Call me impulsive, but me and Jon had been in dilemma since months ago contemplating whether we should watch the play and therefore without a second thought had accepted the excellent opportunity for having been able to watch the play that night!The rabbit thesis
One sunny day a rabbit came out of her hole in the ground to enjoy the fine weather. The day was so nice that she became careless and a fox snuck up behind her and caught her. "I am going to eat you for lunch!" said the fox. "Wait!" replied the rabbit, "You should at least wait a few days." "Oh yeah? Why should I wait?" "Well, I am just finishing my thesis on 'The Superiority of Rabbits over Foxes and Wolves.'" "Are you crazy? I should eat you right now! Everybody knows that a fox will always win over a rabbit." "Not really, not according to my research. If you like, you can come into my hole and read it for yourself. If you are not convinced, you can go ahead and have me for lunch." "You really are crazy!" But since the fox was curious and had nothing to lose, it went with the rabbit. The fox never came out. A few days later the rabbit was again taking a break from writing and sure enough, a wolf came out of the bushes and was ready to set upon her. "Wait!" yelled the rabbit, "You can't eat me right now." "And why might that be, my furry appetizer?" "I am almost finished writing my thesis on 'The Superiority of Rabbits over Foxes and Wolves.'" The wolf laughed so hard that it almost lost its grip on the rabbit. "Maybe I shouldn't eat you; you really are sick ... in the head. You might have something contagious." "Come and read it for yourself; you can eat me afterward if you disagree with my conclusions." So the wolf went down into the rabbit's hole and never came out. The rabbit finished her thesis and was out celebrating in the local lettuce patch. Another rabbit came along and asked, "What's up? You seem very happy." "Yup, I just finished my thesis." "Congratulations. What's it about?" "'The Superiority of Rabbits over Foxes and Wolves.'" "Are you sure? That doesn't sound right." "Oh yes. Come and read it for yourself." So together they went down into the rabbit's hole. As they entered, the friend saw the typical graduate abode, albeit a rather messy one after writing a thesis. The computer with the controversial work was in one corner. And to the right there was a pile of fox bones, on the left a pile of wolf bones. And in the middle was a large, well-fed lion. The Moral of the Story: The title of your thesis doesn't matter. The subject doesn't matter. The research doesn't matter. All that matters is who your supervisor is.
Source: from Professor Phil Ashworth ,University of Brighton.
After getting absolutely fed up with the state of my previous flat that I shared with two other dirty tenants and a landlord plus his quite moody girlfriend (see my previous post), I had decided to call it " a day", find a better flat, packed, and bugger off!
Jon, started to feel annoyed with the whole thing decided to take the matter further by asking another customer queueing just right behind us: "Do I look eighteen?!" he said.
It's almost 1pm when my stomach start grumbling again and by this time I really can't ignore it. Giving a good excuse of the 12minutes wait for the next Metroline, off we go out the station and running like a greyhound to the nearest food station, Subway. Miraculously that is the only time Jon had ever agreed with my choice of Subway, Italian BMT (he usually complain a lot on how he can't take cold meat bla bla bla..). Few minutes later we were making our way back to the station running like a mad dog down the stairs and surprisingly, three minutes to spare.
By about 7pm, we sat in quite an empty carriage all the way back to Euston after doing one of the Northern Northbound end. Feeling exhausted, I fell asleep conveniently between Brent Cross and Euston before being rudely awaken by Jon at Goodge Street.
12.45am: Upminster!! By this time, we had experienced being almost locked up in one of the station in Hammersmith&City line, have an uncountable further toilet stops, being grilled "alive" (we almost know by now how it feels like being a roasted duck) in Victoria line tube, being stared oddly at and endlessly by commuters and members of underground staff alike, and having the urge to runaway back to Jon's house rather than continuing our journey up to Upminster. But most of all, we had experienced the warmth in our heart as we had done what we can to show our support.
“The key challenge is between using MMC and traditional methods of construction and not which material is used”. I am totally agreed with this statement. The obvious difference between MMC and traditional methods of construction lies on one being made off site and one being made on site. However, what if a particular site has a factory located far away? isn’t it better to construct the whole thing on site? How much time and cost can be saved to produce a wall, for example, off-site rather than on site?
“Modern Methods of Construction are not generic solutions that can be applied as effectively everywhere in the country or indeed internationally. Modern Methods of Construction may not be as cost-effective in developing countries where labour is cheap and plentiful. They are particularly effective in
INTEGER has stated in their key outcomes that “it is important to remember that the building process is simply a means to an end. The end product is more important than the process employed. The long term viability of the building is more significant than the building process employed”. A statement that unfortunately I am not really agreed with. From my point of view, the end product is as important as (not more than) the process employed. We must bear in mind that MMC is used because of its faster construction time and also to reduce CO2 emissions as well as wastes generated on site. Therefore, we must also taking into the consideration that volumetric modules used to construct a particular house, for example, might require a more frequent transportation to and from the site and factory (a queries I had made to one of the prefabricated housing manufacture has stated that a lorry apparently has only been able to transport about two modules in one go) hence creating a higher fuel consumption which can incur a higher cost at the end product. If a non volumetric pre-assembly that being used to construct a particular house, for example, its weight is the one that need to be taken into consideration, the heavier the weight of the wall panels be, the higher the fuel consumption will be as well. Sometimes, decision to use modules, for example, will lie entirely on the site location. My interview with one of a local architect has put me in the alert of the horrendous difficulty that can occur if MMC has not been thought through since the beginning of the design stage. Apparently, the modules delivered to the particular site has to be craned on top of the neighbouring houses and poor old people in the neighbourhood need to be ushered away for a ‘cup of coffee’ while they craned the modules pass their roofs, which resulting in a bigger risk in health and safety and might also means that it incur higher cost at the end product.
“There is a need to ensure that the buildings are used properly”. In my opinion, this can mean thousands of interpretation. It might means that the particular buildings need to be designed based on their needs (for example, you wouldn’t want to design a particular building near shore or beach, such as Brighton, in steel construction that can easily get rusty due to the ‘salty’ air around beach area). But it can also be interpreted as “you can ONLY use a particular building designed for a particular purposes!” which I am entirely opposed to. To me, sustainability means that a particular building should fit as much function as possible to prevent unnecessary changes and demolition. This means that a building to be designed with, for example, easily removable internal partition or, in conclusion, as flexible as possible for future change of use.
“MMC is still seen as more expensive than traditional options. The guarantees that can be assumed with traditional structures are simply not there. Therefore RSLs are not keen to change the way they build”. Unfortunately, I found this as quite a pessimistic gesture. I am not promising anything but I have noticed that this means there is still not many research has been undergone to make MMC process better. It will be good to do a research on how sustainable MMC can be maybe, for example, by implementing and establishing the life cycle assessment of not only each particular materials but also as a ‘whole’ end product. By doing this, there can be an improvement that hopefully can be made when you are comparing the traditional construction and pre-assembly construction.
