专英chapter01.docVIP

Chapter 1 Civil Engineering Section A Introduction of Civil Engineering One of the oldest major is civil engineering. Civil engineering is that branch of engineering which aims to provide a comfortable and safe living for the people shelter. The engineering marvels of the world, starting from the pyramids to today’s shell structure, are the results of the development in civil engineering. One of the primary needs of mankind is provided by civil engineers. Civil engineers design and construct buildings, railways, roads, bridges, tunnels, harbors, water and sewage systems, and other public facilities. The efficient planning of water supply and irrigation systems increases the food production in a country. Shelters, apart from just being shelters, have been constructed by civil engineers to provide a peaceful and comfortable life. The word civil derives from the Latin for citizen. In 1782, Englishman John Smeaton used the term to differentiate his nonmilitary engineering work from that of the military engineers who predominated at the time. Since then, the term civil engineer has often been to refer to engineers who build public facilities, although the field is much broader. The works of civil engineer include investigation (collect data before planning a project), surveying (prepare maps to locate the structure on the surface of earth), and design, construction, management, research and development, etc. The scope of civil engineering is broad, depending on the type of the project and the skills needed. Some specializations of civil engineering are listed below: (1) Structural engineering; (2) Geotechnical engineering; (3) Transportation engineering; (4) Fluid mechanics, hydraulics and hydraulic machines; (5) Environmental engineering; (6) Pipeline engineering. Structural engineering is the most important specialization, it includes: positioning and arranging the various parts of the structure into a definite form to achieve best utilization; determining t