A Framework for Evaluating Deep Excavation Alternatives

in Building Construction

MyungSeok Choi, Ghang Lee and Hyewon Kim

Building Informatics Group, Department of Architectural Engineering,

Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea

Abstract: Recently, various innovative excavation methods for buildings, such as up-up and up-down
methods, have been developed. However, underlying uncertainties in new construction methods make con-
tractors hesitant to adopt them despite their potential benefits. Providing reliable cost estimates and sched-
ules for considered excavation alternatives quickly during the early stages of the decision making process
will make it easy for contractors to select an appropriate excavation method. This paper first describes up-up
and up-down excavation methods and reviews previous studies on cost estimation and scheduling methods.
Then it proposes a framework for a web-based method of evaluating excavation alternatives for buildings.
When fully implemented, the system will provide early cost estimates and schedules based on a probabilis-
tic estimating and scheduling method; and also will generate VRML-based 4D simulations of alternative ex-
cavation methods.

Key words: Excavation, Probabilistic estimating and scheduling, Web-based system, 4D CAD

lawsuits by residents near a construction site against

Introduction the contractor for construction dust and noise. On the
other hand, the excavation process itself is slower and
During the past few decades, the importance of exca-
more expensive than traditional methods. The next sec-
vation methods in building construction projects has
tion provides detailed descriptions of the up-up and up-
increased. Various innovative construction methods,
down methods.
e.g., up-up and up-down construction methods, have
When contractors choose a construction method,
been developed and widely applied to construction
their decision-making process requires reliable and ob-
projects. In a traditional construction method, a build-
jective information that allows them to compare trade-
ing's superstructure is erected after the completion of
offs between different methods and, eventually, to
the substructure's construction. Compared to traditional
make a decision with confidence. However, because
methods, up-up and up-down methods, which are
these new methods have short histories and a limited
variations of the top-down (or cover-and-cut) method,
number of applications, contractors often make their
enable both a substructure and a superstructure to be
decisions based on personal preference or sales pitches
constructed simultaneously by covering the ground
by sales representatives of each construction method.
level of an excavation site with a concrete slab [18].
If enough reliable information for comparison is not
This reduces the construction period and potential civil
provided, contractors naturally choose familiar meth-
* Graduate Research Assistant ods despite the potential benefits of new construction
** Corresponding author: Assistant Professor, Dept. Of Architectural methods, especially when the failure of work can lead
Engineering. Yonsei University, 262 Seonsanno, Seodaemun-Gu, to a huge disaster. Any construction methods which in-
Seoul 120-749, Korea, glee@yonsei.ac.kr
clude excavation work are examples of such cases.
 A way to reliably and objectively estimate the cost
and schedule in the early stages of a construction pro-
ject will enable contractors to make decisions confi-
dently. This paper focuses on a system that can help
contractors to select an appropriate deep excavation
method. The first step is to check whether the consid-
ered excavation methods fit the site's conditions. After
that, the two major factors that affect a contractor's de-
cision of which construction method to choose are
construction costs and time. This paper proposes a
framework for a system that supports the process of
evaluating deep excavation methods during the early
stages of a construction project.
1 An Overview of Up-Up and Up-
Down Construction Methods
As mentioned above, unlike the traditional bottom-up
construction method, the up-up method and the up-
down method enable the simultaneous construction of
both the substructure and superstructure. The following
two construction procedures are common in both up-up
and up-down construction: (1) A perimeter foundation
wall is constructed. (2) Pre-formed columns are in-
stalled. They temporarily support loads from a super-
structure to some extent until other parts of the build-
ing are completed. (3) Concrete is placed on the
ground level to cover the entire excavation site and
also to form a slab, which functions as a horizontal
compression unit. After this step, slight differences ap-
pear between the up-up and top-down construction
processes.
In up-up construction [7]: (4) Permanent struts are
installed as the excavation reaches the basement floor
level. Note that slabs are not constructed at this point.
(5) Upon the completion of the excavation, founda-
tions are constructed. (6) Construction of a superstruc-
ture begins. At the same time, the basement floor is
constructed from the bottom to the top, which func-
tions as a lateral brace.
In up-down construction [14]: (4) Upon completion
of the ground level concrete slab, construction of the
superstructure can begin and proceed while temporary
struts are installed at each basement level, and con-
crete is poured on each basement level as the excava-
tion reaches the basement floor level. Temporary struts
are usually smaller than permanent struts and are
placed at narrower intervals than permanent struts. (5)
This process is repeated downward.
2 Previous Work in Cost and
Schedule Estimation
Reliably estimating construction costs and schedules is
essential for successfully completing construction pro-
jects, as well as for selecting appropriate construction
methods for a project. Exiting studies have proposed a
number of cost estimating and scheduling techniques.
Several studies have focused on the use of probabil-
istic approaches for cost and schedule estimation [8-
10]. Because it is nearly impossible to accurately de-
termine activity durations and unit costs for each task,
especially in the early stages of a construction project,
a deterministic approach might fail to represent the
variability inherent in real construction projects. There-
fore, range estimating and stochastic scheduling were
proposed as an alternative. They estimate costs and
schedules based on probabilistic distributions gener-
ated by randomly generated parameter values. The
Monte Carlo simulation technique is often used in this
process. Through iterative sampling processes (1,000
or more), it simulates a model that reflects possible va-
riability in costs and schedules. Efforts also have been
made to use historical cost and schedule data instead of
randomly generated parameter values, for example, us-
ing the Monte Carlo simulation. Back et al. [2] is such
an example of using historical cost data in the prob-
abilistic cost estimation.
In practice, construction costs cannot be estimated
without considering a schedule. However, mapping be-
tween the work breakdown structure (WBS) and the
cost breakdown structure (CBS) is not easy. A problem
arises, especially when activities and costs are at dif-
ferent levels of detail. Many efforts have been made to
solve this problem. They are summarized well by Ras-
dorf and Abudayyeh [19]. The multiple-simulation
analysis technique (MSAT) by Isidore et al. [8,10] is
one of the recent efforts to integrate range estimating
and probabilistic scheduling.
One major consideration in probabilistic approaches
is the determination of a probability distribution func-
tion (PDF) and distribution parameters. Many early
studies have indicated that errors in their predictions
were attributable to the wrong values being assigned to
distribution parameters, rather than the selected PDF
[6]. These days, the beta distribution is commonly used
as a PDF because of its flexibility.
On the other hand, Shaheen et al. [21] and Choi et al.
[4] used the fuzzy set theory to capture subjective as-
sessments related to the applications in cost estimating.
As opposed to the Monte Carlo method, which is sen-
sitive to input statistical distributions, fuzzy arithmetic
is not subject to moderate changes in the shapes of in-
put distribution. However, the fuzzy range estimating
model is based entirely on subjective information from
experts (namely, their perception) about parameters of
interest.
Many researchers also have developed knowledge-
based or web-based systems that enable users to esti-
mate costs and schedules based on input information.
Chou and O'Connor [5] developed a web-based rela-
tional database management system for estimating pre-
liminary highway construction costs. Mohamed and
Celik [17] presented an integrated knowledge-based
system for cost estimating and scheduling. Their sys-
tem focuses on a rapid comparison analysis of cost and
schedule alternatives while considering a variety of va-
riables such as general information on a project, and
several factors (e.g., different material types), that po-
tentially affect the project's productivity.
scratch and evaluating several scheduling alternatives
are painstaking and time-consuming, Ryu et al. [20]
developed a scheduling tool using case-based reason-
ing (CBR). This tool retrieves the schedule of a similar
project stored in a database, and allows users to par-
tially modify the retrieved schedule to fit the current
project.
Nowadays various methods for visualizing construc-
tion processes, such as 4D simulation, have been de-
veloped [12,16] and integrated into web-based man-
agement systems for effective construction manage-
ment [3,11]. VRML (Virtual Reality Modeling Lan-
guage) [22] is commonly used for such web-based
visualization efforts. Lee et al. [13] showed the effec-
tiveness of such visualization methods for evaluating
design alternatives. This application has expanded to
mobile devices such as PDAs [15].
Table 1 summarizes the important issues in previous
studies related to cost estimation and scheduling.
3 A Framework for a System of
Estimating Excavation Costs and
Schedule
The previous section provides a review considering our
ultimate research objective. Our long-term goal is to
develop a system for evaluating excavation alternatives

Table1. Important issues in the previous work

Issues Contents
Linkage between the WBS and the CBS: Development of meaningful common denominator for the in-
tegration of cost estimate and schedule is a critical issue
Probabilistic estimating and scheduling: Probabilistic estimating and scheduling is a useful way to as-
Techniques for cost sume the variability inherent in real construction, especially when all detailed design parameters are not
estimate and schedule specified. Determining which probabilistic distribution and distribution parameters to use is essential for
getting reliable results.
Fuzzy set theory: When sufficient historical data are not presented, the fuzzy set theory may be an alter-
native. It effectively reflects verbal information from experts.
Web-based system: A web-based system is an effective tool in collecting and sharing cost and schedule
estimation data.
Practical systems for Comparison analysis: Using data stored in knowledge-based systems, the costs and schedules of different
implementation design alternatives can be rapidly analyzed and compared.
Case-based reasoning for scheduling: A schedule for a new project can be efficiently and rapidly gener-
ated by retrieving and modifying past schedules.
Operational planning
4D CAD: Visualization of construction processes can help engineers optimize construction schedules and
tools using
provide better insight in temporal and spatial information.
visualization
Because developing a construction schedule from for buildings, which includes the following three mod-
ules. Figure 1 shows the system's functional architec-
ture. This assumes that all the excavation methods un-
der consideration already satisfy the physical condi-
tions of a construction site.
3.1 The Design Generation Module
This module creates and suggests a common design for
the substructure of a selected excavation method, such
as the required number of columns and girders and
their sizes, based on input values such as the building's
general dimensions and several options related to the
selected excavation method. If necessary, users can
modify the suggested design. Geometry and object and
quantity-takeoff information are exported into the
scheduling module and the cost estimating module, re-
spectively.
3.2 The Scheduling Module
This module retrieves a typical construction schedule
associated with a user-selected construction method,
similar to Ryu et al. [20]. At this stage, the retrieved
schedule has only information about activities and their
dependencies. If necessary, users can add or remove
activities and change their order. Next, the module
Fig. 1 The system’s functional architecture
links to the schedule duration information about each
activity from a historical database. Depending on the
amount of equipment and the number of crews selected
by the user, the work's duration might change. A
schedule is generated using a probabilistic scheduling
method, providing variability in the construction
schedule. Once the user chooses a construction sched-
ule, a VRML-based visualization is generated by con-
necting the geometry information from the Design
Generation Module to the schedule information from
the scheduling module. The schedule information is
then exported to the cost estimating module.
3.3 The Cost Estimating Module
This module considers a detailed list of costs in addi-
tion to the quantity takeoff from the Design Generation
Module and the schedule information from the Sched-
uling Module. For example, the labor cost can be af-
fected by several factors such as soil conditions and the
degree of difficulty of performing tasks. Unit cost in-
formation retrieved from a historical data set is then
assigned to each detailed cost account. Finally, prob-
abilistic estimating is analyzed, providing variability in
the cost estimate.

4 Project's Status
Currently, two research efforts are ongoing. The first is
to develop the cost and scheduling modules. The sec-
ond is to develop the Design Generation Module and a
4D simulation tool.
Regarding the cost and scheduling modules, because
the relationship between cost estimation and schedul-
ing is bidirectional, we are trying to find a practical
way to map the CBS and the WBS. Currently we have
collected 16 sets of project documents, including bills
of materials (BOMs) and bar chart schedules. We also
have consulted with field engineers to identify the un-
derlying risk factors accounting for unsystematic vari-
ability in each construction method's cost estimates and
schedules.
Regarding the Design Generation Module, we are
evaluating various BIM and 4D tools that can poten-
tially be a platform for our system. Currently the au-
thors are testing the Application Programming Inter-
faces (APIs) of various tools, including Revit, Con-
structor, Navisworks and others. However, Fig. 2 is
manually modeled in Constructor 2007 [1] to test the
4D functionality.
12 man-hours. Figure 2 presents snapshots of a 4D
model that show consecutive construction processes of
the up-down method. We expect that our system can
significantly reduce the early cost estimation and 4D
modeling time for excavation methods when it is de-
veloped.
5 Conclusion
In order to improve decision-makers' selection of con-
struction methods, it is imperative to have a method to
rapidly and accurately estimate costs and schedules at
the early stages of a construction project. Based on
previous work related to cost and schedule estimation,
this paper proposes a new web-based framework for
evaluating excavation alternatives. As a preliminary
step, we have established a framework for the system,
collected 16 full sets of sample cases and identified
important factors for designing an evaluation system
by interviewing excavation experts. We also have re-
viewed several BIM tools and 4D CAD systems, and
tested their functionality by building several 4D mod-
els. The times for building 3D and 4D models were
measured for comparison. This work is still in its early
stages. We are now testing APIs of various systems to
use as a platform. This effort will be continued and in-
tegrated into a web-based system that we previously
developed as an excavation recommendation system
based on the physical conditions of a construction site.

Acknowledgement
Authors would like to thank for the financial support provided
by the Ministry of Construction & Transportation (MOCT) Ko-
rea, and Korea Institute of Construction and Transportation in
Technology Evaluation and Planning (KICTTEP) through Inno-
vative and Rapid Construction Technologies Joint Venture
(IRCT) under Program No. 05 RND Core Technology D02-01.

References

[1] Constructor 2007, VICO Software,

Fig. 2 Snapshots of a 4D model that shows
an up-down process
[2]
This modeling took about 30 man-hours. A total of
54 activities in an as-planned schedule were linked
with a 3D model to generate a 4D CAD. The linking
[3]
process between a 3D model and a schedule took about
http://www.vicosoftware.com/Products/Constructor/ta
bid/46258/Default.aspx.
W.E. Back, W.B. Walter, T.F. Gary, Defining Triangular
Probability Distributions from Historical Cost Data,
Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
126 (1) (2000) 29-37.
D.A. Campbell, Architectural construction documents on
the web: VRML as a case study, Automation in Con-
 struction 9 (1) (2000) 129-138. Construction Engineering and Management 117 (3)
[4] H.-H. Choi, H.-N. Cho, J.W. Seo, Risk Assessment Meth- (1991) 486-502.
odology for Underground Construction Projects, Jour- [20] H.-G. Ryu, H.-S. Lee, M. Park, Construction Planning Me-
nal of Construction Engineering and Management 130 thod Using Case-Based Reasoning (CONPLA-CBR),
(2) (2004) 258-272. Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering 21 (6)
[5] J.-S. Chou, J.T. O'Connor, Internet-based preliminary (2007) 410-422.
highway construction cost estimating database, Auto- [21] A.A. Shaheen, A.R. Fayek, S.M. AbouRizk, Fuzzy Num-
mation in Construction 17 (1) (2007) 65-74. bers in Cost Range Estimating, Journal of Construc-
[6] J. Fente, C. Schexnayder, K. Knutson, Defining a Prob- tion Engineering and Management 133 (4) (2007)
ability Distribution Function for Construction Simula- 325-334.
tion, Journal of Construction Engineering and Man- [22] VRML, http://www.web3d.org/x3d/vrml/index.html.
agement 126 (3) (2000) 234-241.
[7] W. Hong, S. Kim, S. Kim, Up-Up Construction Takes Off
in Korea, Civil Engineering 158 (3) (2005) 120-123.
[8] L.J. Isidore, W.E. Back, Multiple Simulation Analysis for
Probabilistic Cost and Schedule Integration, Journal
of Construction Engineering and Management 128 (3)
(2002) 211-219.
[9] L.J. Isidore, W.E. Back, Probabilistic Optimal-Cost Sched-
uling, Journal of Construction Engineering and Man-
agement 127 (6) (2001) 431-437.
[10] L.J. Isidore, W.E. Back, G.T. Fry, Integrated probabilistic
schedules and estimates from project simulated data,
Construction Management & Economics 19 (4)
(2001) 417-426.
[11] M. Jang, B. Son, H. Lee, Development of Construction
Schedule Management System for Structural Steel
Works Using VRML, Journal of Architectural Institute
of Korea 20 (8) (2004).
[12] B. Koo, M. Fischer, Feasibility Study of 4D CAD in
Commercial Construction, Journal of Construction
Engineering and Management 126 (4) (2000) 251-260.
[13] E. Lee, S. Woo, T. Sasada, The evaluation system for de-
sign alternatives in collaborative design, Automation
in Construction 10 (3) (2001) 295-301.
[14] H.-S. Lee, J.-Y. Lee, J.-S. Lee, Nonshored Formwork Sys-
tem for Top-Down Construction, Journal of Construc-
tion Engineering and Management 125 (6) (1999)
392-399.
[15] R.R. Lipman, Mobile 3D visualization for steel structures,
Automation in Construction 13 (1) (2004) 119-125.
[16] J.I. Messner, S.C. Yerrapathruni, A.J. Baratta, D.R. Riley,
Cost and Schedule Reduction of Nuclear Power Plant
Construction Using 4D CAD and Immersive Display
Technologies, in: D.S. Anthony, C.M. John (Eds.), Vol.
123, ASCE, 2002, p. 12.
[17] A. Mohamed, T. Celik, Knowledge based-system for alter-
native design, cost estimating and scheduling, Knowl-
edge-Based Systems 15 (3) (2002) 177-188.
[18] J.H. Paek, J.H. Ock, Innovative Building Construction
Technique: Modified Up/Down Method, Journal of
Construction Engineering and Management 122 (2)
(1996) 141-146.
[19] W.J. Rasdorf, O.Y. Abudayyeh, Cost- and Schedule-
Control Integration: Issues and Needs, Journal of