Development and Application of a Production-Rate Resource for Contract Time Determination

• Published in: Journal of construction engineering and management 2018-12, Vol.144 (12)
• Main Authors: Leandro, Roberto, O’Connor, James T, Khwaja, Nabeel
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Highway construction; Technical Note; Technical Notes
• ISSN: 0733-9364; 1943-7862
• DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0001572

AbstractWork item production rates are essential for contract time determination (CTD) procedures as they are used to estimate the duration of activities needed to complete a highway construction project. For this reason, varied sources and estimation systems provide production-rate data for a variety of work items. Yet these data sources are disjointed and do not provide for any side-by-side comparison of data. This research focuses on the development of an integrated Production Rate Resource, a single, easy-to-use reference of production-rate data gathered from publicly available sources. The resource was developed by gathering production-rate information from multiple sources and organizing the found data into a well-assembled Excel workbook. A proposed process for conducting CTD using the resource is included. The gathered information was tested by estimating the contract time of highway projects using the recommended process. Findings from the application led to significant improvements to the resource. The final version of the Production Rate Resource provides integrated production-rate data for 59 highway construction work items and a recommended process for conducting contract time estimation.