Non-excusable delays in construction

Existing literature and research findings indicated that delays are common amongst construction projects in many countries across the globe. Delays can be caused by one or more of the following: the client (excusable with compensation); force majeur or third party (excusable delays without compensation); or the contractors (nonexcusable delays or contractor responsible delays). Previous studies cited that approximately 50% of these delays can be classified as non-excusable delays. The root-causes (or factors) that cause non-excusable delays identified in these studies however, are given no detailed attention. Improving and constantly monitoring the factors causing non-excusable delays can help to determine and improve contractor's performance. This research explores issues related to the factors causing non-excusable delays. It includes establishing indicators to identify these factors and appropriate corrective actions. The research also develops an indicator that offers an alternative to intuitive judgement which can provide a consistent and standardised assessment of qualitative factor. The proposed indicator employs both quantitative and qualitative measures to evaluate qualitative factor which caused non-excusable delays. A correct determination of the root-causes (or factors) of non-excusable delays is vital for deriving an appropriate corrective action. This study offers a method of identifying these root-causes as well as identifying and establishing their corrective actions, a structured approach of deriving corrective actions was also developed. This approach was tested in a survey and proved to be consistent with the opinion of twenty nine contracting organisations. One of the significant contributions in this research was the development of an alternative indicator to assess "communication performance" using the concept of fuzzy logic control. The establishment of the common indicators that were used to identify the critical factors is another important achievement for this research. Fifteen critical factors were established and the findings indicate that resources schedule was the most effective indicators used to identify majority of the factors under consideration. Apart from the knowledge contribution in the subject of delays, the methodology employed to identify the factors of non-excusable delays using cause-and-effect analysis has helped to generate additional factors that previous studies did not focus on

Safety Practices and Labour Productivity in Construction Projects

Safety and productivity issues are become a vital concern in the construction industry nowadays.  Low labor productivity and unsafe working environment have often been claimed to relate each other. Base on that reason, the aim of this study was to identify the most influencing safety practices on construction labor productivity. Questionnaire survey form with the Likert scale questions gave to the respondents to achieve research objectives. Then, the average index method, Kruskal Wallis test, and factor analysis technique were used to analyzed data. The result showed that the using of basic personal protective equipment (PPE) and the existence of safe guard device are the most influencing safety practices on labor productivity. The contractor result is the highest score compare to the client and consultant. This result can be useful to all the stake-holders in construction projects, from the initial to the end of project stages. The most important contribution of this study is the identification of the safety practices factors that give positive influence to the labour productivity. If these factors have been identified, it is easier to prepare the construction process. Construction projects expected to be more productive and also safer

A systematic approach for monitoring and evaluating the construction project progress

A persistent problem in construction is to document changes which occur in the field and to prepare the as-built schedule. In current practice, deviations from planned performance can only be reported after significant time has elapsed and manual monitoring of the construction activities are costly and error prone. Availability of advanced portable computing, multimedia and wireless communication allows, even encourages fundamental changes in many jobsite processes. However a recent investigation indicated that there is a lack of systematic and automated evaluation and monitoring in construction projects. The aim of this study is to identifytechniques that can be used in the construction industry for monitoring and evaluating the physical progress, and also to establish how current computer technology can be utilised for monitoring the actual physical progress at the construction site. This study discusses the results of questionnaire survey conducted within Malaysian Construction Industry and suggests a prototype system, namely Digitalising Construction Monitoring (DCM). DCM prototype system integrates the information from construction drawings, digital images of construction site progress and planned schedule of work. Using emerging technologies and information system the DCM re-engineer the traditional practice for monitoring the project progress. This system can automatically interpret CAD drawings of buildings and extract data on its structural components and store in database. It can also extract the engineering information from digital images and when these two databases are simulated the percentage of progress can be calculated and viewed in Microsoft Project automatically. The application of DCM system for monitoring the project progress enables project management teams to better track and controls the productivity and quality of construction projects. The use of the DCM can help resident engineer, construction manager and site engineer in monitoring and evaluating project performance. This model will improve decision-making process and provides better mechanism for advanced project management

Automated low cost house demand forecasting for urban area

Historically, urbanization was the product of industrial expansion and rapid economic growth. In developing country however, the process has been characterized by rapid urban growth without corresponding economic growth of the cities. This resulted in the emergemve of the informal sector and squatter settlements. In Malaysia, urbanization is expexted to continue, with the Department of Statistics projecting the urban population at 64% of total population by the year 2020

Identification and Classification of the Implementation of Knowledge Management Factors in Malaysian Construction Consulting Companies: An Exploratory Study

Ever since knowledge has become an important corporate asset, Knowledge Management (KM) has become a critical concern for construction consulting companies to create and sustain their competitive advantage. Therefore, an exploratory research was conducted to identify and classify the methods of implementing key KM faktors in Malaysian construction consulting companies using a three-round Delphi technique study to identify and rank critical components of Knowledge Management (KM) principles for construction consulting companies. Subsequently, faktor analysis was used to generate variables for the KM faktors and the results are compared with the original groupings identified from the first level of the research. Finally, the classification of the implementation of KM faktors are analysed and further grouped into two categories i.e., exploitive and explorative. A one sample ttest was conducted to confirm the difference between the two types of KM and the overall the KM program.

A systematic procedure for developing the 3D model to evaluate the construction project progress

This main purpose of this study is to summarize the experience at the Construction Technology and Management Center (CTMC) to develop a Digitalizing Construction Monitoring (DCM) system by integrating 3DAutoCAD drawings and digital images. The objective of this paper is to propose a framework model for the DCM system and discuss in detail the steps involved for developing and calculating the 3D coordinate values from 2D digital images

Sustainable design and construction elements in green highway

Sustainable development principles have been implemented in various sectors including construction. Proper development and operation of infrastructure projects such highways can contribute significantly to the mission of sustainable development. Previous studies shown that most of conventional highways are unsustainable in many ways. Highways are facing severe challenge such as deteriorating condition, congestion, energy supply, and shortfall of funding for maintenance and capacity expansion to meet increasing demand. However at the same time, they consume huge amount of natural minerals and energy and generate waste and emission which contributing to climate changes and global warming. Therefore, sustainable design, construction, operation and maintenance have become priority these day. The aim of this paper is to determine critical elements for sustainable design and construction based on ranking of the priority level of the weighted value of each criteria. The questionnaires survey were developed and distributed to related respondents in order to obtain the agreement level for the element. The data was analysed using SPSS with factor analysis method. Result from the analysis shown the criteria, weightage and score for main criteria for sustainable design and construction activities for green highway

Modeling the potential risk of building vulnerability towards tsunami hazard in Ulak Karang and Pasir Jambak sub-district, Padang

Padang was destroyed by tsunamis generated by the earthquakes in the history of Padang. As an area located in a coastal region, its buildings in Padang face major vulnerability against a tsunami. The objectives of this study are to develop the potential impact model of building vulnerability toward tsunami hazard and to compare the building damage levels based on water inundation, internal, and external factors in Ulak Karang and Pasir Jambak sub-districts. The objective of this research is also to give recommendation to government in making planning strategies for reducing and managing the tsunami risk on building vulnerability. There are three stages of modeling; first stage in this study is simulating an eartquake model for two study areas to estimate the maximum inundation. The second stage of modeling is implementing the spatial analysis of building vulnerability based on the field surveys and GIS. The third stage to conlude is developing the Relative Vulnerability Index (RVI) scores of buildings by mapping the building vulnerability toward tsunami hazard and giving several alternatives to develop a risk management plan in a coastal community. The result shows that Ulak Karang sub-district is determined to be more vulnerable than Pasir Jambak sub-district because many buildings near the coastline of Ulak Karang sub-district are made of timber and are arranged close to each other. Moreover, many buildings in Ulak Karang sub-district, especially along the river, are made of traditional brick. Although near Pasir Jambak coastline many buildings are made of timber, but the buildings are not close to each other. There are several alternatives to increase resilience of buildings in a coastal zone, namely: 1) regulation for buildings that have RVI: 4 and 5; 2) building codes; 3) vertical evacuation structures; 4) land use zones; 5) sea walls along the coastlines; 6) natural barriers and 7) early warning system

Critical project manager competencies in managing highway projects in West Sumatra - Indonesia

The Highway development projects currently being implemented in West Sumatra, Indonesia is important in increasing the competitiveness in the country's economy. At the same period, it will also give a positive impression such as being able to reduce the cost of transportation, increase the quality of life, the value of use and labour productivity. The project managers play an important role in the success of the project. There is a consensus that project managers increase the likelihood of project success even though their projects face major problems. In this paper, the focus is on identifying the competency of Highway Project Managers in West Sumatera in carrying out the Project Management concept that leads to project success. Based on that and in accordance with this study, the approach used in data collection and processing is a qualitative approach. The results of the factor analysis are shown to experts, to establish that all these factors are important in development the performance of a project managed by the Project Manager. The results of the factor analysis derive 31 factors that are validated by the experts. And all these factors are crucial in determining the performance of the Project Manager

Buildability Attributes at Design Phase in Malaysian Building Construction

In Malaysian construction industry, problem is a common occurrence that hinders the project to run smoothly, notably in traditional contracting system where the design and construction process are separated. Previous research revealed that buildability is able to minimise these problems as it link the design and construction. This study outlines the buildability in design stage. Extensive reviews have been carried out on previous researches on buildability concepts, attributes, principles and other areas related to, and contributing to buildability mainly in the design phase. The term ‘buildability attribute’ has been selected in this study to describe those characteristics which directly or indirectly optimize integration of construction knowledge in the building process and balancing the various project and environment constraints to maximize project goals and building performance. Close examinations of available references revealed that altogether there are 19 buildability attributes that can be implemented during the design phase. The results of survey show that Malaysian construction industry practitioners rate the attribute Provide Clear and Complete Design Information (4.56) as the most important and Less Work Below Ground (3.60) as the least important attribute. The client, consultant and contractor share the same opinion regarding the most important and least important attributes, only higher instituiton’s view is slightly different. Out of 19 attributes, 11 attributes have mean values above 4.00, which indicate them as important attributes. This study has successfully measure the importance level of design buildability attributes for building construction in Malaysia