In earlier times, construction companies predominantly used paper to plan & design construction activities; from paper plans to paper specification books to paper records for project schedules, requests for information, detailed project reports, submissions and more – construction activities were overwhelmingly driven by 2D data. The contractors using Excel were deemed advanced players at project sites or in corporate offices. Today, there are varied examples of how technology revolutionizes the construction industry in every stage of the project lifecycle.
As compared to the horizontal construction like roads and highways, there is a larger adoption of technologies in the vertical construction. This is majorly attributed to the perceived benefits and project outcomes seen on the buildings/vertical structures by the designers as well as building contractors.
Let’s see further how technology is actually transforming the horizontal construction landscape.
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Factors contributing to the change in road construction landscape
Connecting any road/highway jobsite through technology via apps and devices helps contractors to communicate, interact and make quicker decisions. Presently, there is a whole gamut of integrated technology solutions accessible for digitalizing the project site. For instance, a mobile device or a tablet can be used on an expansive highway project to control and monitor the site activities.
A range of activities such as, communication with stakeholders, fly or perform site monitoring through drone/ UAVs, access project drawings in the cloud or compare the planned and actual work progress at jobsite from a remote location can all be done using a tablet.
As the price of any digital or geospatial technology continues to decline, platforms/solutions are becoming easily accessible for contractors to significantly increase productivity at the jobsite. This is eventually luring the contractors to further the adoption of technologies at the jobsite, while staying abreast with other competitive industries adaptable to change with the digital advancements.
Geospatial Media and Communications’ GEOBIM Market in AEC Industry Report, estimates the Pre-COVID market size for the global transport infrastructure at USD 1.30 trillion in 2021. However, this market potential is now expected to lower, considering the divulged funding for transport projects by various government worldwide, and the significant hit on construction productivity due to a supply-demand gap.
Although the projects which suffered initially in the first half of 2020 have gained momentum majorly in the West, on the other hand, the industry at large is still pushing to match the Pre-COVID productivity levels.
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Trends in the roads and highways sector
Some of the significant parameters indicating an upturn in market potential can be linked to an increased digital collaboration while moving to paperless projects, intelligent asset management via IoT and advanced analytics, next-gen 5D/6D/7D BIM modelling, and an increased usage of precision surveying and geolocation tools.
Invention and innovation around digital twins, mobile solutions, 3D BIM, advanced manufacturing and digital fabrication technology such as prefabrication, and collaborative tools such as common data environments is beginning to fundamentally affect the construction supply chain through economies of scale. These technology and solutions are further paving the way for adopting more disruptive technologies, while simultaneously improving productivity and cost efficiency in real-time.
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Key technologies making a difference
The modern GNSS machine control systems envisage the capabilities of intelligent machines trained to collect the data while transmitting it to the control centre for a quick response. These machines, though, are supervised primarily by users for now (in many projects), which can later be foreseen as a futuristic process of fully automated systems (globally). For instance, the Trimble GCS900 is used on excavators, motor graders, compactors, dozers and scrapers, is a cutting-edge earthmoving grade control system. It uses total station, and laser technology to position the blade or bucket precisely in real-time, significantly reducing material overloads and drastically improving the efficiency and profitability of the contractor.
One of the many benefits of laser scanning is sustainability. . With the use of laser scanning data and BIM data-management tools, a 3D model can be rendered. This 3D model captures the components of a built asset such as prefab panels, rebars, load-bearing structure, and truss. The appropriate reusable materials can then be assessed by a trained professional, which would cut down cost and increase green footprint. Such 3D models can also be used to develop a Digital Twin infused with construction data, including information about materials, components, to on-site location.
Moreover, the digital twin model enhances better collaboration among all stakeholders across a project lifecycle. On a highway project spanning 1060 km in Malaysia, the upgradation from two-lane to four-lane of Pan Borneo highway witnessed a cost saving of USD 38.5 million using digital and geospatial solutions. The project partners used BIM, GIS, laser scanning, and drones while creating a digital twin of the entire stretch. The contractor was able to deliver a real-time dashboard of maintenance management system, road information system, bridge management system, and pavement management system to carry out the project efficiently.
Picture Courtesy: Pan-Borneo-Highway official website
Due to the large geographical scale of road and highway projects, and layers of data collected for each section of the completed task creates an enormous pool of data. Alternatively, construction firms are loaded with data repositories in the form of daily progress reports, material inventory reports, machinery logs, skilled/unskilled crew report, type of work performed and completed tasks, potential delays, and safety observations among others.
The construction firms with such large structured and unstructured data repositories, tend to adopt Big Data as a solution, which is a real-time, cloud- powered analytics tool to mine data with analytics, enabling stakeholders to easily access accurate insights. In the build stage, the use of big data can be attributed to sensors input from the use of GNSS based machines on a project site.
The input received such as the machine’s active and idle time, can be analyzed to assess the best mix of future buying/leasing the equipment, while also gauging the fuel usage. This enables the contractors to have a better hold on logistics, machine/equipment health and availability of spare parts, thereby, reducing the machine/equipment downtime. Even in the latter stages of operations & management, the pool of data collected for the smooth functioning of the asset, requires predictive analytics.
Big data, thus, helps the relevant authorities take informed decisions for repair and maintenance works. In the O&M stage, the New St. Anthony Falls Bridge (Minneapolis) is a great example for the use of big data on a civil infrastructure project. The bridge is equipped with more than 300 sensors that measures weather conditions, horizontal and vertical movements, effects of corrosion and traffic conditions. These sensors generate a massive amount of data on a daily basis, which is further processed and analyzed to extract useful insights.
Picture Courtesy: Minnesota Department of Transportation
A huge potential for technologies such as robotics, digital twins, IoT sensors, cognitive machine learning, process automation, and AI has been transformative in other industries, and can have near to similar augmenting effects in the transport industry at large. The project stakeholders are materializing the technology adoption in each lifecycle stage from pre-feasibility to O&M.
This can be seen by an increasing uptake of GEOBIM technologies in the highway projects worldwide, while realizing the high return on investments pertaining to cost, material, and time savings.
These existing and upcoming digital technologies (BIM, AI, Big data, Blockchain, Cloud) along with geospatial technologies (LiDAR, GNSS) is being a catalyst in preparing the roadway for the future infrastructure projects.
