A new proposed control system for the new building permit process according to the new planned zoned bylaws

In spite of the innovations and the technological advancements all over the world, technology integration in governmental systems in developing countries are still rudiment. Since the Bylaws, codes, even the education systems are changing every year, there is an urge to adapt automations and collaborative platforms to foster the communication and streamline processes. This study aims to analyze the new Planned Zoned Bylaws, which is published on September 30th, 2017, in order to identify the effects of the new permit process and offer a new system with expedite process to improve the existed conventional system which is believed to be complicated and time-consuming. The research is based on a field study which is carried out at Kartal Municipality in İstanbul province in Turkey. The main purpose of the field study is to identify the permit-related problems and delay causation in the permit process. In addition, to offer convenient solutions to overcome them by offering a new integrated system that provide more comprehensible procedures that serves the transparency of the process. The field study results reveals that the current permit acquisition process is intricate, time-consuming and with a high level of bureaucracy. This is due to the complexity of the current codes, regulations, paperwork requirements and inadequacy if the number of staff to meet up with better customer services. Surprisingly, the permit officials, inspectors and project's owners play a key role in the convolution of the permit process. Moreover, the lack of communication and collaborative platforms, that can be accessible by diversity of parties in the permit process, is perceived to be as one of the major causations of delays in obtaining permits. This research contributes with a novel and a systematic framework of the new permit process that can be used by Kartal Municipality by leveraging the information technologies and the state-of-the-art of collaboration platforms. The authentic aim of this framework is to streamline processes, empowering collaboration and enhance the communications between the involved permit parties. As well as, recommendations are drawn to reconsider the bylaws and regulations by re-examining the related terms which seem to be fuzzy and inconspicuous and provide comprehensible guidebooks for owners and other parties to simplify the permit acquisition process. The first chapter of this research is the introductions which provides the background, the problem statement, the research aim, research objective, the methodology of the research, the novelty of the research and the research limitations. Briefly, this chapter provides an overview with an informative chart concerning the status quo of bothsystem and process of acquiring permits from Kartal Municipality. By examining the current process, significant large number of required paperwork are involved for acquiring permits. This situation is exacerbated by the new Planned Zoned Building Bylaws, that have been published in 30th of September 2017, where many additional paperwork is requested The second chapter provides a background about the structure, building and permits and define the interrelationships between them in accordance to the bylaws and regulations. Consequently, this chapter demonstrates the type of structures, their attributes and the suitable types of permits needed for them. Next, the form of the permit is explained briefly and provide one of the original template for it. Accordingly, this chapter describes the holistic permit concept from the inception, zoning plans, passing through the building permit acquisition and construction control till the occupancy permits. The third chapter briefly defines the permit acquisition process, their procedures, requirements, paperwork and interpretations of their rules and terms. Moreover, the interrelationships between the permits parties are briefly explained, for instance, the relationship between municipality and the contractor. The forth chapter discusses and analyzes the current permit acquisition process using a case study from Kartal Municipality. In this chapter, and with the reference to the appendix 1, the current system in the Kartal Municipality are discussed and explained showing the steps and the procedures for getting a permit. As well as, the time required to accomplish it. Briefly, the process first starts with a petition application to acquire a permit to the Kartal Municipality. In this petition the architectural designs, preliminary designs for elevators, landscape and soil investigations are needed. Second, all of these documents are checked with the compliance to the codes and bylaws. Third, the structural compliance check performed. Forth, by checking all of the previous steps, the chief of the architects and structural engineering department approval of the document are acquired. Fifth step is the mechanical and electrical compliance check and, subsequently, the chief of mechanical and electrical approval of document are acquired. The sixth and the last step is the managerial check to overall checking the approved documents to issue the permits. The sixth step is briefly explained in appendix 2 where all the needed signed documents are explained. Mainly, in this chapter, the detections and the discovery of the related problems are investigated. The investigation is based on a previous research where statistics are provided concerning the number of permits and occupancy permits that are given annually by the Kartal Municipality. The analysis has been achieved by using face-to-face interviews and fish bone diagrams for the discovery of cause and effects. The analysis first stats by fish bone analysis in order to isolate and separate the reasons and causations of the problems. Then face-to-face interviews have been carried out with some of the employees in the city hall Kartal. Through the interview, questions concerning: delay causation in the architectural, structural, mechanical, electrical projects accordingly, as well as the soil investigations reports, are asked. By analyzing the statistics, many problems in the process have been discovered not only in the permit process but also at the construction process too. Ultimately, this research has unfolded the main problem which is there is no integrated system that is collaborative,controllable, and accessible by all the participants in the permit acquisition in the Kartal Municipality. Interestingly, discoordination has not only been observed among the systems in other Municipalities but also among the departments themselves inside the same Municipality. This is discovered by making comparison between the systems in different Municipalities. This discoordination among the Municipality systems makes confusion for the citizen and clients. The political interference is seeming to be as one of the main causes of this discoordination which influence the transparency of the process. Alongside with the main problem, myriad of other issues have been observed to play as a key role and contribute in the main issue, such as: the large number of prerequisite documents for obtaining permits which it seems confusing if it is not controlled by an integrated system, as well as, the lack of experienced employees and engineers exacerbate the delay problem of the process. The fifth chapter presents the new proposed framework that can be used to solve the current problems in the permit process. The new proposed integrated system, which is a web-based collaborative platform, fosters and enhances the communications not only among the inner departments and employees inside the Municipality but also with the clients and citizens as well. Leveraging the advancements in the Information technologies (IT), this integrated system would be accessible by every single participant in the process, such as contractors, owners, building audits, engineering department etc., in order to control and track the procedure to get the permits. Since, this process is integrated and accessible by every participant, the process and steps will be controlled efficiently and sufficiently. Moreover, being a web-based system, the process will be also supervised and will be done with high level of transparency unlike the current system in the Kartal Municipality. The distinctive feature of this system is that the client and the Municipality staff will coordinate with each other in provided the required document. In this way, it will insure the completeness and reduce any discrepancies within the process. The only limitation to this system is the lack of new data processing system which, if exist, this system would be practicable. In this chapter, and with reference to appendix 3, the overall process of the new proposed system is explained. The system is totally digital which can overcome the time-consuming and error-prone paper-based work. The system first starts by making a web-based application to the Kartal Municipality where all the needed documents are provided in a form of checklist and it can be uploaded digitally on the webpage with their corresponding reference numbers. By this way, it will ensure the completeness of the required documents for acquiring a permit in the municipality. The second step, all the required files can be uploaded, except the geotechnical report, structural, mechanical and electrical plans, in order check the architectural designs, preliminary elevator designs and landscape plans. In parallel to second step, the formwork plans of the structure is checked by the structural department which can be conceived as more coordination in solving some systematical problems that causes the delay in the process. As well, if the formwork is checked other departments, such as mechanical and electrical, can initiate the compliance check which accelerate the process and reduce the required time to acquire the permit. Any comments and feedback on the plans and designed can be uploaded interactively on the webpage which can be noticed by the clients. Consequently, the clients shall respond to these comments within 15 days otherwise the petition will be timeout and terminated. Thiswill ensure that the time of acquiring a permit shall be limited and reduced. All in all, this system will provide an informative and collaborative platform that ensures the transparency of the process and overcome the time-consuming and error-prone paper-based work. The new system is recommended be applied interactively among all the Municipalities in the country to overcome the discoordination issue and provide a more robust system that can be in compliance with any changes in the bylaws. Unfortunately, this proposed system need further development concerning the for the data processing and the document control systems that can ensure the originality of the uploaded documents. The sixth and the last chapter will draw some recommendations and conclusions about the new system and how to enhance it in the future studies.