Journal - The Institution of Engineers, Malaysia (Vol. 67, No. 3, September 2006)26

A SYSTEMATIC APPROACH FOR MONIT ORING ANDEVALUA TING THE CONSTRUCTION PROJECT PROGRESS

Zubair Ahmed Memon, Muhd. Zaimi Abd. Majid and Mushairr y MustaffarConstruction Technology and Management Center (CTMC),

Faculty of Civil Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 UTM Skudai, JohorEmail: amzubair2@siswa.utm.my, zaimi@fka.utm.my and mustaffar@fka.utm.my

1. INTRODUCTIONProject progress monitoring and control is one of the most

important tasks of construction project management. Every team-member needs to know, in a timely and accurate manner, how isthe project progressing, where they are currently in comparison tothe initially set plans, whether deadlines are met, budgets aresafely measured and followed. It is mainly the responsibility ofthe general contractor to update the A r c h i t e c t / E n g i n e e r, who, inturn, updates the owner. Figure 1 shows the traditional projectprogress monitoring process and the progress reports are updatedon a periodic printed form; issued in most of the cases on amonthly basis. These reports discuss the current project progresswith planned schedule of work in terms of time and budget toforecast the project finish date. These reports also mentioned theconstructability problems, quality issues including test results,contract changes including modification in design andincrease/decrease in quantities, pending issues from progressmeetings. The photos are attached to these reports to show theachievement of milestones. This traditional constructionmanagement system provides a project manager with the variousreports such as progress control, earned value management andresource management. Project manager spend most of his timefor developing and updating of these reports instead of executionand to take in-time decision to finish the work within prescribedtime scale.

The successful project completion requires the concertede ffort of the project team to carry out the various projectactivities, and it is the project manager who at the centre of theproject network is responsible for orchestrating the wholeconstruction process. The project manager has to maintain theproject network and monitor against slippages in cost, time andquality for the duration of project. In achieving this, the projectmanager relies heavily on a reliable monitoring system that canprovide timely signalling of project problems, whether they arereal or potential.

In practice little has been done to address the problem ofproject progress monitoring and control. The most of theresearch efforts in the field of project control still focus on thedevelopment of cost control models [1]. This paper describesthe current status of an ongoing research project which aims todevelop an easy to use tool or expert system to monitor andcontrol the construction progress at the construction stage. Adifferent class of computer application system are discussed inthis paper, which will be used for monitoring and updating theproject progress by incorporating engineering informationfrom digital images and AutoCAD drawings. To achieve thisobject a prototype system was proposed namely cal ledDigitalising Construction Monitoring (DCM) system. This isauthors’believe that this system can assist project manager todevelop the project progress reports with speed, within time

ABSTRACTA persistent problem in construction is to document changes which occur in the field and to prepare the as-built schedule. Incurrent practice, deviations from planned performance can only be reported after significant time has elapsed and manualmonitoring of the construction activities are costly and error prone. Availability of advanced portable computing, multimediaand wireless communication allows, even encourages fundamental changes in many jobsite processes. However a recentinvestigation indicated that there is a lack of systematic and automated evaluation and monitoring in construction projects. Theaim of this study is to identify techniques that can be used in the construction industry for monitoring and evaluating the physicalprogress, and also to establish how current computer technology can be utilised for monitoring the actual physical progress atthe construction site. This study discusses the results of questionnaire survey conducted within Malaysian Construction Industryand suggests a prototype system, namely Digitalising Construction Monitoring (DCM). DCM prototype system integrates theinformation from construction drawings, digital images of construction site progress and planned schedule of work. Usingemerging technologies and information system the DCM re-engineer the traditional practice for monitoring the projectprogress. This system can automatically interpret CAD drawings of buildings and extract data on its structural components andstore in database. It can also extract the engineering information from digital images and when these two databases aresimulated the percentage of progress can be calculated and viewed in Microsoft Project automatically. The application of DCMsystem for monitoring the project progress enables project management teams to better track and controls the productivity andquality of construction projects. The use of the DCM can help resident engineer, construction manager and site engineer inmonitoring and evaluating project performance. This model will improve decision-making process and provides bettermechanism for advanced project management.

Keywords:AutoCAD, Construction Management, Database, Digital Monitoring Photogrammetry

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A SYSTEMATIC APPROACH FOR MONIT ORING AND EVALUATING THE CONSTRUCTION PROJECT PROGRESS

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Figure 1: Flowchart for traditional project progress monitoring practice

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and accurate to pursue for successful completion ofconstruction work according to clients demands.

2. BACKGROUND OF STUDYThis section provides a brief overview of studies reported in

the literature relating to digitalising the construction monitoringfor construction project. A number of commercial softwarepackages that relate to this topic are also listed. The sourcesoutlined here provide the basis of the analysis of projectmonitoring and the system development presented in thefollowing sections.

The existing computer-based construction tools seem toprovide a wide of functions to manage design and constructioninformation. The researchers attempted and developed thesystems such as; ESSCAD by Wang [2], PPMS by Cheung [3],VIRCON by Dawood [4], PHOTO - N E T II by Abeid [5],CADCIMS by Stumpf [6], OSCONCAD by Maria [7], DIPA Dby Streilein [8] and ADC by Sacks [9]. From the intensive review,researchers developed the integration model for project progressand the ideas for developing automated real-time monitoringsystems are rapidly growing with the advancement in theinformation technology. However, the information integrationhas not been ideal in current practice. From the literature it hasbeen cited that very few have given concern to develop the actualphysical progress bar chart by capturing the information fromdigital images. This study uses the close range photogrammetryto develop the 3D Model from digital images with the help ofPhotoModeler pro version software, which is requirement foraccurate photogrammetry. This system enables the projectmanager to simulate the traditional practices and A r t i f i c i a lIntelligence to evaluate the physical progress of constructionactivities and develop the progress bar chart in Microsoft project.

Most construction project employ scheduling methods tomonitor and control the progress of work and develop progressreports, which involves the recording of constructionachievements for detection of deviations from actual plan and forforecasting project performance. The primary control systemused by project managers to obviate or mitigate time-basedclaims in construction industry is construction schedule [10]. T h ecurrent practice of project control is entirely dependent on cost,schedule, and quality reports and personnel performance reviews[ 11]. Monitoring project time is one of the many challenges forthe project manager. Time monitoring seeks to assess how wellthe project adheres to the planned schedule over a period of time.There are a variety of ways in which a construction schedule canbe presented. The more common types of construction scheduleinclude: Gantt chart, activity on the arrow, precedence networkand line of balance. Bar charts or Gantt charts are a powerfulcommunication tool and an extremely useful, visual andgraphical medium in construction scheduling.

A persistent problem in construction industry is to develop theas-built physical progress schedule of construction scene. The as-built project information presents how construction is actuallyperformed. The research reported in this paper focuses on theissue related to developing the digitalised actual physicalprogress report during the construction stage. As-built schedulesare costly to prepare because of the amount of research necessaryto determine the actual dates and considerable judgment is alsorequired. Since detailed records are not always available and evenif they are, work on the site does not necessary confirm theplanned schedule. This state of affairs leads authors to propose

the prototype system for developing as-built schedulea u t o m a t i c a l l y.

In addition the scenario discussed in above paragraph, aquestionnaire survey was conducted within MalaysianConstruction Industry. Zhang [12] stated that questionnairesurvey is an effective, convenient, economical investigation toolfor obtaining data and sampling the opinions of individuals inspatially diverse locations. Al-harthy [13] listed that thequestionnaire survey usually provides large amount of data in ashort time with relatively ease of preparation, distribution andtabulation of answers and responses can be given easily andq u i c k l y. Therefore, a close-end questionnaire was designed forthis study; to identify the current practice. The result of surveysupports the authors to propose the system, as MCI utilising thetraditional practice for monitoring and progress reporting. T h efollowing sections discuss the result of questionnaire survey andpropose a framework model to overcome the limitation of currentpractice in the MCI.

3. QUESTIONNAIRE SURVEY WITHINMALA YSIAN CONSTRUCTION INDUSTR Y

The questionnaire survey form was designed to verify theexisting methods and processes which are related with theproject progress monitoring. It is important at early stage todecide for analysing method before developing any system ofdata collection. So, Statistical Analysis method has beenconsidered to analysis the collected survey form. The data wascollected by using measurement or likert scale method. Fivescale rating was used to determine the severity of influence onproject progress monitoring techniques by client, consultantand contractor. Al-Hammad [14], Abd.Majid [15] and Al-harthy [13] used and explained the Average Index Method toanalysis data in the ordinal or ranking scale. This study alsouses Average Index Method to analysis data of survey andexplained as follows:

(3)

Where, ai = Constant expressing the weight given to i, X i = variable expressing the frequency of the response for;i = 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and illustrated as follows:X1 = frequency of the ‘very rare’ response and corresponding

to a1 = 1;X2 = frequency of the ‘rare’response and corresponding to

a2 = 2;X3 = frequency of the ‘slightly frequently’response and

corresponding to a3 = 3;X4 = frequency of the ‘frequently’response and

corresponding to a3 = 4; and X5 = frequency of the ‘very frequently’response and

corresponding to a5 = 5.

Table 1 shows the result of questionnaire survey whichwere conducted within Malaysian Construction Industry(MCI). The table 1 highlighted a need to propose a digitalisesystem for construction monitoring and progress reporting. The

Journal - The Institution of Engineers, Malaysia (Vol. 67, No. 3, September 2006)

A SYSTEMATIC APPROACH FOR MONIT ORING AND EVALUATING THE CONSTRUCTION PROJECT PROGRESS

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result of survey shows thattraditional or paper- b a s e dinformation flow onconstruction projects stilldominate; as computers areincreasingly becoming acentral component of projectinformation systems and usedfor developing the plannedschedule. The several areas inconstruction management,such as scheduling,estimating, cost control, andaccounting, employ well-establ ished computerapplications. To carry-out thelaborious calculations anddata tracking for these tasks,they represent a small portionof the day-to-day constructionmanagement activi ties. T h eresult of survey alsohighlighted that the updatingthe project progress stillcarried out manually, nocomputerised system is usedfor developing the projectprogress automatically.

4. THE PROPOSED PROTOTYPESYSTEM

The basic theory behind developing the modelis to extend the traditional approach to representthe dynamic and simultaneous constructionoperations by incorporating inter- r e l a t i o n s h i p sbetween hierarchical processes of evaluating. Theobjective of developing a DigitalisedConstruction Monitoring (DCM) model is tosystematise the construction monitoring andevaluation of a project. DCM is implementedusing object oriented concepts and event drivenprogramming. The object-oriented concepts wereuti lised in the graphical user interface ofconstructing the DCM processes. Graphicalinterfaces were created in the Photogrammetryand photomodeler environment and then exportedinto Visual Basic TM (event drivenprogramming). Relational Data base wasimplemented using Micro Soft Access TM engineto store project related information. T h esimulation concept of DCM model is currentlybeing used to test and check the validity. The maingoal of DCM model is to propose an interfaceprocess model between the 2D digital photo anddetail design drawings and update the physicalprogress chart by integrating the information.

Figure 2 shows the framework model for theproposed system. The proposed system is dividedinto four different phases. In phase-I, the inputinformation will be browsed by the user in the

Table 1: Result of questionnaire survey within MCI

Figure 2: Developed frame work of digitalising construction monitoring

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format of planned schedule of work, txt file and 3DAutoCAD file.Once user browsed all the information, phase-II start, which is toprocess the information. The process is done by automatically, asDCM user interface was designed, developed and computerprogramme are written in Visual Basic. During this phase, thepercentage of progress will be calculated by integrating thedatabase. These databases were developed during the Phase-II asuser browsed the required information and content the 3D co-ordinate values from digital images and 3DAutoCAD drawings.

The phase-III wil l show the result interface of thesystem. This phase also shows the result in graphical

format. As seen in Figure 2, the graphical informationis shown in Microsoft Project Gantt chart. The nextand last logical step of prototype system is to takeAction as a remedial measure. This step activatedwhen project manager real ises the delays arehappening and required to boot the progress and totake decisions for successful completion withinprescribed time.

5. ARCHITECT OF THE DIGIT ALISINGCONSTRUCTION MONIT ORING

The major task of developing this model is todevelop the link between existing methods of evaluatingand monitoring the physical progress of constructionscene with modern technology. The main aim of DCM isto develop the project progress monitoring system thatimproves construction management methods in projectprogress reporting and control.

Figure 3 shows the process flow diagram for theDCM, in which digital images wil l be captured fromsite and 3D model wi l l be developed by usingPhotomodeler software and AutoCAD used to display3D information of the intended design. Al l the designparameters are stored in the primary and secondarydata base and code are designed to calculate thepercentage of actual progress. This percentage wil l beintegrated with the Micro Architecture of the DCMModel, which shows a dynamic connection betweenthe database and graphical information. The DCMmodel wi ll be integrated with existing commercial orresearch prototype systems. The graphicalinformation is created from 3D Model by usingprofessional prototype system namely Photomodelerand AutoCAD 3D drawing. The primary data basefrom AutoCAD drawing has been developed at thestart of the project by developing an Expert systemand wil l be reluctant as any change order will becorrected in the data base. Secondary data base willbe developed as construction work constructed andthe source of information will be using photos. Vi s u a lbasic wil l be used to bui ld interfaces between thedatabase developed from AutoCAD and Photos byusing Photomodeler. By simulating both data base, itwil l calculate the percentage of progress consideringthe updating date and will transfer this information toMicrosof t Project to show the actual physicalprogress in bar chart.

6. ALGORITHM FOR USERINTERFACE OF DCM SYSTEM

As discussed under the heading of Architectural of DCM, thissystem integrate the information from Microsoft Project,AutoCAD drawings and digital images and produce the endresult in the format of Gantt chart in Microsoft Project. The figure4 shows the detailed Algorithm for the proposed system. A sfigure shows, to start working on DCM, user needs to install thesetup initially on his system and for successful running, user mustbe equip with AutoCAD to develop 3DAutoCAD model, plannedwork schedule in Microsoft Project and PhotoModeler softwareto develop the 3D Model. These three were considered the basictools for DCM system.

Figure 3: Process flow diagram

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The first logical step after installing and running the DCMsystem is to browse the planned schedule of work in Microsoftproject. The figure shows the detail algorithm for browsing thework schedule. Once successfully complete this step, next stepis to browse the { * .txt} file. This file is created from digitalimages by running with PhotoModeler Pro version. The detailof developing the 3D model from digital images is shown infigure. This algorithm is carried out before running the DCMfor measuring the progress. Once { *.txt} file exported fromP h o t o M o d e l e r, then it is suggested to run the DCM system. A ssoon as { * .txt} file browsed the information will be grouped inMicrosoft Access database to store the information.

The next logical step is to browse the 3DAutoCADdrawings as can be observed from the figure. As 3DAutoCADfile is browsed, the information is stored into database and usercan start the process. By clicking on process command, it startsintegrating the information in the database and calculates thepercentage of progress. This percentage of progress can beviewed into the Microsoft Project. The algorithm is designedfor this to show the view of comparison of progress betweenplanned and actual progress.

Algorithm of user interface of DCM model is successfullydesigned. By implementing this algorithm model, i t isa u t h o r s ’believe the efficiency of construction industry willbe improved. The successful implementations of DCM willspeedup the process of developing the progress reports andwill help the project manager in decision making process.From the view of professionals in Malaysian Construction

I n d u s t r y, they suggested additional remarks for the usabilityof DCM especially when the contract dismantled during thecontract period, DCM will be more effective and efficient asthis stage also. They also suggested for the improvement ofthe model, which wil l be incorporated at the time ofdeveloping prototype system.

7. CONCLUSIONS The research described in this paper attempts to overcome the

limitations of the previous research development in the area ofevaluating the construction phase. The main focus of this paper isto design a methodology for the monitoring and evaluation ofconstruction project and developing a systematic modelconsidering Malaysian construction industry’s view point. Aquestionnaire survey was carried out within MCI and analysedand the result identify the need of digitalise system for MCI. Inthis regard this study proposes a system and discusses themethodology for designing the prototype model to systematisingmonitoring and evaluation of a project. The model allows users todocument and retrieve project information in the form of digitalimages and close-range photogrammetry techniques are used tocreate 3D Model.

An integrated simulation model, named DCM (Digitalisingthe Construction Monitoring) is developed to integrate digitalimages of construction scene with AutoCAD drawings and itresolves the existing project progress reporting problems. Basedon traditional approach, actual physical progress reports isdeveloped manually by comparing the planned with actual

A SYSTEMATIC APPROACH FOR MONIT ORING AND EVALUATING THE CONSTRUCTION PROJECT PROGRESS

Figure 4: Algorithm of DCM user interface

Journal - The Institution of Engineers, Malaysia (Vol. 67, No. 3, September 2006)32

performance measured on site. The Digitalising the ConstructionMonitoring (DCM) model is developed by using the RelationalDatabase Management System (RDBMS). The integration ofdigital images and drawings will enable construction mangers todevelop progress reports in a more consistent and accuratemanner and more accurate as-built project schedules can betransferred to facility managers for operation, maintenance,renovation and demolition. The DCM model will improve thedecision-making and productivity of the construction activity.

8. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTThe authors acknowledge the contributions and support for

this work by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation(MOSTI), Malaysia, for the grant, under the grant number Vo t eNo. 74107. The author would like to give especial thanks to DatoAbdul Rashid, Former JKR Chief to visit ConstructionTechnology and Management Centre (CTMC), Faculty of CivilEngineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) and put fullconcentrate on the presentation of DCM model, and suggestsremarkable ideas for successful launching of the system. ■

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