Towards sustainable infrastructure development through integrated contracts: Experiences with inclusiveness in Dutch infrastructure projects

Abstract

Current complex society necessitates finding inclusive arrangements for delivering sustainable road infrastructure integrating design, construction and maintenance stages of the project lifecycle. In this article we investigate whether linking stages by integrated contracts can lead to more sustainable road infrastructure development by assessing Dutch experiences with inclusiveness of Design-Build-Finance-Maintain (DBFM) projects in the dimensions of actors, scope and time. We examined practical public and private experiences through semi-structured interviews and document analysis. We find that in practice the closed procurement stage often results in a conservative, detailed contract. Awarding on quality criteria can stimulate inclusiveness in the actors and scope dimensions, and therefore provide possibilities to increase sustainability. In construction and maintenance, cooperation between actors has improved due to lifecycle linkages. However, in the time dimension the relation between integrated project and infrastructure network needs further optimization. We conclude that integrated contracts can lead to optimizations by lifecycle costing and management because of linked stages in the project lifecycle and recommend pursuing three avenues towards sustainable infrastructure development: green procurement, strategic asset management and relational contracting.

The impact of contract characteristics on the performance of public–private partnerships (PPPs)

“…The extra investment needed by these innovations will be more affordable with long contract periods during which there is a guaranteed cash flow (Pollitt, 2002;Koppenjan, 2005;Lenferink et al, 2013). Therefore, we hypothesize that:…”

The sustainable project management: A review and future possibilities

“…authorities, Social organizations, Cinema Artists etc. Mathur et al (2008), Lenferink et al (2013), Ross et al (2010), Yunus and Yang (2014), Genus and Theobald (2015), Johnson et al (2006) 7.…”

Legal and contractual foundations of intellectual property of design of construction projects

“…What gives meaning to the publication industry is the thought, prevailing across the society through this industry. Renaissance brought these thoughts [4].…”

“…This movement which has been called Renaissance, according to Eugenio Garin," primarily is born of a concept of life and reality, penetrated in art, literature, science, ethics and everywhere. [4] For the subject of our discussion, historians believe that renaissance , on one hand, has led to honoring and revering human personality specially the personality of the authors, thus the authors are no more anonymous, as they were anonymous in Middle Ages; on the other hand, the art now is free from irreverence and discredit. The existing literature on Pis church by Giovanni Pisano, Italian sculptor and architect in 14 th century, is a sufficient proof for it.…”

“…Industrial & Commercial Property Rights Include patents, Trademarks & Commercial Names, Passing Off, Industrial Designs, and Geographical Indication, Layout-Designs (Topographic) of Integrated Circuits, Undisclosed Information, Unfair Competition, and Industrial Design. The author's rights contain a variety titles, divided into several subcategories: [4] 1)…”