Base Building and Fit-out: Principles for 21st Century Building Maintenance and Management

Transcription

1 Base Building and Fit-out: Principles for 21st Century Building Maintenance and Management Dr. Stephen Kendall, AIA, CIB Professor of Architecture Director, Housing Futures Institute Department of Architecture Ball State University Muncie, Indiana, USA Introduction: Entangled Buildings Buildings require continuous cycles of care and adjustment to help them remain useful to society, owners and users. The resulting dynamics of building use, alteration and reuse are highly complex. All parts of buildings do not require adjustment at the same time, adding to the complexity of maintainance and repair scheduling. Further, decisions to alter or replace building parts are not entirely based on technical criteria such as utility or safety, but are sometimes based on less precise criteria such as simple user preference, changes in the market of users and matters of style. To maintain real estate propery values, building maintenance and management therefore depend on clear organization of technical systems and work. The most important criteria for such organization is the reduction of friction and conflict among the many professionals involved. As buildings have become more complex through the addition of new and improved technical subsystems - particularly heating, cooling, power, data and communications systems - conflicts among the many professionals involved has increased at all stages of buildings' life. The principle reason for the increase in conflict and friction is the increase in "systems entanglement". "Entanglement" means the disorderly and "ad-hoc" layout of physical systems so that the change of one part disrupts (requires the movement, destruction or change of) many other parts. The greater the number of physical systems and their "entanglement", the greater the chance for conflict among the various parties controlling them. Conflict leads to legal disputes, reduced quality, increased rework, and unsatisfied users and building owners. The evolution of "building entanglement" has occurred gradually and in an unplanned way over the past 100 years. Facilities managers, construction engineers and contractors, and building designers are familiar with the extraordinary growth of these systems in contemporary buildings. Most users may not be aware of the difficulty they present because these systems are usually concealed behind walls, under the floor and above ceilings. However, most daily activities of occupants of modern buildings are fully dependent on attaching to the end of these pipes, wires and ducts. The chart below shows the period during which the "pipes, wires and ducts" have been introduced into buildings. It highlights the period between 1900 and 1950 as the "era of entanglement", and suggests that in the last 30 years (since about 1960) the building industry has been quietly engaged in a search for disentanglement. From the beginning of that latter period, I suggest we have entered a period that can be called the era of "Open Building". We are just now beginning to understand this. This paper describes this new era and why it is significant for the future of building maintenance and management.

2 Correcting for Entanglement: the Use of Levels The diagram above gives a picture of the technical situation of modern buildings. In the long history of buildings, these changes have occurred quickly. Only 3 generations of engineers and building managers have struggled with them. It is not surprising that we - the professionals responsible for making and managing buildings - have not fully accounted for this reality. The building industry has now entered the beginning of a period of rediscovery of older principles. These principles were found in all sustainable built environment up to 100 years ago. They could work in previous generations of buildings and building operation without argument when buildings were less complex and the pace of building alteration was much slower. Most buildings, of any style, were

3 relatively simple enclosure types, later filled in and subdivided again and again over time. Buildings were in general based more on convention and familiar types rather than tightly designed for specific users or their specific technical requirements. In any case, until 60 years ago, buildings were much less complex. Conditions are no longer so simple. Buildings and the society they provide space for are now more dynamic, more filled with technical systems as shown above, and steered by many specialists. These specialists have to coordinate their work. Therefore the main task for modern building professionals is to rediscover and to renew principles that enabled buildings to remain useful for generations before the era of entanglement. We now must reduce conflicts and deliver a building stock that has the capacity for change and permanence under new circumstances. While these are new conditions, the built environment as a whole has again shown itself to be amazingly self-correcting, as it has in the past. We can see such evidence. The methods used to design, build and manage buildings have begun to sort out and organize in the face of these new realities. This sorting and organizing is taking place according to the principle of levels. The basic idea of levels is familiar to those delivering and managing properties today, but needs to be pointed out explicitly, so we can improve our working methods consciously. Levels come into use when the physical system - the building at hand - is too complex to be under the responsibility of only one party, or when many different parties each desire to have control of some part of the whole. Work must be distributed in an organzed way. Thus levels such as the following emerge: Urban Structure Urban Fabric (Neighborhood) Base Building Fit-out Furniture and Equipment These "levels" are actually "bundles of parts and decisions" and are related to each other in a particular way. Urban structure (the larger scale ordering of land uses and transportation arteries) provides a context for the design and construction of neighborhoods or urban fabric. An urban fabric or neighborhood is a context for base buildings (the shared parts of multi-tenant buildings) that are independent of the urban fabric, but nevertheless follow certain rules. Each individual base building is itself a context for the fit-out of the building (partitions, some mechanical equipment). Fit-out is freely decided but also follows rules. Finally, furniture and equipment may be a separate level independent of the fit-out. There are further levels if we look closely, but these are the main ones. Each "level" comprises a body of knowledge, skills, products and organization. Each lower level is constrained by the next higher level above, and each in turn sets the conditions for what can be done at the next lower level. Because these levels relate to decisions by building owners and managers, it follows that the parties responsible for each level relate to those operating at another level in an hierarchical way. The higher level controls the lower level, and the lower level has some freedom to decide within the rules established by the higher level. The Principle of Fit-out in the United States Office Building Market As buildings increased in complexity, as the dynamics of use increased and individual tenants asked for more independence, the use of levels was inevitable. Buildings could not be designed, built and managed any longer under unitary, integrated control. It was only natural that new levels came into being to help solve the problems.

4 First, the furniture and equipment became autonomous from the building. Then the fit-out level came into its own, in between the building and the furniture. Fit-out generally includes ceilings wire management access floors interior partitions and doors airconditioning specific to the individual tenant cabling specific to the individual tenant all floor and wall finishes lighting The following diagrams give a conceptual image of the distinction between base building and fit-out, and the changes in this distinction in the past decades. The Basic Distintion Base Building and Fit-out

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6 W ithin the pa st de cades, investment in the fit-out level has incre ased. Further, ma ny buildings constructed only 10 y ears ago are being c omple te ly alte red inside and out, with only the struc tural fra me rem aining from its origina l state. But some buildings c annot have a future bec ause their base buildings had no ca pac ity for c hange: e.g. their floor to floor dim ensions are too sm all. Fit-out work now outpace s base building work a mong de signers, builders and product manufac turers. In addition, the range of va rie ty in fit-out spac e planning and te chnology has incre ased drama tica lly. In the best projects,variety is not more e xpe nsive than m aking uniform plans and te chnology. It is still the case that the various subsy ste ms in a fit-out installation are controlle d by spe cialize d subcontractors. The be nefits of multi- skilled installation teams have not ye t ente red the construction industry. Base Bui ldin g Leve l Fit-out Le vel

7 A Three Tier Model of Control Distribution It is only in the last 30 years that the fit-out level has emerged. An integrated fit-out level is emerging and will eventually include both interior construction and furniture and equipment. Until then, however, fitout is conventionally divided into two categories of products and work, illustrated in a three tier model of control distribution as indicated in the charts below. In conventional office building construction and management, interior construction and FF&E are often distinct decision levels. This can be shown using the conventional classification system developed many years ago by the Construction Specifications Institute in the United States. This 16 division system is used industry-wide to organize the description and specification of products in all buildings. Most non-residential buildings (and some Residential Open Building or S/I housing projects) are now organized on levels - indicating patterns of control as well as technical systems. I have therefore overlaid a three tier model of control distribution onto the CSI model. The following diagrams show the reality of levels in practice.

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11 Current Developments at the Fit-out Level in the United States Office and Retail Markets: Implications for Facility Managers and Maintenance Forces. The demand - supply relationship in the US commercial office and retail market is very dynamic at this time. On the demand side, building owners, and the owners of companies who order fit-out in existing buildings, want good results in a short time and at reasonable cost. Many seek single-sourced delivery of design and installation services, wanting to avoid the uncertainties of conventional design/bid/award/build processes. On the supply side, many experiments are being made in a highly competitive environment to deliver customized building fit-out and interiors. At the fit-out level, two major directions are being taken. They concern the way decisions (responsibilities) and physical elements (value added manufactured products) are bundled, delivered and serviced. Direction One: The PATHWAYS product introduction by Steelcase in the past year represents one direction. Here, the largest manufacturer of systems furniture has acquired other companies and has expanded its product lines to include nearly everything needed for a complete office interior environment, as well as the software to manage the design and installation logistics. PATHWAYS will soon offer a complete "Slab-to-Slab" fit-out product. Steelcase is moving to directly (by manufacturing and installing) and indirectly (by ordering and packaging with its own products) control at least 75% of a complete office fitout. Some of the questions that are raised include: 1. Can Steelcase deliver? > will its manufacturing plants maintain quality and JIT delivery schedules; > will its distributors be able to develop the set of new skills and techniques to deliver the product? > will the software work. 2. Will the design and construction industry welcome or reject this further migration of control up the value chain? 3. Will the market respond? 4. Can Pathways - with its deep integration of and investment in "design appearances" and "technical solutions" in a single level, adjust quickly enough to style and design ambiance changes on the one hand and technical advances on the other? 5. Will local regulatory officials accept Pathways, with its expansion of the scope of products classified as "certified consumer products" rather than "building products"? Will the U.S. national model building code (in development) accept Pathways as a certified consumer product? Direction Two: The second direction is being taken by other major manufacturing companies who have a major presence in the office fit-out market. This can be characterized as "co-marketing open architecture". In an effort to maintain corporate and product independence while coordinating product and business interplay

12 sufficiently to gain market share, these companies aim toward an open systems approach to fit-out - multi-company, systematic variety. These efforts depend on open architecture principles of product interfaces, as well as supply chain, installation team and product logistics agreements. They depend on software which performs the same functions as Steelcase's Accelerate software, but which allows products from the various "co-marketing" companies to be imported and combined. Direction Three: The third direction is the conventional, piecemeal, one-job-at-a-time fit-out using the normal design, bid (or negotiate), build model, with the normal distirbution of off-site and on-site work and the normal confusion of a train of subcontractors. This direction still dominates the fit-out activity. Future Base Building and Fit-out for Building Management and Maintenance

13 In the coming decades, base building architecture will become increasingly free of the particular and changing requirements of the fit-out, while offering improved capacity for change and individual preferences of occupants. The distinction between urban residential and non-residential architecture will be less pronounced, enabling a more healthy mix of uses. New fit-out technology will be developed, and new organizational skills will emerge to manage the design, fabrication and installation of advanced, co mprehensive infill or fit-out systems. Specialization among all the players will continue to be molded to the principles of Open Building. These principles include: 1. ordering and combining subsystems so that interference between them - and the parties controlling them - is minimized. This allows for more efficient building and the replacement or redesign of subsystems or parts with others performing the same function, without having to redesign or rebuild the whole. 2. organizing buildings according to levels. In the levels approach, there is stability and coherence at the higher level (e.g. base building) while adjustments can occur at the lower level (e.g. fit-out) with reduced conflict and confusion, improving efficiency and economic value. It also enables control to be distributed to all levels including that of building users without fear of unintended and unsafe consequences. These principles also apply at other levels in the built environment. In residential and non-residential buildings, the fit-out level, responding to resident and user / tenant power, will continue to be as differentiated as those deciding. The new-found balance between the common fabric of built environment and the individual parts will more clearly reflect both human values and the exigencies of materials and products. base buildings w ill become more general, s erviced framew orks repres enting common v is ions and priorities for a long life. fit-out w ill begin to include parts of the building envelope, increasing the range of freedom of individual oc cupants. Base Building Level Fit-out Level

14 Conclusions These notes give only a general map of the distinction in building management according to the principle of LEVELS. Specific instances of fit-out can be mapped accordingly. The reality of levels is certain. Our task as building professionals is to work with this reality to improve our services and the buildings we are managing. The implications of the emergence of the fit-out level for building managers are significant. By consolidating or bundling many products, decisions and responsibilities together into competitive, integrated products, the building industry may be able to provide well organized variety for each tenant in large buildings at reasonable costs, similar to the way successes in the automotive industry. This will be a significant step toward a more open architecture.

15 Bibliography Habraken, John. The Structure of the Ordinary; Form and Control in the Built Environment. MIT Press, Cambridge, 1998 Kendall, Stephen. Developments Toward Open Building: Subsystem Compatibility: Access Floors and Systems Furniture from Different Manufacturers. Joel Polsky Fixtures Furniture FIDER Endowment Fund, Kendall, Stephen. Control of Parts. Parts Making in the Building Industry. Unpublished PhD Dissertation, MIT School of Architecture and Planning, Department of Architecture, "Reclaiming Buildings: Interior Strategies for Change". A Steelcase Knowedge Paper, Steelcase North America, Grand Rapids, Michigan. "Commercial Building Situation Analysis", US Department of Energy, Office of Building Technology, US Department of Commerce Current Construction Reports, C30, Steelcase North America Product Literature Haworth Inc Product Literature Knoll Product Literature Herman Miller Product Literature Technical Bulletin Number IAR/PLEC "Interior Solutions for Flexibility and Productivity; Product Evaluation Criteria for PLEC Services in Horizontal Distribution". Interface Architectural Resources. Grand Rapids, Michigan.,1997. Russell, James S. "Alternative Workplace: The Way We Work". Architectural Record, June, Loftness, Vivian; Beckering, Jack. Revaluing Buildings: Investing Inside Buildings to Support Organizational and Technological Change through Appropriate Spatial, Environmental and Technical Infrastructures. Steelcase, Inc., 1996.