Civil and Environmental Engineering Commons^™

Dunne Hall Redesign, Isabel Andaya, Rianna Maulino, Jason Uechi

Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Senior Theses

As Santa Clara University expands its community, more on-campus residence halls are needed to support the growing student population. Constructing brand new residence halls using traditional framing could take months or years, interrupting the academic environment and campus aesthetic. This demands technology that can speed up construction time. A proposed solution is to use modular construction, or construction that is partially or fully assembled before it is delivered to site. This paper will explore the feasibility of using modular construction to build a residence hall within a three (3) month summer quarter, when campus is less active and less student …

Design Of Sustainable & Affordable Housing For Disadvantaged Communities In Nicaragua, Guillermo Terán

Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Senior Theses

Addressing Nicaragua's urgent housing needs, this project transforms a conventional CMU block design into a sustainable and affordable model using local, structural bamboo and adobe plaster. It includes appropriate member size connections, local-code compliant construction drawings, cost estimation and logistics, offering an eco-friendly, affordable housing solution for local communities. The scope of this project can be emphasized with the three words from the project title which are design, sustainable & affordable. The design aspect of this project involved producing detailed architectural and engineering drawings for the housing model, incorporating structural design to ensure the safety, stability and durability of the …

Sheep Camp Creek Low-Water Crossing Redesign, Alex Avila

Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Senior Theses

The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) owns a biohabitat restoration site in Sunol, California titled the Sheep Camp Creek Biohabitat Restoration Site. The goal of this site is to provide habitat to endangered species and improve the environmental benefits of the area. The site is split in half by the main basin stream, which was sectioned-off as part of the restoration efforts. Three cattle crossings are still present on-site, however, to facilitate travel between either side of the site. The most downstream crossing present on-site, however, has seen detrimental erosive effects as a result of major storms that have …

Electric Vehicle Adoption Behavior And Vehicle Transaction Decision: Estimating An Integrated Choice Model With Latent Variables On A Retrospective Vehicle Survey, Fatemeh Nazari, Mohamadhossein Noruzoliaee, Abolfazl (Kouros) Mohammadian

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications

Electric vehicles (EVs) promise a sustainable solution to mitigating negative emission externalities of transportation systems caused by fossil-fueled conventional vehicles (CVs). While recent developments in battery technology and charging infrastructure can help evolve the niche market of EVs into the mass market, EVs are yet to be widely adopted by the public. This calls for an in-depth understanding of public adoption behavior of EVs as one dimension of vehicle decision making, which itself may be intertwined with other vehicle decision-making dimensions, especially vehicle transaction. This study presents an integrated choice model with latent variables (ICLV) to investigate households’—as a decision-making …

Improvement Of Subgrade California Bearing Ratio (Cbr) Using Recycled Concrete Aggregate And Fly Ash, Safkat Tajwar Ahmed, Mozaher Ul Kabir, Chowdhury Zubayer Bin Zahid, Tahsin Tareque, Seyedali Mirmotalebi

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications

The study aims to understand the effect of different admixtures on improving the quality of flexible pavement subgrades. In this paper, recycled concrete aggregates (RCA) and Fly Ash were used as the admixtures in improving the maximum dry density (MDD), swelling potential, and California bearing ratio (CBR) of subgrade soil. The percentages of RCA and fly Ash used were 5%, 10%, and 15%. With the upscaling in fly ash dosage, the optimum moisture content and the California bearing ratio increased. However, the MDD of soil decreased for higher fly ash contents. On the contrary, the optimum moisture content (OMC) of …

Experimental Study On Fiber Reinforced Concrete (Frc) Beams With Splices, Mohie Eldin Salah Shoukry, Ahmed Mokhtar Tarabia, Nabil Youssef Nabil

Journal of Engineering Research

This paper presents the results of an experimental study involving nine simply supported beams featuring lap-spliced bars within the constant moment zone. All beams shared identical reinforcement details, including three longitudinal reinforcement bars (12 mm diameter) and two top reinforcement bars (8 mm diameter) for shear stirrup hanging. The lap-spliced specimens were created with a splice length of thirty times the bar diameter (360 mm). The study focused on two key parameters: the fiber content of hooked-end steel fibers used in the concrete mix and the presence of stirrups in the lap-splice region. The hooked-end steel fiber used was with …

Innovation In Egyptian Linear Construction Projects: Enablers, Obstacles, And Suggested Improvements, Saeed Ahmed Elshinawy, Mohammed Elsayed Elsharkawy Assis. Prof., Adel Ibrahim Eldosouky Emeritus Professor

Journal of Engineering Research

Abstract- This research aims to investigate the obstacles, enablers, and suggested improvements for innovation in the Egyptian linear construction projects. The study is motivated by the need to understand the dynamics of innovation within these projects and identify practical approaches to overcome obstacles to innovation.

Owners, contractors, and consultants involved in linear construction projects constituted the target population of the study. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from a representative sample of 70 participants.

It is found that time and budget constraints, along with traditional tendering and procurement methods were significant obstacles to innovation, while technological and technical …

Effect Of Corrugation Properties On The Flexural Behavior Of Small-Scale Mono-Symmetric Steel Girders With Corrugated Webs, Ahmed Elgendy, Ahmed M. El Hadidy, Dr. Mahmoud Hassan Elboghdadi

Journal of Engineering Research

Steel girders with corrugated webs have been extensively researched and used in a variety of applications during the last few decades, including bridges and industrial buildings. Many studies explored the behavior of double symmetric girders with corrugated webs, but only a few articles used unequal flanges. Furthermore, the majority of research focuses on large-scale girders such as bridge girders, with just a few publications considering small-scale girders that may be employed in traditional construction applications. Additionally, performed investigations that consider the flexural behavior focused their studies on the effect of varying the dimensions of flanges without considering the effect of …

Finite Element Investigation For The Flexural Behavior Of Small-Scale Mono-Symmetric Steel Girders With Corrugated Webs, Ahmed H. Elgendy, Ahmed M. El Hadidy, Dr. Mahmoud Hassan Elboghdadi

Journal of Engineering Research

In the last decades, steel girders with corrugated webs have been widely investigated and implemented in many applications such as bridges and industrial facilities. Many researchers investigated the flexural behavior of traditional doubly symmetric girders with corrugated webs, but a very limited number of investigations considered the usage of unequal flanges. In addition, for most cases the performed investigations focus on the behavior of large-scale girders similar to bridge girders, while few papers considered small-scale girders that could be used in traditional structures. Thus, the objective of this paper is to investigate the lateral torsional buckling behavior of small-scale unsymmetric …

Performance Evaluation Of Gravity Quay Walls Under Seismic Loads, Magdy Ali Fawzy, Bakenaz A. Zeidan, Yasser Elhakem, Ahmed I. Elshinnawy Dr.

Journal of Engineering Research

This study explores the seismic performance of a prototype block-type quay wall using the PLAXIS 2D software. The numerical model was forced by historical records of two earthquakes employing four soil types including sand, clay, gravel, and rock. The study investigated the influence of the earthquake seismic motion level, seismic motion configuration, peak ground acceleration (PGA) value, tidal range, and soil type on the structure behavior under the seismic action. Additionally, we assessed the accepted damage level of the structure based on the computed horizontal displacement and tilting. Results indicate that the structure behaves differently under the same seismic load …

Modelling Techniques For Slab Track Systems, Mohamed Hafez Fahmy Aly, Islam Mahmoud Abou El-Naga, Ahmed Abdul Hay Soliman, Muhammad Ahmad Diab

Journal of Engineering Research

The railway slab track has replaced the ballast material in the classical ballasted track with reinforced concrete slab or asphalt layer to cope up with the increasing axle loads, train high-speeds, and to reduce overall maintenance cost. This paper aims to investigate the linear and nonlinear behavior of the most common slab track systems (BÖGL, Shinkansen, and RHEDA 2000) using American (AREMA) loads for different soil types to recommend the most suitable analysis type for each component of the slab track systems. Slab track Finite Element models have been built using Midas GTS NX software. The geometric model for each …

Supply And Distribution Of Flow And Sediment In River And Delta System, Kazi M. Sadid

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

River deltas are valuable ecosystems that have been essential in supporting human populations and the economy across the world for centuries. However, climate change and human activities have caused significant land loss in delta areas. A prime example of a region that has suffered severe land loss is Louisiana in the United States. Coastal restoration is therefore essential for the livelihoods of its residents. To address this issue, the Lower Mississippi River (LMR) channel bar has been regularly dredged to rebuild degraded marsh areas. Additionally, sediment diversions off LMR have been designed to build marsh areas sustainably. This dissertation investigates …

Advancing Depth-Storage-Discharge Modeling In Regional Hydrology, Fahad Alshehri

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation presents the development of an innovative approach to populating rating characteristics and supporting hydrologic modeling, designed to simplify complex real-world hydrological systems and accurately estimate their responses to rainfall, runoff, baseflow and evaporation stresses. The core of this research addresses the challenges inherent in characterizing hydrography elements in hydrologic modeling, particularly in regions lacking comprehensive stream reach survey data, flow and stage. This issue is pronounced in areas with extensive wetland hydrography, where traditional modeling requires intensive manual calibration, and course rating data that are often unavailable. To overcome these challenges, this study introduces a novel procedure that …

Image Filtering To Improve Maize Tassel Detection Accuracy Using Machine Learning Algorithms, Eric Rodene, Gayara Demini Fernando, Ved Piyush, Yufeng Ge, James C. Schnable, Souparno Ghosh, Jinliang Yang

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Faculty Publications

Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-based imagery has become widely used to collect timeseries agronomic data, which are then incorporated into plant breeding programs to enhance crop improvements. To make efficient analysis possible, in this study, by leveraging an aerial photography dataset for a field trial of 233 different inbred lines from the maize diversity panel, we developed machine learning methods for obtaining automated tassel counts at the plot level. We employed both an object-based counting-by-detection (CBD) approach and a density-based counting-by-regression (CBR) approach. Using an image segmentation method that removes most of the pixels not associated with the plant tassels, the …

Development Of Data-Driven Models To Predict Chemical Dosage And Energy Intensity For Different Supply Sources Of Drinking Water, Rehnuma Salsavil

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

As part of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG6), access to clean water for the entire population and sustainable management of water resources have been stressed. Demand for water is increasing due to population growth, economic development, water quality degradation, and climate change. More water needs to be produced for the community at lower treatment costs. The chemical dosage and energy intensity are two important factors that influence water treatment costs and sustainable management of resources as well.

Previously, chemical dosage modeling to reduce treatment costs have been explored but there have been more focus in coagulant dosage modeling. Other …

The History And Explanation Of Stormwater Ponds In East Tampa, Natasha Sutton

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The overall goal of this research was to explore and understand the history of stormwater ponds in the East Tampa Community Redevelopment Area (CRA), a 4,800-acre urban community comprising many different historic African American neighborhoods in Florida's City of Tampa. Seen as one of the most affordable stormwater management solutions in southeastern parts of the United States, stormwater ponds dot the East Tampa landscape. As the manager of CRA funds, the City of Tampa stands out as a main decision maker around the stormwater ponds within the East Tampa CRA. Over the years the stormwater ponds have generated much interest …

Bear Lake Session, Lawrence Culver, Ben Shaw, Wesley Matthis, Mario Harper

Spring Runoff Conference

No abstract provided.

Watercave: Virtual Reality For Engaging The Next Generation In Wastewater Management, Leeza Duller

Graduate Student and Postdoctoral Fellow Symposium

Within the next five to ten years, a significant portion of water and wastewater personnel are expected to retire, posing a substantial challenge for the utilities industry. The potential shortage of experienced workers poses inherent risks to the continuity of water services. WaterCAVE emerges as one of several tools designed to address this impending issue by engaging and inspiring the next generation to consider careers in the wastewater industry. This virtual reality (VR) simulation utilizes a ten-sided immersive display and was designed using Unity's 3D real-time development platform. Students from various educational levels, ranging from Pre-K to 12, are invited …

Use Of Waste Plastics In Asphalt Mixes: Addressing The Variability Of Source, Venkatsushanth Revelli, Anil Kumar Baditha

Graduate Student and Postdoctoral Fellow Symposium

Use of waste plastics in asphalt mixtures suffers from a serious problem of significant variability with global sources; preventing proper guidelines for field applications. The aim of this study is to address the variability in source of waste plastic and its impact on asphalt mixture design. The study was designed to provide a selection criterion to evaluate the suitability of waste polyethylene (PE) for asphalt pavements. PE obtained from five sources was used as a replacement for asphalt binder. Dry mixing of plastics with asphalt and aggregate was performed at the dosage levels of 3%, 6%, and 9%. The changes …

Performance Assessment Of Microencapsulated Phase Change Materials With Low To High Thermoregulation Range In Asphalt Binder, Anil Kumar Baditha, Ayyaz Fareed

Graduate Student and Postdoctoral Fellow Symposium

Asphalt pavements face significant challenges due to low temperature cracking and rutting caused by extreme temperature fluctuations and traffic loading. These issues result in higher maintenance costs and reduced service life of the pavements. To address this, researchers explored the use of Microencapsulated Phase Change Materials (MPCMs) to induce thermoregulation in asphalt pavements. However, the existing research focused on high-temperature performance of binders, highlighting the need of research on evaluating the low-temperature performance. Therefore, the study aims to evaluate the impact of incorporating MPCMs on low to high temperature performance of binders. Three types of MPCMs were incorporated into asphalt …

Assessment Of Pollution Sources For The Lake Burullus Influent Drains At The North Of Egypt, Aya Hassan

Civil Engineering

Assessment of Pollution Sources for the Lake Burullus Influent Drains at the North of Egypt. Egyptian northern region is facing significant pollution issues due to various factors such as fish farming expansion, industrial activities, and agricultural drainage water that enters the lake from the north through different drains. This pollution has detrimental effects on the lake's ecology and economy. The main goal of this study is to assess the current state of the influent drains into the Lake Burullus, that represent the second largest lake in the northern lakes of Egyptian. The water quality parameters in the influent drains to …

Safety Investigation Of Crash Rates During Hurricane Evacuations, Amelia K. Lawson

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

This study aimed to investigate crash rates across four distinct periods—evacuation, re-entry, emergency, and non-emergency—during Hurricanes Matthew (2016), Irma (2017), and Michael (2018). A notable gap in existing research pertains to understanding crash rates during these critical phases of hurricane events. By addressing this gap, this research contributes to a deeper comprehension of evacuation transportation safety. The methodology employed ArcMap to construct an interactive map for data collection, encompassing key variables such as the number of crashes, traffic volumes, duration of each period under analysis, and roadway segment lengths for each hurricane. Evaluating the crash rate per million vehicular miles …

Leveraging Systems Thinking For Global Environmental Health, Martha M. Mcalister

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Environmental health inequities such as household air pollution, inadequate water, sanitation, and hygiene, and chemical pollution persist globally and have myriad consequences on individual and societal well-being. Unfortunately, while billions of dollars and countless hours of research have been applied towards addressing these issues in development, humanitarian, and environmental justice contexts, attempts to reduce the environmental burden of disease can seem successful at first, but then backslide to pre-intervention conditions (or worse). This is indicative of policy resistance, a tendency of complex systems that makes it very difficult to enact change if the “rules” of the system are misunderstood. There …

Macroscopic And Microscopic Investigation Of Gypsum Slag Cement-Stabilized Recycled Aggregate Base Layers, Changdong Zhou, Pengcheng Shi, Junan Shen

Civil Engineering & Construction: Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study is to investigate the macro and micro properties of stabilized recycled aggregate base layers using gypsum slag cement (GSC) and compare them with ordinary Portland cement (OPC). To achieve this, four levels of recycled aggregate content (0%, 50%, 60%, 70%) and three levels of binder materials (3.5%, 4.5%, 5.5%) were designed, where the binding materials included OPC and GSC. When GSC is used as the binding material with 0% recycled content, two scenarios for the ratio of slag to activator are considered: 4:1 and 4:2. For recycled content of 50%, 60%, and 70%, only the …

Sanitation In Urban Areas May Limit The Spread Of Antimicrobial Resistance Via Flies, Drew Capone, Oliver Cumming, Abeoseh Flemister, Victor Ilevbare, Seth R. Irish, Ishi Keenum, Jackie Knee, Rassul Nala, Joe Brown

Michigan Tech Publications

Synanthropic filth flies are common where sanitation is poor and fecal wastes are accessible to them. These flies have been proposed as mechanical vectors for the localized transport of fecal microbes including antimicrobial resistant (AMR) organisms and associated antimicrobial resistance genes (ARGs), increasing exposure risks. We evaluated whether an onsite sanitation intervention in Maputo, Mozambique reduced the concentration of enteric bacteria and the frequency of detection of ARGs carried by flies collected in household compounds of low-income neighborhoods. Additionally, we assessed the phenotypic resistance profile of Enterobacteriaceae isolates recovered from flies during the pre-intervention phase. After fly enumeration at study …

Key Construction Techniques For Incremental Launching And High Falling Beam Of Long‑Span Simply Supported Steel Box Girder, Wu Yanbin, Lyu Maofeng, Yin Qijia, Yu Guanqiu

Journal of China & Foreign Highway

Based on the overpass project over Beijing-Hong Kong-Macao Expressway on Changsha Pan-Pan Road，this paper proposed a construction method of large-slope walking-type incremental launching and high falling beam of steel box girder given the difficulties in busy traffic under the bridge，large pushing slope，and great total height of falling beam.After the steel box girder assembly was completed，some bridge deck ancillary facilities were constructed in advance in the preassembly yard and the weight was allocated.The steel box girder was pushed synchronously，thereby reducing the aerial work on the bridge in the later stage.During the incremental launching construction of the steel box girder above the …

Different Forms Of Nano‑Sio2 In Emulsified Asphalt And Their Effects On Emulsion Storage Stability, Ji Chao, Cao Yuanhao, Li Zhigang

Journal of China & Foreign Highway

The insufficient storage performance of emulsified asphalt has always been a problem affecting its application，and there have been studies in China on nano-SiO2 particles as additives to improve the stability of emulsified asphalt，but the effect is not obvious.Based on the principle of Pickering emulsion，nano-SiO2 with surface modification was used as an emulsifier to directly emulsify matrix asphalt，and whether its stability improvement effect on emulsified asphalt is better than nano-SiO2 as a modified additive was explored.Firstly，three emulsified asphalt were prepared，namely ordinary modified emulsified asphalt A，emulsified asphalt B with nano-SiO2 as a modified additive，and emulsified asphalt C based on the new nano-SiO2 …

Study On Test Methods Of Wheel Sticking‑Free Emulsified Asphalt, Wang Peng, Qin Yongchun, Wang Jie, Xiong Weiming, Chang Rong, Fu Chongfeng, Feng Guoli

Journal of China & Foreign Highway

The wheel sticking-free emulsified asphalt is a key material to solve the wheel sticking problem in the process of asphalt pavement construction，with the wheel sticking-free effect as the core index.The accurate evaluation of the wheel sticking-free effect is important for the popularization and application of wheel sticking-free emulsified asphalt.Based on the research results in China and abroad，two test methods for wheel sticking-free effects （counterweight method and indenter method ） were innovatively proposed，and the wheel sticking-free effects of various emulsified asphalt were evaluated.The test results show that the two test methods can accurately evaluate the wheel sticking-free performance of emulsified asphalt，and …

Study On Mobilization Rate Of Rap Aged Asphalt Based On Ftir, Zou Xiaoyong, Li Ning, Wu Wenxiu, Wang Xin, Xu Xiaohe

Journal of China & Foreign Highway

During the preparation of the recycled asphalt mixture，part of the aged asphalt is first transferred from the surface of the recycled material to the new aggregate and then diffused and fused with the new asphalt，in which the percentage of transferred aged asphalt plays a key role in the final regeneration effect.In order to study the degree of transfer of aged asphalt in reclaimed asphalt pavement （RAP ），the mobilization rate （RMR） was calculated and analyzed based on the Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy （FTIR ）.The AC-13 graded recycled asphalt mixture was mixed and sieved to separate the new aggregate and RAP.The recycled …

Deflection Variation Rule Of Main Girder For A Concrete Cable‑Stayed Bridge Based On Combined Static And Dynamic Modification, Li Qi, Qi D Ongchun, Yang Hu, Zhao Zhiguo

Journal of China & Foreign Highway

In order to solve the problem of continuous downward deflection of the main girder for a concrete cable-stayed bridge during its service life，the deflection variation of the main girder for a long-span concrete cable-stayed bridge during its service was analyzed based on the modified model.A dual-objective optimization problem was constructed by using the combined static and dynamic finite element model modification method and was solved by the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm （NSGA- Ⅱ）.The Pareto optimal solution set was obtained，and the coordinated optimal solution was found in the Pareto optimal solution set，so as to modify the finite element model.The calculated values …