Process Modelling in Civil Infrastructure Projects: A Review of Construction Simulation Methods

Abstract

It is known that process simulation is a feasible solution to deal with real-world complexities and problems. Civil infrastructure in particular, is a complex system that can benefit from process simulation. This paper provides a critical overview of different simulation modelling paradigms used in construction to achieve better system performance. Three simulation paradigms of agent based modelling, discrete events simulation, and system dynamics are reviewed and their different applications, specifically in civil infrastructure are discussed. The paper then discusses the hybrid paradigms of agent based modelling with system dynamics, and agent based modelling with discrete event simulation, and how hybrid approaches have better capabilities to model complex problems occurring in civil infrastructure. Such modelling approaches, therefore, will improve overall efficiency of construction production.

The Cost Burden of Safety Risk Incidents on Construction: A Probabilistic Quantification Method

“…Moreover, the most popular technique for nondeterministic analysis of real‐world scenarios is discrete event simulation (DES). DES has many favorable advantages when analyzing complex problems involving significant uncertainties (Al‐Kaissy, Arashpour, Fayezi, Nezhad, & Ashuri, 2019; Hazır, 2015; Martinez, 2010; Padalkar & Gopinath, 2016; Tokdemir, Erol, & Dikmen, 2019). Thus, DES was selected as the simulation method for this research to analyze the impact of safety incident events on project cost overruns.…”

Quantitative Analysis of Safety Risks and Relationship with Delayed Project Completion Times

“…Very few research articles have focused on the quantitative relationship between safety risks and project schedule overruns (Cho, Kim, & Hong, 2020;Larsen, Shen, Lindhard, & Brunoe, 2015). As a result, the industry still considers few inputs into project plans including resource availability and interdependency of project activities, without considering safety risks as an important input (Al-Kaissy, Arashpour, Fayezi, Nezhad, & Ashuri, 2019). This is due to the fact that impacts of safety risks have not been quantified and incorporated to project schedules.…”