dynamic process. Concluding, the awareness of complexity and flexibility helps to cope with complex infrastructure projects. The developed tool for project management will help apply specific flexibility enablers to cope with relevant complexity elements. Future research into other construction organisations is needed to generalise the findings of the operationalisation of the selected flexibility enablers. Also, future research is recommended on the awareness and the adaptation possibilities for flexibility in project management within the infrastructure.

It is a well-known fact that the construction industry operates under high levels of complexity and uncertainty, which gives rise to challenges such as ineffective communication, lack of trust, insufficient support from the higher management, etc. Collaboration has demonstrated to be a solution to all these problems. In order to stimulate collaboration, there are certain tools such as early involvement of all parties, co-location of all parties, team building activities, hiring a facilitator, etc. which are effective. This research revolves completely around these collaboration tools adopted predominantly in the design phase of infrastructure projects using integrated contract forms. The following contract forms have been studied: Bouwteam (Netherlands), Alliance (Finland) and NEC4 (United Kingdom). The collaboration tools used in these projects have been analyzed and compared, after which recommendations have been proposed to each contract form to enhance collaboration. The goal of this thesis is to stress on the fact that merely introducing the concept of collaboration in the contract does not guarantee the success of collaboration. This thesis calls for more attention to be paid to the recommended collaboration tools even before finalizing the contract form for a particular project.

This research aims to identify gain-and-pain-sharing methods to foster a collaborative environment to create win-win situations and create mutual objectives. To do so, gain-and-pain-sharing methods that can positively influence a collaborative environment are explored. This study is restricted to the Dutch construction sector because it is for Dutch implementation. Second, the research scope includes projects with high complexity because otherwise, gain-and-pain-sharing do not have effects, and most problems arise due to complexity. Lastly, the research focuses on the client side, since the client chooses the type of contract and criteria. The objective of the research is to provide clients with insight into the gain-and-pain-sharing possibilities and practical implementation steps to implement a gain-and-pain-sharing mechanism to incentivise collaboration. In the literature, different definitions of gain-and-pain sharing were identified and combined into the following definition: ‘Gain-and-pain sharing is defined as an agreement that allows the parties in a construction project to share profits or cost savings and to share losses due to errors or cost increases. Mutual benefits are achieved through gain sharing. Benefits could, for example, also be a reward for one’s delivered work, a bonus or recognition, and losses are the risks’. Based on this definition, the following gain-and-pain-sharing concepts were identified: -Bonus-malus; -Sharing of new created benefits; -Risk pot; -Target cost. The different concepts have different effects and different reasons for use as gain-and-pain sharing mechanisms. The way to deploy the mechanism depends on the choice based on the vision and strategy that the client has for the project. These two elements in turn depend on the company and project objectives, project specifications, experience with collaboration concepts, risk aversion, market conditions and one of the most important conditions, the scope certainty. It can be concluded that the gain-and-pain-sharing mechanism is deployed by different concepts for different purposes to incentivise collaboration and create mutual objectives. This coordination for the implementation of the mechanism is custom-made for each project based on a number of steps. The step-by-step plan that supports the implementation of the gain-and-pain-sharing mechanism. The case studies demonstrated that such a mechanism has been successful in those cases and is an added value for collaboration and the realisation of common goals.

One way to reduce the environmental impact of the construction sector is the inclusion of environmental requirements in the procurement of construction projects, also called Green Public Procurement (GPP). This thesis first analysed the current inclusion of environmental requirements in the invitation to bid, bid and assessment of the bid. Hereafter, the results were evaluated and a proposal to develop the inclusion of environmental requirements has been made. A misalignment of environmental inclusion was found. Environmental requirements were included in 86% of the 70 invitations to bid, 74% of the bids and 46% of the assessments of the bid. Three defects possibly causing the misalignment were obtained. First of all, ineffective inclusion of environmental requirements in the invitation to bid. Secondly, missing feedback and scores in the assessment of the bid. Thirdly, when feedback was included on the environmental requirements, it was unclear or very limited. As a consequence, environmental requirements are not taken into account in the procurement process. Four purchasing experts from Dutch provinces have been interviewed to evaluate the three limitations and come up with opportunities to resolve them. By looking critically at the expert interview results and comparing them to the results of the content analysis, two problems were noticed. First of all, window dressing: ambitions to improve the inclusion of environmental requirements were stated, but not realised. Secondly, a lack of responsibility. The window dressing and lack of responsibility are caused by the absence of environmental management in the IPM-model. No one is taking action, because no one is responsible. It was concluded that a change in the IPM-model is needed to create responsibility and that the procurement process needs to be improved to incorporate environmental requirements more sufficient. It is recommended to the client to include environmental management in the IPM-model. The environmental management department should have four responsibilities: ensure environmental inclusion, correct limited or incorrect environmental inclusion, learn from mistakes made and develop environmental inclusion based on acquired knowledge. Secondly, a learning process needs to be started. It is recommended to both the client and the contractor to document feedback and review the environmental inclusion in the invitation to bid and bid. The feedback and reviews have to be interpreted and used to improve future invitations to bids and bids. By documenting past performances, future performances can be improved.

BIM implementation is one of many developments in the building industry that is hindered by a resistance to change. Studies have shown that project managers are among the key players in BIM implementation. Especially when there is no clear vision on BIM, implementation is highly dependent on the project manager of a specific project. This research was initiated by a practical problem in the Dutch building industry. It has been observed that a group of project managers is still present who are reluctant to apply BIM to their projects. Furthermore, a research gap was found on how BIM is perceived by project managers. This research explores the perspectives of project managers towards BIM implementation in the building industry. This research aims to visualize the perspectives of project managers and develop a strategy to deal with contemporary barriers that project managers perceive towards BIM application. Through Q-methodology, three perspectives of project managers are found. Perspective one [N=17 participants], also called (BIM) supporters, consists of a group of enthusiastic BIM drivers who only experience the benefits of BIM and perceive no barriers to implement BIM. Perspective two [N=4 participants], also known as the moderately hesitant group of project managers, experience resistance to implement BIM because of multiple barriers. Not only do they lack knowledge about the possibilities, rules and standards of BIM, they also experience a lack of comfort to manage a project in which BIM plays a role. Perspective three [N=3 participants] is a critical group of project managers who are unsure whether BIM's benefits outweigh the investment costs. Furthermore, this group has doubts about whether the client is ready to apply BIM for facility management, in which, according to these project managers, the most benefits of BIM can be achieved. A strategy is developed to deal with the barriers found in this research. The strategy is based on well-known change and transition management theories such as Kotter’s eight-step model to lead change and Bridges’ transition model. To outline the structure of the proposed strategy, it is recommended to (1) identify the perspectives of project managers within the organization through a “BIM Insights” session, (2) implement a customized approach to deal with barriers of the perspectives, and (3) monitor the implementation of BIM through recurring “BIM Sharing” sessions. The customized approach aims to deal with the barriers perceived by the project managers from different perspectives in a tailored manner, in which the focus shifts between guidance and/or education. This research contributes to the research gap on the perspectives of project managers towards BIM application and presents a strategy that can be applied to stimulate project managers to apply BIM and reduce resistance to change.

Temperatures are increasing all around the world due to climate change and are predicted to continue to rise in the future. This rise in temperature is worrying especially for urban areas around the world that already suffer from increased temperature due to the urban heat island effect. In order to adapt to these changes buildings often get outfitted with mechanical cooling, solving the temperature problems indoors but making the outdoor temperature rise even more and thereby creating a vicious cycle of increased demand for cooling and increased mechanical cooling. This research aims to search for a way to ensure indoor thermal comfort in a passive way without worsening the UHI-effect. This is done by creating an alternative design for a case study that is planned in a Dutch urban center and measuring its impact on the urban microclimate and its indoor thermal comfort performance in a future climate scenario. The alternative design is put together by designing and testing different compositions of passive measures found in the existing literature. These passive measures compositions are then analyzed by software simulation to assess their performance and the effect they may have on the urban microclimate and in turn what this changed urban microclimate means for the implementation of the passive measures. The final result is a building design that not only ensures indoor thermal comfort in current and future climate scenarios but also makes its surroundings more comfortable which in turn results into more manageable microclimate. Turning the vicious mechanical cooling circle into a passively cooled virtuous circle.

This research focusses on the usage of Building Information Modelling (BIM) in the construction project life cycle and how to improve the overall use. The construction industry can be characterized as being fragmented and having focus on the many different projects. The use of BIM in construction projects is increasing steadily in the last few years, as companies rush to a swift transition towards the use of BIM. However, it is found that not all the benefits BIM has to offer are realized in the entire life cycle of the construction projects. Therefore, this research is looking towards a strategy that aids in better and broader use of BIM in the project life cycle. For this the main research question is as following: “What strategy needs to be used, to improve the use of BIM throughout a construction project life cycle?”.

This thesis includes the research performed to investigate how to move away from the current adversarial practices in the Dutch infrastructure sector found in the current way of contracting. Adversarial practices are defined as each party pursuing their own concerns at the other party’s expense. As a result of this, the industry is not performing to its maximum. The objective of this research is therefore to stimulate client-contractor collaboration in Dutch innercity infrastructure projects in order to move away from the adversarial practices. In the way the current UAV-GC is applied in projects, dysfunctional conflicts arise between the client and contractor. This research aims to find opportunities for improvement in the UAV-GC by means of clauses from the NEC4 ECC contract. The NEC4 ECC contract is a relational way of contracting, which is relatively new for the infrastructure sector.

Today’s rising project complexity in combination with the changing economic environment has led to an increased interest in improving organizational business processes. Large multinational companies were always affected by those two factors in a greater extent than other smaller more localized competitors, rendering process reengineering an indispensable need for their continuous thrive. Determining best-practice approaches and integrating scale and knowledge into business process management may improve business performance by reducing error potential. This could be achieved through process standardization according to best-practice approaches. However, the proclaimed uniqueness of construction projects in combination with the numerous uncertainties that the industry is facing is rendering process standardization in the construction industry more complex. This research aims to explore the implications, opportunities and barriers of standardization in the construction industry and the implementation of previously gained knowledge – marked as best practices.

The construction industry faces problems in interoperability. Information is not easily interpreted nor accessed by participants. The insufficient level of interoperability occurs due to fragmentation between disciplines in the construction industry. To enhance interoperability, Building Information Modeling (BIM) formed a collaborative model that connects team members. However, the different disciplines continue to share information that cannot be directly used by others. This situation is present between designers and cost engineers. Despite working in a 5D BIM model that considers cost information, fragmentation between these disciplines persisted. Costs do not guide the design and they are computed after the model matures. Furthermore, the detachment of design and cost estimation processes led to the segregation of information in BIM. Addressing the problem of fragmentation between processes, the research aims at investigating the main question: How can design and cost estimation be effectively integrated using 5D BIM?
To answer the research question, several steps were performed. From the case study research, the following issues on fragmentation and BIM application are identified: [1] unsteady involvement of the cost engineer in the design, [2] limited influence of the cost engineer on the design, [3] model complexity, [4] incompatibility of model information and cost estimation, [5] absence of standardized and uniform information representation, and [6] resistance of clients and practitioners to the application of BIM/5D BIM.
By countering these issues, the “Integrated Design – Cost Estimation 5D BIM Process” is designed to answer the research question. The integration between design and cost estimation via 5D BIM focuses on cost driving components which are components influencing costs. Accordingly, these components are considered as key for communication, discussions between designers and cost engineers, and model development. Focusing on cost driving components, the process balances the information in the model. The information in the model is checked for compatibility with the estimate’s accuracy. Furthermore, the process proposes the consideration of the cost engineer’s perspective in the design. Then, 5D BIM is incorporated in the designed process by standardizing information and following the semi-automated approach for cost computation.
To assess the effectiveness of the integration addressed in the research question, a pilot case is performed to test the process in a running project. From the observations, it is concluded that the process provided a standard representation of objects, enhanced the communication between the designer and cost engineer, and involved the cost engineer earlier in the design. Furthermore, the pilot case led to the conclusion on barriers to BIM implementation. These include: the cultural change from individual effort to collaboration, lack of support from the management and client, inadequate planning for BIM application, and the inexperience in applying 5D BIM. These factors limited the successful implementation to reach effective integration. Despite the limited integration achieved in the pilot case, project participants and interviewed BIM experts ensured that the process leads to effective integration. However, it is crucial to respond to the noted barriers to have effective integration between designers and cost engineers via 5D BIM.

'Intensely Infrastructural' seeks to question the self-reinforcing 'pan-humanist' logic behind a contemporary spatiotemporal condition I decide to name the Seamless Paradigm – an urban, capitalist economy founded on the ethos of smooth, transnational circulation of bodies, goods and ideals. Despite being a modus facilitated by and generative of a typically postmodern, neoliberal reorganisation of capital, this urbanistic dictum is not a late 20th century phenomenon, but an ever ongoing material-discursive project, following the steps of the likes of Cerdà and Saint-Simon. Naturally, a well-developed mobility network is capable of breaking centre-periphery dichotomies, redistributing capital, providing just-in-time, around the clock goods and services and rendering accessible a greater variety of spaces for a greater variety of people – theoretically enabling everyone to 'choose' their lifestyle. However, the deterritorialisation of internal boundaries always entails a reification of external ones; something of which, to mention one example, the migration politics of the European Union is a clear example – its policies struggling to adapt urban territories to the increased flux of asylum seekers and intra-european economic migrants; an influx which which, although perceived as a threat to the European Project, is facilitated by its very own hypermobile raison d'être Furthermore, transit space is not something to 'enter' and 'exit' - ”you are not stuck in traffic, you are traffic” - and all mobile societies require intense synchronisation, monitoring and control - modulation - of bodies and spaces.

The project argues that we ought to remain aware and weary of the effects of the positive feedback loop of interiorising forces and hypermobile ideals, on subjectivity in general, and the built environment in particular. As a response, 'Intensely Infrastructural' suggests a permanent intervention for (con)temporary needs for shelter as well as future civic desires of ever more mobile subjects, located in Strasbourg, one of three administrative centres of the European Union, historically defined by a binational identity, and currently in possession of France's most sophisticated multi-modal transportation infrastructure. Wedged between vast train and road systems, and set within the long stretch of artificial slope – glacis - that marks the previously fortified western boundary of the city, the intervention attempts to rearticulate this residual boundary condition, currently defined by technologies of mobility and defense, as a relatively autonomous ”processual ecology”, consisting of factors which affect and are affected by the Seamless without being immediately involved in its system – an 'immanent outside' . Unlike the systemic environment of the Seamless Paradigm, which quantitatively defines its singularity through interior-exterior relations, the immanent outside is defined qualitatively, through the very surplus, externalities and contingencies brought about by the Seamless. By locating, articulating, appropriating and intensifying the immanent outside, the project seeks to provide a facilitating environment for growing truly ”nomadic subjects” willing to not only consume space through vectorial movement, but to produce it by staying put; to change not simply their habitat, but their habits.

Because in the past, assignments of infrastructure projects became less specific and increasingly complex over time, construction companies had to start joining forces and working together to be able to deliver these projects. This asked for a change in behaviour of the employees on these projects. According to literature, in other industries, simulation games proofed to be helpful to induce such a behavioural change. However, a knowledge gap exists about the effectivity of applying a simulation game to induce a behavioural change in the construction sector. Certain characteristics of the construction industry make it difficult for employees in this sector to change their behaviour, which makes it seem too blunt to assume that simulation gaming would have the same positive effects on behavioural change in this industry, as it has in other industries. Therefore, the goal of this research is to fill the knowledge gap surrounding the application of a simulation game to a construction company by conducting an empirical research into the effectiveness of the application of a simulation game to a behavioural change process in a construction company. It was established that a simulation game can be considered effective when it induces a behavioural change or a change in attitude of participants. With help of interviews, questionnaires and observation it was investigated if such a development in attitude or behaviour arose in the company under investigation. Within the timespan of this research no behavioural change was measured and also a change in attitude was only measured amongst a part of the participants. It can be concluded that the investigated simulation game was not effective to induce a behavioural change in the construction company. However, as a simulation game has the characteristic that every game-run is different, this game could yield a completely different result when applied to another company. Therefore it cannot be assumed that the results from this research are representative for the entire construction sector. It is recommended to conduct further research into the application of other simulation games to other construction companies. By comparing the results of the different cases a better idea about the real effects that a simulation game could have on a behavioural change in a construction company can be formed. Next to this, recommendations were stated to the company under investigation to improve their simulation game.

Ericis b.v is a dynamic real estate organisation which provides numerous services in real estate. This project concerns project management department. The operational team of this department is relatively small and exists out of six people. Although this department is quite small, their demand on the real-estate market is not. The consistent successes of their projects, which are created through their high level of execution and premium services and products, cause an increase of demands and projects. A consequence of this success is that an imbalance is created between the amount of work and the available employees. As the pressure and workload increases the team starts to experience numerous difficulties which refrain them from seamless project management processes. Once a lot of projects start to run simultaneously, certain existing problems in the organisation, of which the team might have been unaware, become very prominent and can’t be ignored anymore. One of the most prominent difficulties the team encounters is the lack of an overview regarding the project processes. The organisation indicates that next to the large number of projects and small number of employees, this problem is foremost caused by the lack of a standardized project process. The team does not have a clear documented process which they can hold onto when for example the projects increase and the overview blurs. In order to solve the difficulties they cope with, one of the steps is the implementation of a tool which supports and accommodates the organisation with the difficulties they face. The following design challenge is created: ‘Design and develop a tool which facilitates the management of the project process as well as the management of all running projects.‘ This tool will both support the team dealing with the difficulties and solve the existing situation. In order to solve this design challenge a design process is conducted. This design process exists out of a research & analysis phase, a ideation phase, a conceptualisation phase and finally an embodiment phase. Within this process elements are discovered, defined, developed and designed. From discovering the underlying core problems, to developing ideas based on the defined design requirements and finally developing a concept which is also user tested. Eri-tool is an interactive smart app which provides management support regarding the phasing, hierarchical lines and decision documentation of each project. This application requires specific project input which is to be defined in the project plan- and decision documentation templates. From this input, numerous fundamental elements are generated such as the long- and short term overviews (plannings) of the project process. The user can zoom in and out on the project-phasing overview, as much as preferred or required. The application also contains personal pages, project pages and an archive which offers the users a continuous learning process. The Eri-tool is an application which guides, supports, enhances and optimises the process and projects management by not only facilitating the management process however also by accommodating the required fundamental elements to perform to full potential.