Monday 18 April 2011

Civil Design Services

 Civil Design is a professional engineering discipline concerning the design and maintenance of the natural and physically built environment, including structures such as canals, dams, roads, bridges and buildings. After military engineering, civil engineering is the world’s oldest design discipline and can involve designing structures in the public sector (from local to national governments) and also in the private sector (ranging from homeowners to large multinational companies).

 The discipline of Civil Design covers a wide range of sub-disciplines: Environmental Engineering (applying scientific and engineering principles for the benefit of the environment, so as to provide healthy air, water, and land suitable for habitation by humans and other organisms); Municipal/Urban Engineering (a discipline concerned with municipal infrastructure and involves designing, constructing, and maintaining urban installations such as pavements, streets, sewers and even street lighting) and even Coastal Engineering and Hydraulic Engineering (the discipline concerned with the conveyance and flow of fluids, particularly water and sewage and involving the design and construction of canals, dams and bridges) and Earthquake Engineering (the study of how buildings and structures act when put under seismic pressure and foreseeing the potential consequences of strong earthquakes on urban infrastructure).

 However, civil designers work closely with surveyors and specialised civil engineers to carry out fixed projects within their given terrain, community or site, such as designing drainage systems, pavements, sewer services and water supplies. Due to the fact that general civil designers spend the majority of their time on site, general civil engineering is also referred to as site engineering (a branch of civil engineering which mainly focuses on converting an area of land to meet a different purpose).

 Civil Design is also essential to the business of electrical and architectural designers. Such designers recognise the necessity for civil and structural design services if they are to be able to offer a complete design service for their customers. For example, an electrical design company may be approached to design the foundations for a large Electrical Transformer including the rebar schedule. In this case, employing civil designers would allow the company to complete all aspects of design themselves.

 Employing civil designers in their company allows the electrical and architectural design companies to offer several different services such as designing site layouts, foundations, rebar schedules; conducting building condition assessments and structural calculations as well as carrying out topographical and geotechnical site investigations and surveys.