Assessment of highway construction schedule review problems of Departments of Transportation : case study of Texas

Schedule review is an important aspect of schedule management for the owners like the state Department of Transportation (DOTs) to successfully deliver projects on time. However, the quality of schedules submitted by the contractors varies greatly, without having the required formats and information. Therefore, the competency of schedule reviewers to accurately detect problems in the submitted schedule and make sure that the schedule fulfills all the contractual requirements is essential. Past studies in schedule review focused on developing review criteria and thresholds focusing on the schedule itself. There has not been a comprehensive study to collect problems arising from the entire DOT’s schedule review process. To assist schedule reviewers in detecting the problems and making decisions based on the problems, three objectives were defined: 1) assembling and categorizing common contractor schedule problems faced by DOT’s schedule reviewers, 2) defining the criticality of identified problems, and 3) identifying high and low critical problems that are perceived by the practitioners. To achieve these objectives, this study developed a list of construction schedule problems that are found during the schedule review process. Three main categories are covered in this problem list: 1) schedule planning problems, 2) Critical Path Method (CPM) scheduling problems, and 3) contractual compliance problems. Furthermore, a survey was deployed to DOT practitioners to assess the level of impact and the likelihood of occurrence of each identified problem and to determine the criticality of the identified problems. By ranking the most critical problems perceived by the DOT practitioners, this study analyzed the discrepancies between the survey results and industry standards. Also, areas for improvement in DOT’s standard specifications were identified. This paper contributes to the body of knowledge in schedule management by expanding the research on schedule review by investigating actual problems faced by DOT practitioners. Furthermore, the study makes an impact on DOTs’ schedule management by diagnosing and exploring their current status and procedure.