Effective development, utilization and management of underground commercial areas

Abstract

With development of the global economy and the improvement of people's living standards, commercial spaces have been expanding to cope with market demand. In most large cities in China, due to the limited space in central urban areas, effective development, utilization and management of underground commercial areas is a topic worthy of further research. The development of underground commercial areas has to go through a project lifecycle starting with a feasibility study including site selection, financial viability, environmental assessment, government involvement and stakeholders. Once a particular project is decided upon, designing, financing, and construction have to be smoothly executed in order to finish the project by the agreed completion date. To achieve this, there needs to be an effective strategic management system for the duration of the project's lifecycle. The development and utilization of underground commercial areas has the characteristics of high investment, high risk, high profit, and irreversibility. China's underground commercial areas have transformed from one with a very high degree of government intervention into a more market-driven system, which has become a popular investment opportunity. The ultimate purpose of modern underground commercial projects is to operate at a profit and are therefore mainly developed by state-owned and private enterprises. Although some progress has been made, there is a lack of strategic guidance, ideology, and scientific management for project decision-making of underground commercial areas, especially for developers. This thesis establishes an effective strategic management model to help developers improve the quality of decision-making for project lifecycle development of underground commercial areas using strategy as its guiding ideology. The research objectives at the outset were to: 1. Identify and analyse the strategic decision factors covering the project lifecycle development of underground commercial areas. 2. Establish a strategic management model to improve the quality of decision-making for project lifecycle development of underground commercial areas. 3. Evaluate the strategic management model by a case study. Qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis were combined in the process of achieving the research objectives. First, document analysis and interviews with experts were adopted as the main research methods to achieve objective 1. Second, document analysis and Delphi method were adopted as the main research methods to achieve objective 2. Third, case study, the AHP method and the Delphi method were adopted as the main research methods to achieve objective 3. The AHP method was applied to evaluate the strategic management model through a real-life case study. By developing the strategic management model to achieve optimal economic benefits for a real-life project, the model was empirically validated by using the Delphi method and Yaahp software. Three university scholars were interviewed in order to identify the strategic decision factors, and nine experts, including university scholars, industry experts, and enterprise executives were invited to assess the established strategic management model. Determination of the model's effective development, utilization and management of underground commercial areas and the measurement of such effectiveness is based on the established strategic management model. The research results show that the model is applicable to decision-making for project lifecycle development of underground commercial areas by developers. It serves as a scientific management model contributing to the effective development, utilization and management of underground commercial areas. The thesis contributes to the relevant body of knowledge in two respects. First, it is the first study to investigate the comprehensive strategic decision factors covering the different stages of project lifecycle development of underground commercial areas for decision-making by developers. Second, it is the first study to establish a strategic management model consisting of different layers, including strategic objective layer, primary decision-making layer, secondary decision-making layer, and tactical execution layer to improve the quality of project decision-making for underground commercial areas by developers.