Skeleton and Infill Housing Construction Delivery Process Optimization Based on the Design Structure Matrix

Abstract

Skeleton and Infill (SI) housing system is considered as a significant path of sustainably prolonging building life by improving structural durability and infill variability for its nature that the skeleton system is fixed, while the infill system could be rebuilt to satisfy users’ changing demands in different stage without damaging the skeleton system. The application of a SI housing system involves two new characteristics compared to traditional cast-in-place housing system: components production in factories and site construction are carried out simultaneously; the skeleton system and the infill system are constructed in parallel phases, which increase enormous parallel work. Iterations and rework would increase with the improper handling of parallel works, which lead to higher construction cost and lower participant willingness of stakeholders in SI housing construction delivery process. It is essential to establish a model to clarify the dependencies among major parallel work items and recognize parallel work sets to optimize the construction sequence for stakeholders to strengthen communication and coordination on key work items in a more efficiency way. By conducting investigations into the construction delivery process of typical SI housing projects in China, this paper developed a parallel collaborative mode based on the design structure matrix (DSM) to identify the complex dependencies among major cooperative work items. Furthermore, to provide an optimized parallel collaborative process, graph theory was introduced to find parallel work sets and eliminate repetition and iteration caused by improper work execution sequences. The results provide a guide for stakeholders to make appropriate cooperation strategies in implementing major work items and promoting cooperating efficiency by reducing iteration and rework.

Congruence Mapping of the Activity Flows Allocated in Built Environments: A Pilot Application of Under-Development Software in an Emergency-Care Service

“…A lightweight strategy that is adaptable to different data volumes, and that has already been adopted in the development of complex systems, is the dependency (or development or design) structures matrix (DSM) [42,43]. In construction surveys, it has already been used to improve the flow of information [44], to evaluate the building's adaptability [45], to sustainably prolong the building's useful life [46], and so on. The DSM allows us to determine (and describe), through a mathematical matrix, whether the dependencies between the activities in a given complex process have serial relationships, parallel relationships, or if they have iteration relationships between their realization [47].…”

“…The DSM allows us to determine (and describe), through a mathematical matrix, whether the dependencies between the activities in a given complex process have serial relationships, parallel relationships, or if they have iteration relationships between their realization [47]. It is used to optimize collaborative work dependencies in order to reduce iteration and rework and thus improve the collaborative efficiency and optimize resources [46]. Another use of this strategy in architecture, engineering, construction, and maintenance is in improving the architecture of buildings.…”

“…Another use of this strategy in architecture, engineering, construction, and maintenance is in improving the architecture of buildings. The DSM is an effective method for illustrating the dependency relationships between components and environments in building architecture [46].…”

“…In order to reduce the complexity of the built environment, it is possible to discretize the geometry of the spaces of a given layout in a topological model, which is a graph with spaces as vertex attributes [27,34,46,48]. With the graph matrix of the spatial arrangement, it is possible to relate the dependencies with other matrices through a multi-domain matrix (MDM) [45,49].…”

“…With the graph matrix of the spatial arrangement, it is possible to relate the dependencies with other matrices through a multi-domain matrix (MDM) [45,49]. This relationship, which recurs in other research areas, such as structural design [46], product design [50], and systems development [51], is the basis of the functionality of the program that is presented here.…”