Automatic generation of work spaces and analysis of time -space conflicts at construction sites

As contractors face increasing pressure to shorten project delivery, they schedule more activities concurrently. Consequently, space becomes a critical resource during construction. Today's scheduling tools do not explicitly represent the work spaces needed for activities. Therefore, time-space conflicts, which exist when an activity's space requirements interfere with another activity's space requirements or work-in-place, occur frequently at construction sites. Project managers reactively manage these conflicts by delaying one of the conflicting activities. Ideally, they should represent and manage work spaces of activities during planning to detect, analyze and manage possible time-space conflicts between activities prior to construction.;The representation of activity space requirements, and the detection and analysis of time-space conflicts prior to construction pose unique challenges. Depending on the construction method being used, activities require multiple types of work spaces with varying orientation and volumetric requirements. The locations and sizes of these spaces change across time according to the locations and sizes of the components and the scheduled durations of the activities. Time-space conflicts exist only during certain periods of times. There are several types of conflicts creating different problems on site. Multiple types of spatial conflicts can exist between a pair of conflicting activities.;This research addresses these challenges by defining the representation and reasoning mechanisms necessary to automate the generation of work spaces and the analysis of time-space conflicts. It defines an ontology that represents work spaces generically within construction method models. This ontology models the relationship between construction methods and work spaces. The synthesis of this ontology in conjunction with a project-specific production model enables the automated generation of activity space requirements represented in four dimensions. Once the spaces are represented in four dimensions, discrete-event simulation and geometric clash detection mechanisms automate the detection of time-space conflicts. Modeling time-space conflict analysis as a classification task and a taxonomy of spatial conflicts allow the categorization and the prioritization of the time-space conflicts.;These formalisms provide an environment for project managers to define and generate work spaces, and to analyze time-space conflicts prior to construction. This proactive time-space conflict management could minimize activity delays and improve safety and quality at construction sites.