From A to B

The scheduling process in a construction project is not only complex, it is unique to the building, the site, the location, and the people involved.  There are several approaches to creating a project timeline, but in all cases it is essential to have checkpoints, monitoring, and flexibility.  If the challenges of constructing the project were not enough, you must also add the stress of the credo "time is money" as the need to finish quickly must balance with quality.

One of the most essential elements of creating an effective timeline is to identify critical path items - key work items that must happen before other items may occur.  These items become the focus when crashing or accelerating a project, so they must be clearly identified early in the process.

The bar chart allows the developer to see the project length and overlap the duration of each important element of the process.  One of the major shortcomings of this process is that it does not easily show how one activity might be dependent on the completion of another.  It does allow visualization of different elements occurring simultaneously and gives an overall sense of time, but is not usually used to calculate hard dates.

The matrix approach is most often used for repetitive elements and gives a timeline with basic start, stop, and duration times that are helpful in planning.  It provides a framework of the project and its major parts without focusing on overly specific details and as a result is a good launching point for more complex planning.

The network schedule is also known as precedence notation and looks at critical path elements.  It assigns each major task both early and late start dates as well as duration time.  As a result it is helpful in determining where time can be given or made up in the event of a delay.  It is also helpful in the ordering materials because if provides and ongoing check of the time frame to allow for just in time procurement and reduces the need for additional storage.

These timelines, what ever format, are usually displayed on site as well as used in ongoing meetings with the owner, contractors and superintendent of the project to help keep everyone accountable and aware of the importance of timely progress. The timeline also helps everyone see the fuller scope of work and hopefully creates some buy in to the finished project.

The visual timeline of this old warehouse being transformed into a trampoline park demonstrates the many different construction aspects of getting from point A to point B. (Be sure to watch for the dry erase board timeline at about 1:30)