Trenchless Industry Comfort Level When Using Alternative Delivery Systems

Trenchless construction projects are typically delivered using the traditional design-bid-build (DBB) system. The DBB sequential process often results in inefficiencies and creates a knowledge gap between the contractor and engineer. Alternative project delivery methods (APDM) were developed to bridge the gap between contractors and engineers, and to help mitigate the resulting inefficiencies. APDM have been widely adopted in many industries, including highway and building construction. However, they have not gained significant popularity in the trenchless construction industry. This lack of adoption can be attributed to many different reasons, one of these being the comfort level of project stakeholders in implementing APDM. This paper investigates the comfort level of project stakeholders through a questionnaire sent to individuals in the trenchless industry. The findings demonstrate that there are different comfort levels for implementing APDM for each type of project stakeholder and across different APDM.