Essential Causes Of The Critical Site Coordination Problems In Building Projects: A Hong Kong Study

Abstract

In Hong Kong, main contractors of building projects tend to subcontract most of their work. However, many of the subcontractors complain that they are unable to perform to their full capacity due main contractors' poor site coordination of temporary works and interfacing works and plant supports etc. Six critical site coordination problems caused by main contractors that had adversely influence to the performance of subcontractors were identified in previous study. Twelve essential causes to the problems were identified from literatures and previous studies. A questionnaire survey was conducted to establish a model that explain how the essential causes contributed to the occurrence of the critical site coordination problems which subsequently affected the performance of subcontractors. The survey results were validated by neural network analysis. Backward elimination method was adopted to identify the 'most essential' causes that enable main contractors to formulate measures to eliminate the critical site coordination problems. The survey findings show that 'design of the temporary work provided by main contractor cannot meet the requirements requested by the subcontractors' is the 'most essential' causes of four out of the six critical site coordination problems.