Critical factors that influence lean premise design implementation: a case of Hong Kong high-rise buildings

ABSTRACT

When a building design fails to meet the end-user's needs after construction, it is considered faulty. Faulty designs often lead to renovation, demolition, and material waste. This study aims to identify critical factors that influence the implementation of the Lean Premise Design (LPD) scheme in high-rise residential (HRR) buildings to facilitate sustainability practices, ensure energy conservation, promote innovative green technologies and water efficiency, and reduce abortive works in Hong Kong's HRR buildings. A comprehensive literature review of concepts similar to LPD scheme and sustainability practices in designing and developing high-rise buildings was undertaken. In addition, interviews were conducted to validate factors influencing LPD adoption. The study focused on sustainable building design relating to users’ behavior patterns and expectations, social needs, green maintenance technologies, and government initiatives. According to the mean score ranking, 20 factors are critical to adopting LPD schemes, accounting for 47.6% of all identified factors. Government-sponsored LPD education, explicit LPD objectives in design, and construction waste reduction are among the key drivers of LPD. Nonetheless, developers’ emphasis on return on investment, varied buyer expectations, and diverse end-user requirements stand as the most significant barriers to LPD. The Mann–Whitney U test also revealed that expert groups disagree on some factors. The study's findings are consistent with recent research on the critical success factors of identified sustainability concepts in the construction industry.

KEYWORDS:

• End-users
• High-rise
• Hong Kong
• Lean premise design
• Sustainability

Acknowledgement

This manuscript represents an extension and further development of the previous work of the authors presented at the WATEF conference which laid the groundwork for the extended analysis and insights presented in the paper. The authors thank the editors and reviewers for their insightful comments, which have greatly enriched this study. The authors also thank the practitioners whose involvement in the data collection was invaluable. Furthermore, the authors acknowledge that the current study, although distinct in its focus on a different facet of the LPD scheme implementation, employs a methodology that parallels that used in prior publications from the same expert interviews and surveys. We recognize the foundational work previously published and its relationship to the research presented here.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability

The data supporting this study's findings are available from the corresponding author, [K.K.O], upon reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

The work described in this paper was fully supported by a grant from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (Project No. UGC/FDS24/E02/21).