Tool For Calculating User Delay Cost Associated With Urban Arterial Construction Zone

Roadway construction work zone imposes travel delay on the road users. The monetary cost of the delay is called user delay cost (UDC). Limited work has been done on quantifying UDC in Canada and their focus were rural highways. If there is a realistic estimate of UDC, it could lead to less schedule overruns and more cost-effective work zone layouts. Considering interest of roadway agencies in quantifying UDC associated with urban arterial work zones, this research developed a probabilistic tool for monetizing UDC in urban setting using traffic microscopic simulation and Monte-Carlo simulation. Based on this tool, one hour of morning peak construction work on NB Crowchild Bridge created 169.2 hr of vehicles delay with average and 95 percentile UDC equal to $2,199 and$5,653, respectively. The application of the tool for selecting optimum work zone layout was demonstrated using the data from the rehabilitation of Bow Bridge in Calgary

Factors impacting selection of construction subcontractors

A considerable portion of the work in construction projects is carried out by subcontractors. The current lowest bid practice, in which the main contractor offers a subcontract to the bidder who submits the lowest price, is considered to leave subcontractors with very low profit margins, and with a lack of motivation to provide high quality work. Selecting appropriate subcontractors is consequently seen as contributing significantly to a project's success. Although subcontractors are mainly selected by the main contractor, as one of the influential contributors to the project, the choice of subcontractor will also affect other project stakeholders such as owners and consultants. The goal of this study is to identify the factors that different project stakeholders consider important when selecting subcontractors, and the extent to which their professional background affects the way they view selection factors used for subcontractors. To this end a questionnaire was designed and distributed among construction industry experts in Alberta, Canada, from three groups of general contractors, owners, and consultants with various professional backgrounds. The survey results verified that the factors identified in the survey were in fact those that were considered in the selection of subcontractors. Based on statistical analysis of the survey results in most cases, respondents from the contractor group associated a different degree of importance to each selection factor compared with consultants and clients. The level of importance associated to each selection factor was found to be more similar among the latter two groups. Interestingly the lowest bid price was not necessarily ranked highest by professionals within all background groups.Non UBCUnreviewedFacultyOthe