Fundamentals of Infrastructure Management

Reviewed by Peter Kazarinoff, Professor, Portland Community College on 5/20/21

Comprehensiveness rating: 5 see less

Infrastructure is a pretty wide-ranging topic. The book does not go into great detail on any one component or part of infrastructure. It does give a general overview of the topic of infrastructure management and basic types of infrastructure. I expect 10 different reviewers would notice 10 different things that are missing. Because there are a lot of different parts of infrastructure and the authors can’t possibly include everything.
For this reviewer, the book does not really address railways or airports in the category of transportation infrastructure. In addition, the book does not really address public transport infrastructure such as buses, light rail, and subways. The content on telecommunications infrastructure does not include satellite infrastructure for GPS. The main focus of the book seems to be building infrastructure and building management systems as compared to a focus on transportation systems or information systems.

Content Accuracy rating: 5

To the best of my knowledge, the content in the book is accurate. Images, tables, and diagrams were clearly cited and the source could be located for the few references I looked up (but I did not do an exhaustive reference search). Some of the charts are graphs in the book are about data that is getting kind of out of date. A lot of the data presented ends in 2014 or sometime in the first decade of 2000. This review was written in 2021.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 4

The basics and fundamentals of Infrastructure Management are the focus of the book. In terms of this focus, the book is relevant. Cost-benefit and construction-maintenance topics maintain relevancy regardless of the infrastructure type and current year. The book could be updated with more current data. Many of the case studies in the text analyze data from before 2015. The infrastructure types noted in the book: roads, buildings, water, telecommunications, electricity, and bases will be with us for a long time.

Clarity rating: 5

The clarity of the writing is high, the font and spacing are easy to read. Infrastructure is a HUGE topic and the authors do a good job dividing it up into infrastructure categories and limiting the scope of their discussion within a category. The text is not overly wordy or academic given the book’s intended audience.

Consistency rating: 4

The book is consistent from chapter to chapter and the formatting is consistent chapter to chapter. The quality and readability of the figures and diagrams do vary a bit. Some of the tables in Chapter 13 have pixelated text that looks different from the rest of the text in the book. Other diagrams and charts in the book are high resolution and easy to read.

Modularity rating: 4

The book has two basic parts. The first 10 chapters are on infrastructure management and chapters 11 to 16 are each about a specific type of infrastructure, such as water, electricity, telecommunications, and roadways. Chapters 11 to 16 can be read on their own, and each chapter could be assigned to a course as a separate reading assignment, without students needing to read the whole book. There are sections at the end of Chapters 11 to 16 that contain how infrastructure management corresponds to that chapter’s topic. These end-of-chapter sections may be less useful for a class on infrastructure that isn’t focused on infrastructure management. Chapters 1 to 10 are more integrated. All 10 chapters can be read together, but reading just an individual chapter in the first half of the book wouldn’t make much sense.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 5

This book is organized and has a clear structure. After the Introduction, in the first ten chapters, the book covers the topic of infrastructure management: background, theory, and methods. Then the text continues with a description of each specific infrastructure system in the remaining chapters 11 to 16. References and Exercises are included at the end of each chapter. An index at the end of the book would be nice to have. The list of tables and list of figures could be moved from the Preface to an Appendix.

Interface rating: 4

The online book interface is easy to navigate. Each chapter and section is clickable and text is searchable. Using Adobe Acrobat Pro DC Version 2021, no Table of Contents showed up in the PDF. A Table of Contents in the PDF version of the book would make the book more navigation-friendly when read in PDF format.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

No grammatical or structural errors were found. The book is in its 3rd Edition and it seems to be free of typos.

Cultural Relevance rating: 3

Although infrastructure is created to serve a public good, there is a long history in the United States to use roadbuilding as a way to divide communities of color. In addition, there is a digital divide in the United States between the wealthy and poor. Access to broadband internet in the United States is not evenly distributed. Neither of these cultural issues are really addressed in this book. The book covers some infrastructure topics in other countries, but a global perspective isn’t consistently used. This US focus seems reasonable, given the book’s topic and audience. Given that infrastructure varies widely in different parts of the world, the fact that almost all of the book is about US infrastructure could have been addressed more deliberately.

Comments

This is a very well-written, high-quality, and organized book. It is a great resource for both instructors and students in senior undergraduate or first-year graduate courses in Infrastructure Management. For our needs, at a community college with a 2-year program in Civil Engineering Technology, the target audience for the book doesn’t fit our infrastructure course. That’s not a knock against this book with a clear target audience. It’s a high-quality and interesting book- it’s just not the book that fits our needs.

Reviewed by Atefe Makhmalbaf, Assistant Professor, University of Texas at Arlington on 1/3/20, updated 2/4/20

Comprehensiveness rating: 5 see less

This book does a great job covering different practical and theoretical topics including asset management, analytical tools and informed decision-making methods. Topics and strategies covered are applicable to different infrastructure systems such as buildings and facilities, transportation, water system, and the power grid system. This is very important and useful because infrastructure systems are interconnected and managers should have good understanding of how they are related and know about different types of systems.
Everything is written in an easy to understand language and each chapter includes exercises, which are very useful especially for a textbook. They are very well thought out and help both instructors and students better understand the material covered and test their knowledge. Furthermore, issues related to management of each infrastructure system are included towards the end of each chapter, which is helpful to both practitioners and researchers.
Each system included is very complex and evolving (e.g., the power system) and its management strategies are also complicated and extensive. As a result topics (e.g., demand response) are left out and the book tries to cover a comprehensive list of topics rather than diving into detailed management of each system because each could be a book by itself.

Content Accuracy rating: 5

The content of each chapter is accurate and I did not find any inaccuracy in the text, images, or equations to the best of my knowledge.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 5

All topics and material included are very relevant to Infrastructure Management. Current concerns of our time such as performance, efficiency, sustainability, and resiliency are considered. Strategies and methods to manage each infrastructure system is discussed in relevance to these objectives. These emerging strategies ensure up-to-date management of infrastructure system, which is evolving.

Clarity rating: 5

The authors make each of the topics very clear and accessible, even for students.

Consistency rating: 5

The text is consistent throughout in terms of terminology and framework.

Modularity rating: 5

This book is modular and very easy to separate into sections and instructors or students could focus on topics relevant to their area. Almost every part of the book could be read separately, Hence the modularity is excellent. This also supports openstax cnx.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 5

This book is very well organized and has a clear logical flow. After introductine Infrastructure Management, it covers general infrastructure management methods and strategies in the first 10 chapters and then it goes over each specific infrastructure system.

Interface rating: 5

The interface is very easy to navigate. Each chapter and section is clickable and text is searchable.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

No grammatical errors found.

Cultural Relevance rating: 4

This book covers some data about other countries but it could probably have more of a global perspective and it would be helpful to supplement with information about how this topic is applicable to other countries.

Comments

This book is a great resource. It is a very well written and organized book. It is a great resource for both instructors and students who are interested in Infrastructure Management. Infrastructure Management is an important topic that should be considered in more schools. Today, designing sustainable and resilient infrastructure is not sufficient if the system is not operated and managed with the same decision objectives and criteria as it was designed. Instructors should take advantage of this freely available book, educate students about Infrastructure Management and use it as textbook for their courses.