The development of productivity in the construction industry has long been at a steady state compared to the manufacturing industry. Studies have shown that, amongst other things, waste on construction sites can reach up to one third of the total production cost. This has been observed from different aspects, and change is forthcoming.This thesis aims to provide a foundation for an increased productivity at production sites of building bridges. It is primarily based on a field study at Skanska, at a bridge construction site near Grängesberg. Via continuous interviews with the whole production crew, construction workers and management, information on interference and possibilities of improvement at the work site has been documented.

Today´s roofing of dwelling houses is a very time consuming procedure, which includes a lot of different steps on the construction site. Not only does it cost a lot of money, but often do problems with rot and mold occur in the attics of houses today. The use of prefabricated modules has seen a great breakthrough in the field of construction of dwelling houses; at least when it comes to foundations and walls, where this type of approach makes the construction process way more efficient. What no one previous has succeeded to develop is a corresponding system for roofs that meets the demands of a dwelling house. Accordingly the goal of PlusTak has been to come up with a proper module system for roofing of dwelling houses, where the roofing is completed to meet the demands of the Scandinavian market. During the project a lot of effort has been put into customer contacts and the usability of the product, as well in the manufacturing process as on the construction site. This development has gone hand in hand with several practical tests and tryouts.

The essay discusses how to look at a equality plan of a academic department experiences the, gender equality in general and how power is portrayed from a gender perspective in the academic department. Through the use of qualitative interviews and a short survey the results have shown that few of the staff members have knowledge about the equality plan and few are familiar with its contents. Furthermore results show that the academic department is run hierarchyilly and that both vertical and horizontal gender segregation exists.The climate at the academic department is characterized by the will to work with gender equality but so far there have only been few exercised or planned efforts to do so. The gap between theory and practise is wide, the will to be seen as an equal academic department concerning equality of men and women seems important. The conscious or unconscious strategy of covering up the real gender equality seems to be done by focusing on the numerical equality..

The purpose of this paper is to investigate in which aspects the public library is affected by its local community. This is re-searched by means of an exemplified case study of a Swedish public library in which we analyze governing documents and the library website with respect to environmental scanning and mar-keting of library services.The research questions are: How are the local community?s demands on the public li-brary being described in the governing document? How is the public library?s response to the demands of the local community being described in the operational plan? How are the demands of the local community, as shown in the governing document and the operational plan, re-flected in the marketing of library services on the library website?Our conclusions are that:The demands of the local community are described in a general fashion in the governing document, but there is a lack of concrete political guidelines.The public library's response to the demands of the local commu-nity is described to some length in the operational plan, but not with respect to economical factors.The demands of the local community are reflected to some length in the marketing of library services on the library website. Many of the overall themes that we identify in the governing document and the operational plan can be found in the marketing directed towards important target groups..

Housing construction very close to the lake Mälaren has become very popular today. One potential problem with these houses is the influence of the sea climate. Unprotected buildings are affected by strong winds and precipitation. So for that reason, it is very important to make an accurate climate investigation and use it for decision-making during the planning of the new settlement.It is very important with a good moisture protection regarding pelting rain, that is the combination of wind and rain. This is more important for buildings close to a lake, as this location normally means a higher exposure to wind.

This report presents thesis of Liisa Kokkonen in collaboration with Muovikilpi Oy.The project?s goal is to find a new construction for an existing lamp made of acrylic. Form and design retains and the manufacturing occurs at Muovikilpi Oy. The project contains the new construction and manufacturing of the lamp and also a proposition for a set with floor and wall lamp.  The paper gives an outline of acrylic as material and how it reacts with light.

Virtual communities are a phenomenon that is becoming more common as the information technology comes with in reach for the general public. This report will bring the theories and construction of a virtual community together. The purpose of this report is to describe the different theories that have emerged from the research within this field and to examine the work procedures that have been used during the development of a site for a MDA-community. The MDA-website is a homepage on the Internet that was developed to bring the students closer together. The report describes the work of the project group, why the website was not completed and at the end the theories are looked at on the basis of the construction of the website..

In the year 2002 a commission wasappointed by the government and taskedto clear up possible flaws in the lawgoverning spatial planning (Plan ochbygglagen, PBL). The commission's reportlaid the foundations for a new law whichwas adopted by the Swedish parliament onthe 20th of June 2010 and is scheduledto come into effect on the 2nd of May2011.The purpose of this thesis has been toexamine the changes made in the new law,primarily from a civil-rights point ofview, focusing on the appeal process.This is a highly interesting subjectconsidering one reason behind the newlaw was to simplify and streamline theplanning process while keeping civilrights intact.Through a comprehensive literature studyand interviews with experts the currentplanning process was mapped out andrelevant changes in the new law wereexamined. After the study had beenconcluded we were able to distinguishseveral areas that underwent especiallyinteresting changes;The requirement of a plan program wasremoved and the exhibition process wasremoved and replaced by a writtenreview. Individuals were given thepossibility of requesting a plan notice.The different spatial plan documentswere merged into one single document andthe number of responsible authoritiesfor spatial plans is no longer limitedto one.The study has shown that the aspirationfor a more effective spatial planningprocess has mostly been conducted at theexpense of individual rights.The single biggest obstacle forachieving a democratic planning processis learning how the law works and howthe spatial planning process isimplemented, this is has been proven tobe a very hard and time consuming taskfor individuals to undertake..

This research analyzed differences in measurements of magnetic field strength and frequency response in five audio induction loops installed in rooms of wooden construction materials and five audio inductive loops installed in rooms of steel reinforced concrete constructions. The inductive loops were installed at floor level and the measurements were made at the listening height of 1.2m. Measurements of background noise, field strength and frequency response were made at fifteen different measurement points across the room. The research measurements showed that there are differences in field strength and frequency response between these two conditions, whether the audio induction loop is installed in a wooden construction or the audio induction loop is installed in a reinforced concrete construction. The results had a significance level of p=0,05..

This essay examine the meaning produced around bodies and body fat in the queer community, but also in the surrounding straight community. The author has interviewed fat activists, and are using queertehory, to examine and analyze the relationship between body fat and the understanding and construction of sexuality and gender. The author concludes that even if norms around body shape and body fat are overlapping between the two contexts to some degree, they also differ. In the straight community, people with larger body shapes and sizes are punished, and encouraged to stay, or become, slim. However, in the queer community, ?fat? or bigger body sizes are not frowned upon in the same degree.

Logistics and supply chain management in the construction sector is an area with great potential for improvements. Today, a lot of the workers time is spent on non-value adding activities. Research has shown that waste is a large proportion of the total production cost in building projects today.The purpose of this report is to analyze problems concerning logistics in the construction sector. Two of Skanska?s construction projects in Uppsala have been analyzed to identify problems.

In the construction industry the number of female managers is very low, only four percent (SCB, 2010). In fact, women with management positions has risen by six percentage overall, the last seven years (SCB, 2010). If women in managerial positions continue to grow at this rate, the proportion of women managers will be equal to that of male managers in 2033. More women are needed in the maledominated construction industry in particular because it is deemed that they have a different way of thinking and acting (Granér, 1994). Nelton (1991) believes that companies can take advantage of female managers to be more competitive on the market, the reason why is because women can see other possibilities when solving problems. Rapacioli (2010) argues that the recruitment of women into management positions not only benefits the individual itself but also the company. We have used a qualitative study with a deductive approach. Six respondents from the same company were interviewed, two of them have management positions and the other four were underemployed.The research question of this paper is: What differences and similarities are seen between male and female leadership in terms of their characteristics in the construction industry?The purpose of this paper is to examine similarities and differences in leadership in the construction industry where the focus is on the female and male characteristics. To fulfill our purpose we chose a qualitative study. We have interviewed six respondents at one company in the construction industry. Two of the six respondents have management positions and the remaining four are employed. In this paper we have concluded that there are some differences and similarities between men and women´s leadership in terms of their characteristics.

This qualitative research is about how Swedish media constructs immigrants in articles. The focus of the study will lie on ten Swedish articles and how they stereotype immigrants, but the demarcation will be for young immigrant boys related to crimes. The purpose of this paper is to highlight how media achieves its goal to construct a group as inferior. This will be implemented with the help of articles from different newspapers that reported on immigrants who have committed crimes. We have chosen to look at different newspapers to see if there is a curtain pattern in the construction of immigrant boy.

We have produced a process mapping and from there developed a document management plan for the research service at the Labour Movement Archives and Library (ARAB) in Stockholm, Sweden. The project was conducted during five weeks in the spring of 2011 at ARAB and the resulting classification structure and document plan has been formulated and presented to the staff at a seminar. We found that the institution in some cases were suffering from an inadequate documentation in a number of the identified processes, and also in their records management and archiving. In this additional memorandum follows an analyzing discussion of activity-based document- and archive management, e-archives and process mapping. We have accordingly tried to standardize the process of research services and contribute to a more adequate document management within the institution.

This report is the final step in the Bachelor of Science program in Building Construction Engineering, Department of Engineering Sciences, Uppsala University.The purpose of this study is to highlight the difficulties and possibilities that could involve the introduction of new energy efficient technologies and changing work around this technology. This study focuses on energy use at a construction site or other temporary workplace where so-called portacabins are in place to address the need for temporary facilities.The method for obtaining knowledge on the subject was mainly interviews with site managers working in Svevia AB's various activities. In conjunction with the interviews I visited construction sites and portacabins if it was possible.My most important suggestion to Svevia AB concerns a better organization in order to make poratacabins more efficient on energy and costs. The company should also evaluate and monitor the energy efficient portacabins that are in operation.Expected energy savings of new technology may not materialize if there are gaps in information, education, technical services and technical maintenance. It is very important to utilize the experiences of new technology.