A Study on Optimal Duration Estimation for Construction Activity

As a construction project is recently becoming large-scaled and complex, construction process plan and management for successful performance of a construction project has become more important. Especially a reasonable estimation plan of activity duration is required because the activity duration is directly related to the determination of the entire project duration and budget. However, the activity duration is used to estimate by the experience of a construction manager and past construction records. Furthermore, the prediction of activity duration is more difficult because there is some uncertainty caused by various influencing factors in a construction project. This study suggests an estimation model of construction activity duration using neural network theory for a more systematic and objective estimation of each activity duration. Because suggested model estimates the activity duration by a reasonable schedule plan, it is expected to reduce the error between planning duration and actual duration in a construction project. And it can be a more systematic estimation method of activity duration comparing to the estimation method by experience of project manager.