Journal of Construction Engineering and Management

The terrorist attack on September 11, 2001, and subsequent potential threats to U.S. transportation systems have presented an urgent need to develop emergency response plans to quickly react to the possible consequences of extreme events. Extreme events include terrorist attack as well as man-made and natural disasters such as explosions, fires, floods, and earthquakes. The objective of this research was to identify strategies and technologies to quickly restore the use of highway bridges, a critical component of the nation’s transportation network, in case they are damaged or destroyed by extreme events. One of the tasks associated with this research was to conduct case studies of previous bridge replacements following extreme events. By studying these cases, the research team sought to identify and expand on lessons learned, address which actions did and did not work well given the circumstances of the incident, and incorporate lessons into the emergency response plan for highway bridges. This paper presents the findings from one of the case studies, the I-40 Webbers Falls Bridge in Oklahoma.

The salient phases in a facility’s service life that are most decisive for the effectiveness of its facilities management (FM) are the preliminary design, construction, and maintenance. The effectiveness of facilities is vastly affected by decisions pertaining to the strategy of the organization that owns or uses the facilities. The goal of this study was to develop key performance indicators (KPIs) for strategic FM that will provide a conclusive approach towards the facility’s service life conditions. Parameters were developed by means of field surveys and statistical analyses, and were validated by means of case studies. The research resulted in a series of 11 KPIs for strategic healthcare FM, which can be classified into four categories: development, organization and management, performance, and maintenance efficiency parameters. The study proposes age and occupancy coefficients as essential parameters for the assessment of large healthcare facilities needs, as an effective measure for long term facility maintenance planning, and for measuring FM effectiveness. The paper stresses that strategic healthcare facilities management must integrate quantitative performance, manpower, and maintenance indicators.

Constructability analysis can provide valuable input to optimizing urban bridge construction in terms of reducing impacts on traffic, safety, and overall project budget and duration. This paper presents a constructability analysis of the superstructure rotation method for bridge construction. The method includes building the bridge parallel to the obstacle being overpassed (a river or a highway) and then rotating the superstructure into place. The method has been used successfully in over one-hundred bridges (mostly in China). The paper documents two case studies of bridges that used this method and provides an analysis of the constructability of the method. This includes identification of the factors influencing the constructability of the methods and lists of design and construction objectives/strategies that support the constructability of bridges using this method.

The sequences in which work is completed bear significantly on the performance of electrical contractors in building construction projects. When project work sequences are poorly planned or poorly executed, electrician constructors often must contend with compressed schedules, trade stacking, and out-of-sequence work to ensure timely completion of a project. This paper analytically evaluates the importance of sequence planning to efficient electrical work. It describes changes that were made to crew-level planning procedures for an electrical contractor and the impact these had on crew performance. The analysis shows that sequence planning at both the project level and the crew level are important to the performance of electrical crews. Most notably, a strong correlation (0.73) was detected between crew planning performance one week and crew productivity performance in the following week. Results of the study are provided. Principles of sound sequences and guidelines for sequence planning are also captured from the analysis. These sequence guidelines are designed to avoid, where possible, the often adverse project conditions in which electrical contractors find themselves and to handle those conditions most effectively when they cannot be avoided.

This report reviews guidance on constructability programs from a variety of sources and presents the current practice of constructability. The advice of several organizations and researchers is summarized to describe expectations for ideal constructability. Actual current constructability practice, based on results and analysis of a Constructability State of Practice survey, is described. Approximately 100 owners, architects, engineers, consultants, contractors, and construction managers answered the survey’s ten questions and provided written comments. The results provide a picture of current constructability practices in the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry and progress in recent years. Major conclusions include: (1) constructability has gained acceptance throughout the industry; (2) constructability efforts are clearly beginning in early project phases; (3) a wide variety of constructability techniques and new technologies are being implemented; and (4) obstacles to improving constructability remain, but may be changing. Finally, recommendations are provided based on areas where constructability practice can still be improved. This report is relevant to both industry practitioners and researchers.

The purpose of this study was to establish a research mechanism to investigate the impact of corporate commitment to sustainability on capital project planning and capital project performance. The research hypothesized that increasing commitment to sustainability leads to increasing sustainable project planning, and to better cost and schedule performances in large projects. Two sustainability indices, CSCI and SCPPI, were used to determine the level of corporate sustainability commitment and its impact on sustainability practices in capital project planning, and the impacts of corporate sustainability commitment and sustainable practices in project planning on cost and schedule performances, design changes, and safety compliances. Limited data collected from 17 Fortune 100 owner organizations suggested that a relationship between the two indices existed and that there are strong grounds supporting further development of such sustainability indices. Such indices can help multinational corporations better allocate resources and strike a balance between sustainable practices and financial bottom line.

The high variability of construction environments results in high construction-cost variation, especially in material costs. Inadequate planning may cause material shortages that delay the project schedule or, alternatively, a substantial increase in inventory costs by producing or supplying materials earlier than they are needed at the construction site. In order to solve these problems, this paper studies steel rebar production and supply operations and establishes an optimal model that minimizes the integrated inventory cost of the supply chain. Based on the optimal model, this paper develops a decision-support system to generate a production and supply plan for a supplier and buyers of steel rebar. After utilizing the decision-support system to create the supply and production plan, this paper analyzes the results to study the influence of transaction constraints on inventory cost. This paper also discusses cases of global optimization of the inventory cost for the entire supply chain and compares them with cases of local optimization for individual members.

Both the importance and process of estimating highway construction time have increased in significance as roadway user costs themselves have become more significant. In estimating construction time, few parameters are more significant than work item crew production rates and factors significantly affecting those rates. A standardized data collection tool was used to acquire a total of 67 data points from 25 ongoing Texas highway projects between February 2002 and May 2004, for three selected critical work items: beam erection, bridge deck, and bridge rail. With the data, several hypothesized drivers of the crew production rates were analyzed. While the factor of shape of deck (straight versus curved) was identified as a statistically significant driver of bridge deck crew production rate, no statistically significant drivers were found for work items of beam erection and bridge rail. The study also found that both formwork and rebarwork crew sizes have significant relationships with bridge deck production rate. Findings from this study will enable highway agencies to enhance accuracy of contract time estimation for highway bridge construction. The methodology for obtaining field-based production rates will also be beneficial for future researchers.

A proper method to assess contractor competitiveness is important both for assisting clients in the selection of proper contractors and for assisting contractors in the development of more competitive bidding strategies. Previous studies have identified various indicators for assessing contractor competitiveness, and several assessment methods have been introduced. Nevertheless, these studies are limited because they are unable to tell which indicators are more important in different market environments. This paper identifies the key competitiveness indicators (KCIs) for assessing contractor competitiveness in the Chinese construction market. An index value is used to indicate the relative significance of various competitiveness indicators based on which KCIs are identified. The data applied in this study are from a survey of the construction industry in mainland China. The research findings provide valuable information for both existing businesses and the construction professionals who plan to compete for construction works in the Chinese market. The study provides useful references for further studies that compare the KCIs used in the Chinese construction industry and those used in other construction industries.

Construction work is often allocated to contractors via first price sealed bid auctions (FPA). American Nobel Prize winner and economist William Vickery, however, suggested that second price auctions (SPA) (i.e., the lowest bidder wins the contract at the second lowest price) may be more beneficial due to the revenue equivalence theory (RET). This implies that, upon certain conditions being met, clients can, in the long run, expect to pay approximately the same to contractors irrespective of whether contracts are awarded according to an FPA or SPA. At the same time, it is expected to be easier to bid in an SPA. In the absence of real world data, the likely effects of using SPA for construction were examined experimentally. This involved experienced respondents bidding on over 60 identical FPA and SPA. Contrary to expectations, the bids for the SPA were significantly higher, indicating that RET is unlikely to occur in practice in construction bidding.