Interoperable Approach in Support of Semi-Automated Construction Management

Construction progress monitoring has always been a major concern for managers. Several are the advantages provided by a reliable approach in this field, among which we cite efficient project performance control and quality control, timely on-site inspections, better control of health and safety prescriptions against job injuries and fatalities, which are still too high. This paper addresses the development of a semi-automated approach for construction management, based on two main features: on one side a project management oriented re-organization of project’s information based on interoperable BIM (Building Information Modeling) and 4D modeling protocols, which aims to facilitate the control at the execution phase; on the other side a monitoring platform for real-time collection of data, relative to work progress and resources usage, by means of low intrusive technologies. Preliminary experiments on the capability by the low intrusive and real-time monitoring system to acquire and filter the data collected on resources usage are carried out. In addition, a general framework implementing several high-level logics is proposed. Its application would lead to seamless production of reports, to a semi-automated control of materials procurement, that is to say with limited or no human intervention. Preliminary application cases are shown, too. Among the expected benefits, not only economic savings for builders, but also better quality of recorded data and real-time availability of information have been pointed out.