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Arun, C (2004) Development of a decision support tool for scheduling highway construction projects based on simulation studies, Unpublished PhD Thesis, , Anna University, Chennai, India.

• Type: Thesis
• Keywords: cost overrun; decision support; security; traffic; estimating; government; project cost; project evaluation; scheduling; India; delay analysis; probability; statistical analysis; simulation; duration; construction project; construction site; highway
• ISBN/ISSN:
• URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10603/73980
• Abstract:
  Highways are known all over the world as the providers of most inexpensive and easy transport of people and goods. They are considered to form one of the most important sub sectors of transportation sector, which is a main contributor to national economy. India has a total of three million kilometres of highway out of which fifty-eight thousand one hundred and twelve kilometres is National Highways, which caters to forty five percent of traffic demand. The National Highways are considered to play prominent role in nation’s economy and security. Hence the Government of India has formulated several programmes for the development of National Highways that run throughout the length and breadth of the country. Construction of National Highways in India poses a major challenge as they have to traverse through varied geographic conditions with wide variety of geological, climatic and sociological complexities. These complexities necessitate need for proper management of men, material and machineries for the construction. Information on highway construction projects indicates that duration and cost associated with the activities are probabilistic in nature and can be represented by some form of probability distribution function, which can be incorporated in construction project scheduling. It is also observed that project schedules prepared by conventional techniques are not accurate and require lot of updating and rescheduling. Hence a thorough study was carried out to formulate the probability distribution functions for duration and cost of different activities using the data collected from a large number of National Highway construction projects located all over India These probability distribution functions were then incorporated in the formulation of simulation models for estimating total project duration and project cost. The characterisation study for the activity durations revealed that the activity durations predominantly followed Loglogistic distribution function rather than Beta distribution function, assumption of Project evaluation and review Technique (PERT). The probability characterisation study of the cost of activities revealed that most of them followed Exponential distribution function. The actual distribution functions were used to formulate three-dimensional probability models of cost and duration for each activity. These probability distributions, obtained from the statistical analysis have been used in the formulation of simulation models for the project duration and cost. It was observed that the resultant probability distribution for project duration, obtained from the simulation runs, could be characterised as Erlang distribution function rather than Normal distribution function. From simulation studies it was observed that the critical path of the project would not remain unique for all the simulation runs. The critical path was found to be unique for each simulation run. Hence a delay analysis for the project was carried out to determine the activities that are likely to control the project. Data pertaining to various causes of delay, the activities affected by it and cost and duration overrun were collected from National Highway construction sites all over India. Based on the nature of delay, the various causes were classified into controllable and uncontrollable. The duration and cost overrun of each activity for each type of delay was stochastically analysed to obtain the characteristic probability distribution functions. These distribution functions were then introduced in the formulation of simulation models for duration and cost overrun. These simulation models were formulated for unit kilometre of highway construction. The simulation models involving the different types of delays and project duration and cost were then integrated into a Decision Support Tool. The decision support tool was developed so as to help the project personnel to make a speedy decision regarding the project completion date and cost of the project and the associated confidence level. The software, developed in Java, uses simulation models to generate the various scenarios for project completion. The tool aids the project personnel in providing onsite corrections and updates to the schedule when any adverse condition precipitates a delay. The support tool provides a more realistic estimate of the duration and cost overrun of the project and indicates the activities that are likely to be affected. The decision-making tool, apart from providing the onsite update of the likely overrun for the construction project, can be used to predict the overrun of both project duration and cost if the parameter that influences the delay is known in advance.

Shanmugapriya, S (2016) Structural equation modelling to investigate the factors influencing quality safety and productivity in construction projects, Unpublished PhD Thesis, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Anna University, Chennai, India.