EVALUATING THE CITY OF JOHANNESBURG'S ABILITY TO ENFORCE BUILDING CODES AND BUILDING POLICIES WITH A VIEW OF BUILDING A DISASTER RESILIENT CITY

EVALUATING THE CITY OF JOHANNESBURG’S ABILITY TO ENFORCE BUILDING CODES AND BUILDING POLICIES WITH A VIEW OF BUILDING A DISASTER RESILIENT CITY.

Lack of building compliance is posing serious threat in the built environment and has negative impacts on safety and human health. Building code compliance is affected by different aspects such as: Lack of municipal management Awareness Corruption Inability to form a close working relationship between different stakeholders.

Rapid urbanization is the serious issue in the urban centers and it increases community exposures to negative events such as disasters and climate change impacts. The population growths in the urban areas result in the development on unsafe land that in turn leads to the increase in exposure of vulnerable population. The risk these communities face is exacerbated by a lack of protected infrastructure and services as well as the lack of building codes and standard ( Andelekani et.al 2015:36-37).Building collapse is one of the results of the natural hazards such as earthquake and they lead to severe disruptions, economic losses, death and damages to infrastructure in the human environment ( Akinyemi et.at 2016:106).Thousands of lives have been lost due to disasters because of the vulnerable urban environment they live in ( Subedu et.al 2008)..

Nwadike et.al 2019:239 advocates that building code compliance is playing a vital role in upgrading the resilience within the built environment during and after a disaster. In order for the building code compliance to be achieved, the building code enforcement is very much needed for compliance to take place ( Nwadike and Wilkinson 2020). Nwadike et.al (2019:6) specify that the choice of complying with the building code guidelines ensure safety. The foundation of building resilient building designs within the city depends on the enforcement of building code compliance ( Nisanka et.al 2019:146)..

Asante and Sasu (2018:110) elaborated that noncompliance with building code regulations is the serious issue that causes more building collapse in Africa. Nwadike et.al (2019:20) highlighted that many lives and properties have been lost due to negligence and ignoring the building code regulations. (May and Wood 2003 131-132). Enforcement and compliance of building codes are facing serious challenges and obstacles related to governance and limitations or risks associated with project resources as well other factors resulting to vulnerability of disasters Mwelu et.al (2018:04) noted that building code compliance is affected by aspects such as the lack of professionalism..

“ According to Nwadike et.al (2019:6) building code compliance is one of the vehicles to drive the goals of the disaster risk reduction agenda in the built environment”. The plan is to go deeper in to literature review and also visit the COJ headquarters in Braamfontein to conduct some few interviews with the building inspectors to compere what I’ve learned and what the inspectors have to say, so I can have a way forward to my final research project regarding the evaluation of building code compliance within the city..

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Akinyemi , A., Dare, G.Anthomy , A. & Dabara , D.I. 2016. May. Building collapse in Nigeria: Issues and challenges. Conference of the international journal of arts & sciences, CD-ROM, Vol.09 no. 01, pp. 99-108, 2016. [Online]Available at. < https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/64430760/BUILDING%20COLLAPSE%20IN%20NIGERIA%20ISSUES%20AND-with-cover-page-v2.pdf?Expires=1653872423&Signature=bbVYSWywLxWeAGdzO1-BkMujfL5L-55aLwKofAYsqQlJFONNFdnk~~EntcgKJd86V~PBNWtMu8PLzFoJfiBwxJ0Czoe8BDbEnj8sQ1~AEifExgJHAGfKEmaqg6VrnalBTLLxH6vqcD4a3d~KOcVzad4nuvOdWtFNzOfdNi8KvImJii9XR44NXRgIPsHbndOy3305lSoNqZ4jMuzRnsQcH26XKsfJY~LzFPFd51~PmtFDEazmkQdBsy2fGW7TmTxENFhf7psyYVDna~sghXNnPM88FcAOZo7DP6rzN-TUnGQGygrZuhHDIawOtTI7X9uX644WUQyLONk6nNS2ohR-ig__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA >Accessed on [ 29 April 2022]..

May ,P., & wood, R.S., 2003. At the regulatory fronlines : inspectors enforcement style s and regulatory compliance. Journal of public administration and theory , 13 (2), pp.177-139.[Online] Available at< https://academic.oup.com/jpart/article/13/2/117/936208?login=true >Accessed on [11 june 2022]. Asante, L.A,. & Sasu , A. 2018 . The challenge of reducing the incidence of building collapse in Ghana. Analysing the perspective of building inpectors in Kumasi. Sage open 8 (2) pp. 21584401778109.[Online] Available at < https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2158244018778109 >Accessed on [ 11June 2022]. Nwadike , A. Wilkinson, S. & Clifton, C. 2019. Improving disaster resilience through effective building code compliance. [Online] Available at<< https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Amarachukwu-Nwadike/publication/339230717_Improving_disaster_resilience_through_effective_building_code_compliance/links/5e452e55299bf1cdb924f6eb/Improving-disaster-resilience-through-effective-building-code-compliance.pdf . Accessed on [16 April 2022]..

Nwadike , A. Wilkinson, S. & Clifton, C. 2019. Improving disaster resilience through effective building code compliance. [Online] Available at<< https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Amarachukwu-Nwadike/publication/339230717_Improving_disaster_resilience_through_effective_building_code_compliance/links/5e452e55299bf1cdb924f6eb/Improving-disaster-resilience-through-effective-building-code-compliance.pdf . Accessed on [16 April 2022 Nwadike .A.N. & Wilkinson. S. 2020: challenges facing building code compliance in New Zealand, international journal of construction management. [Online] Available at< Challenges facing building code compliance in New Zealand (tandfonline.com) >Accessed [10 June 2022]. Asante, L.A,. & Sasu , A. 2018 . The challenge of reducing the incidence of building collapse in Ghana. Analysing the perspective of building inpectors in Kumasi. Sage open 8 (2) pp. 21584401778109.[Online] Available at < https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2158244018778109 >Accessed on [ 11June 2022]. Mwelu , N., Davis, P., Ke , Y., & Watundu . 2018. Complience with regulatory framework in implementing public road constaruction project. Constriction economics and building 18(4). Pp. 1-32.[Online] Available at< https://search.informit.org/doi/abs/10.3316/informit.113890425146705 >Accessed on [ 8 june 2022]..