Building Our Future

Anywhere you look, Civil Engineering is involved. Civil Engineering is a type of engineering that involves projects that affect everyone. The projects that civil engineers are related may include: designing of transportation networks (highways, railroads, bridges, and airports), water supply systems, sewage systems, and buildings. Civil Engineering has a direct impact on today’s society. A civil engineer determinates how the environment looks and functions to meet the requirements of society.

On a daily basis a civil engineer’s job involves much more dynamism than other engineering positions. Some jobs require the worker to be sitting on a chair all day long, other are mostly outdoors but they don’t have any office time. Civil engineers balance both aspects perfectly. Civil engineers design the project with a team of engineers, and once the project is done their job consist on visiting the site regularly to ensure that the procedures are being done the right way. 

Civil Engineers at work

Civil Engineering is one of the most complete engineering that exists. Other engineering fields are very focused on one purpose. While mechanical engineers focus in machine design, civil engineers work to ensure public wellbeing and the safety of the population. Think about this for a second, what would be the life expectancy if we didn’t have any sewage or water supply systems? Civil Engineering makes life easier and better. How could we travel without roads or airports?

The Colosseum

                         

Civil Engineering is one of the oldest fields of engineering. This engineering is not new for us, long time before other types of engineering were even discovered, people were already applying their Civil Engineering knowledge. The growth of the population is directly related to the evolution of Civil Engineering. It is known that Civil Engineering was first used by the Egyptians around 4000 and 2000 BC to build the pyramids. Many civilizations in the past used Civil Engineering for survival and growth, some examples are: the roads that were built by the romans let them expand their empire throughout Europe, and also the expansion of the rail roads out west, which made possible the rapid growth of the United States.
 

Civil Engineering is building our future. One of the challenges Civil Engineering faces nowadays is how to make this world safer and healthier. Many civil engineers are working on developing nanomaterials that can be applied to structures. The main purpose of these nanomaterials is to maintain a structure strong for a longer time so there is no need of repairing it after several years. By developing these nanomaterials, governments won’t be spending that much money repairing structures because they will be able to stay healthier for longer periods of time. Civil Engineering is one of the few fields in engineering that tries to improve our quality of life.

Nowadays that we are very worried about pollution, Civil Engineering is developing new ways to incorporate sustainable and environmental friendly structures in the construction process. Green Roofs are a different way to make the building environmental friendly and at the same time making it look good.

Example of a green roof
http://www.greenrooftechnology.com/
Here is a link to a page that explains the technology behing green roofs

Civil Engineering is one of the most complete and old engineering techniques. Throughout its history Civil Engineering has been trying to improve our quality of life. Civil Engineering and evolution walk down the same path to ensure human prosperity.