Construction project scheduling under workspace interference

Abstract

Workspace interference in construction sites usually leads to work inefficiency, rework, and risk to the workforce. In this paper, we present a study on controlling and mitigating workspace interference in construction project scheduling. In particular, we consider two types of workspace interference: unacceptable workspace interference (USI) and acceptable workspace interference (ASI). During the scheduling process, if two activities cause USI, they must be scheduled for non‐overlapping execution periods. If the two activities that cause ASI are executed concurrently, it will lead to decrease in productivity. We first establish a mathematical model for construction project scheduling subject to these two types of workspace interference. This established model is a mixed‐integer, multiobjective optimization problem. Then, a two‐stage metaheuristic algorithm is developed to solve the problem. Two construction scenarios are selected to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method. By comparing with traditional forward scheduling method, the two‐stage metaheuristic algorithm can achieve solutions with, on average, shorter project makespan, less total cost as well as milder resource usage variation in execution.

Technology Framework for Real-Time Assessment of Spatial Conflicts in Building Retrofitting

“…Construction projects involve several types of limited resources such as labour, equipment and space (Tao et al, 2020). The idea of space as a type of resource in project management was first introduced by Boer (1998).…”

“…These kinds of interference have recorded impacts as significant as up to 65% productivity loss and a 30% delay to the entire project (Hosny, Nik-Bakht and Moselhi, 2020). A survey conducted by the Occupational Safety and Health Branch of the Labor Department of Hong Kong demonstrated that 79% of the fatalities that occurred in the construction industry during 2011 were related to workspace interference (Tao et al, 2020). Spatial collisions that occur on construction jobsites are usually the result of poor workspace management and may pose several threats to the project performance (Hosny, Nik-Bakht and Moselhi, 2020).…”

“…quantity, place and time. The research proposed by Tao et al (2020) aims to schedule construction activities considering workspace interferences classified as unacceptable (USI), which must be avoided, and acceptable (ASI), which must be at least controlled. To this end, a two-stage metaheuristic algorithm has been developed and implemented in Matlab.…”

Resilient Scheduling as a Response to Uncertainty in Construction Projects

“…Schedule management concentrates on the processes that are essential to appropriately deliver critical project aspects, such as time, cost, resources, etc. [2] Scheduling methods which are used to establish reliable construction plans can be broadly classified into exact [3][4][5][6], heuristic [7][8][9], or metaheuristic approaches [10][11][12][13][14]. Current practices in the domain of construction planning and scheduling are oriented towards automatic schedule development and the application of specialized optimization techniques [15].…”

Stochastic resource leveling optimization method for trading off float consumption and project completion probability

“…Detailed descriptions of LOB that have existed for more than two generations are delegated to another literature (Hegazy, 1999) to allow the readers to access it. In addition, a mixed-integer linear programming method was used to reduce operation completion time, cost, and resource (Yi & Wang, 2016;Tao, Wu, Hu, & Xu, 2020) and balance multiskilled workers engaged in labor-intensive operation (Florez, 2017), albeit for different objectives.…”