Optimized Construction Equipment Allocation Method for Highway Construction Projects

Abstract

Highway construction projects are divided into new roadway construction and rehabilitation projects. In Korea total contract value of highway construction projects was over $2 Billion in 2011, which took over 24% of the total budget of the Korea Highway Corporation, and the volume is expected to be increase due to many rehabilitation projects for the existing roadways. Highway construction is known as a collection of linear and repetitive operations that are highly equipment intensive. Typically, construction equipment costs made up to 40% of the total construction costs on the highway construction projects. Therefore, construction cost and time for the highway construction projects are highly dependent upon the effective usage of construction equipment. In other words, the utilization of construction equipment has a great impact on the entire construction process and the optimal selection of the equipment becomes the key factor to the project success. However, most construction projects rely on experience or intuition without proper consideration or planning when it comes to select construction equipment. This research involves analyzing current equipment utilization to identify the major factors affecting equipment selection process for the asphalt pavement operation with the help of a computer simulation technique. The methodology developed can replace educated-guessing in the planning process for the equipment selection process.