Development of an integrated BIM-enabled approach for construction progress monitoring

Abstract

Successful construction project management and control is highly dependent on information. Early detection of actual and potential schedule delays or cost overruns in construction activities is vital to project control. Time and cost are identified as the two most objective progress performance criteria commonly used in the construction industry, which need to be integrated for more effective progress monitoring and reporting. The use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is recognized as a highly suitable way of integrating cost and time data and many integrated models have been developed during the past decades. However, the lack of automation in data acquisition and processing, and the lack presentation via visual progress reports, have also been identified as drawbacks. Meanwhile, Building Information Modelling (BIM) is gaining increasing attention by its accurate and consistent information storage, and realistic visualization. Numerous research has been done using BIM for specialized project control tasks. Nevertheless, it is clear that BIM data have not yet been effectively employed by current 4D models to produce further advantages. There is a lack of motivation in utilizing BIM for detailed progress monitoring and reporting at present. In this research, an integrated BIM-enabled progress monitoring approach is proposed to facilitate current construction progress control processes, which involve a relational database and BIM software. A relational database is developed based on a system development approach and is tested with BIM for integrated progress monitoring via a system evaluation project. The results of the evaluation demonstrate that the proposed approach is effective in monitoring progress, and reveals advantages in data integration and processing over conventional method. The potential for time saving is also implied based on the comparison of the actual and proposed monitoring processes. The proposed approach can generate output in multiple forms to support easy understanding and interpretation of progress information.