Mehmet Emre Bayraktar

Public-Private Partnerships in U.S. Transportation: Research Overview and a Path Forward

Public-private partnerships (PPPs) are contractual relationships between government and industry to deliver facilities or service for public benefit. In the United States, existing transportation infrastructure is aging and new infrastructure is underfunded. PPPs are considered one way to help meet this looming need. Although PPPs have a long history, interest in modern PPPs is renewed. The current debate over PPPs lacks theory and research to support the various views of PPPs. Promoters say they bring needed financing, technology, management, and risk sharing to infrastructure development. Detractors say government agencies are better positioned to finance and own infrastructure and protect the public interest. The unique contribution of this paper is to provide the results of a national survey on the state-of-practice of PPPs in transportation in the United States, and to provide a comprehensive overview of research on U.S. transportation PPPs in the areas of economics, law, and public opinion. Additionally, a path forward is offered to help organize and guide research in U.S. transportation PPPs in the future.

LEED Implementation Guide for Construction Practitioners

Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) is a certification program developed by the U.S. Green Building Council for designing, constructing, and certifying green buildings. This paper presents a LEED implementation guide for construction practitioners to assist them in the certification process. The guide was formulated primarily through input, suggestions, and recommendations received from LEED accredited professionals including architects, engineers, commissioning authorities, general contractors, construction managers, and facility managers. Data were collected through four questionnaire surveys where two of which were used for guide development and the other two for modification and validation. General contractors, construction managers, and engineers can use the LEED implementation guide as a reference for managing their LEED certification process. The proposed guide can also assist owners interested in building a LEED certified facility.

Bayesian Belief Network Model for Decision Making in Highway Maintenance: Case Studies

This paper presents two case studies that were conducted to illustrate the functionality and application of a decision support system for predicting the influence of decisions made by state highway agencies regarding important work zone project variables such as work window, work zone length, lane closure strategy, and contract incentives on the cost, duration, quality, safety, and public satisfaction of a particular project under consideration. The first case study describes in detail the operation and function of the three major levels of the proposed framework using a completed project, whereas the second case study provides an opportunity for the application of the decision support system to a work zone project in the planning stages using the input of the actual decision maker for the project.

Decision Tool for Selecting the Optimal Techniques for Cost and Schedule Reduction in Capital Projects

Projects must meet budget, schedule, safety, and quality goals to be regarded as a success. Many factors come into play, and many decisions are made that influence a project’s outcome. Today, owners are often faced with deciding between an execution strategy that emphasizes either project cost or project schedule. Such a decision may be made not once, but throughout the life of the project. Project teams, when required by the owner to make a cost-schedule trade-off, generate common sense ideas, best practices, and other means of achieving the desired trade-off through brainstorming sessions. This paper offers a tool for systematically identifying the techniques which are most effective in achieving the trade-off goal. Project teams can then use these techniques in a timely fashion to increase the likelihood of project success.

Scoring Approach to Construction Bond Underwriting

This paper introduces a conceptual scoring-based contractor evaluation system to address the problems created by the subjective nature of surety underwriting process. The methodology presented in this paper provides the surety underwriters with an objective tool for estimating the probability that the evaluated contractor would perform in a satisfactory manner with respect to the main decision factors considered in the bond underwriting process. The proposed model could be used by decision makers to prescreen contractors and make underwriting decisions. The paper first discusses the construction bond underwriting process and provides a brief introduction to the scoring technique as the modeling environment used in this paper. Then, the three steps included in the development of the proposed scoring system are presented in detail followed by an example demonstrating the application of the final product.

Theoretical framework for transportation infrastructure asset management based on review of best practices

The transportation agencies have historically focused on major building and expansion of roads, bridges, and other transportation infrastructure. However, the emphasis has drastically shifted from development of new infrastructure to intelligently maintaining the existing one. In recent years, budget tightening and increasing demands had also impacted the allocation of funds in transportation infrastructure. This situation has lead to emphasize the development of asset management systems. At its core, asset management is a business process that often changes the way of thinking in an organization and drives the decisions based on information. A strong asset management system provides a solid foundation that optimizes the performance and cost effectiveness of transportation facilities’ operations and maintenance. Keeping in mind, this paper provides an overview of transportation infrastructure asset management. It provides a review of the best practices adopted by different transportation infrastructure agencies internationally & United States. The review shows that the front runners in the asset management system internationally are Australia while Michigan takes the lead in US. Finally, based on the review of best practices, a theoretical framework for transportation infrastructure asset management has been proposed. The framework is focused on six important aspects of an asset management system i.e. asset management organization and concept, planning, contractual arrangement and mechanisms, monitoring and performance measurement, information systems and decision making.

Improving Green Building Education by Addressing the Learning Style and Prior Knowledge of Students

Green building education requires successful teamwork of students from different disciplines to solve challenging problems. Team performance depends on both team process behavior and team cognition...

Counterfeiting Risk Governance in the Capital Projects Supply Chain

The capital projects supply chain has proved to be vulnerable to disruption by counterfeit, fraudulent, and suspect items (CFSI). The challenges associated with CFSI are intensified considering the project-based nature of industry that involves diverse actors and a complex supply-chain structure. The aim of this research is to study governance of the risks associated with CFSI in the capital projects supply chain. First, the status of the industry regarding CFSI is updated through a multistaged survey of the industry. An analysis of the survey results underscores the lack of awareness in the construction industry about the risks associated with CFSI and highlights the need for guidelines and collaboration at the industry level. A comparative study of CFSI risks and mitigation procedures in other industries echoes these needs. Therefore, mitigation strategies and practices are explored, and a framework to govern the risk of CFSI in the capital projects supply chain is proposed. An implementation roadmap is also recommended as a two-phased collaborative approach at the construction company and industry levels based on the proposed framework.

Judiciary’s Use of the Critical Path Method to Resolve Construction Claims

The number and magnitude of disputes between contractors and owners continues to be a serious problem in the construction industry. Even with technological advancements in project scheduling, delay claims persist. When compromises between the parties are not possible, claims are often presented to a court of law or board of contract appeal. These judicial entities have relied on the critical path method (CPM) as a tool to resolve these disputes. Moreover, they have recognized the CPM as legal evidence in assessing the responsibility and damage amount for delays associated with construction projects. The first part of this paper provides brief background information on major types of construction delays, basics of the CPM, use of the CPM in delay analysis methods, and use of the CPM by industry practitioners. In the second part, a discussion of how courts have used the CPM to resolve construction claims over the past decade is followed by three in-depth case studies that feature CPM as the critical factor ...

Opportunities for Value Extraction Projects in Highway Rights-of-Way and Development of Feasibility Assessment Tool

State departments of transportation (DOTs) have been trying to identify alternative and innovative sources of revenue and cost savings. One potential solution to funding issues that has gained recent attention is value extraction from highway rights-of-way (ROW). In this paper, first, the state-of-the-practice of value extraction projects in highway ROWs is established. Next, detailed analysis is conducted regarding three high-priority value extraction projects chosen by the Florida DOT including solar photovoltaic, light emitting diode (LED) lighting, and agricultural uses. The feasibility screening tools introduced in this paper integrate all of the research findings from the literature review, survey of state DOTs, and case studies of select projects and programs. The screening tools provide in a tabular form a thorough list of various technical and financial criteria that play an important role in choosing and implementing the related value extraction projects. The information provided for the individual value extraction project types can be used as a platform to successfully design and manage those projects in the highway ROW.