Practical Application of Two-Way Multiple Overlapping Relationships in a BDM Network

Abstract

Today, most construction projects in urban environments are complex high-rise buildings that present unique challenges, including local building ordinances and restrictions, adjoining public and residential areas, narrow sidewalks and streets, and underground utilities, all of which require extensive planning and tight schedules. A major problem facing such projects is to formulate realistic schedules that will make it possible to meet contractual completion dates with limited resources and budgets. The scheduling software products currently used in construction projects, which include Primavera P6, Microsoft Project, etc., are not actually applied as a scheduling tool in practical construction projects, which instead generally depend on Microsoft Excel or a bar-chart. This is because the existing scheduling programs cannot provide more user-oriented schedule format such as representing two-way multiple overlapping relationships. To overcome this deficiency, the BDM (beeline diagramming method) is proposed as a new networking technique in 2010. But two-way multiple overlapping relationships generate the loop in a conventional schedule computation process. This paper addresses the loop phenomenon of two-way multiple overlapping relationships in a BDM network as well as proposes the solutions of them, and then presents a practical application of two-way multiple overlapping relationships at a real project.