Application of Gis in Construction Management

Abstract

Geographic Information System (GIS) has been used in many fields of Science including engineering. GIS is a Computer based tool which is used to solve engineering problems related to spatial data. The potential importance of GIS to construction management in the construction industry has not been realized completely. GIS technologies have the potential to solve space related problems of construction management involving, integration of information, urban planning, project site selection, soil studies, hydrology and environmental studies. It was found that the construction industry in Sri Lanka is reluctant to apply the GIS in the construction projects. Therefore, this study was aimed to analyse the implementation issues of the application of GIS in the field of quantity surveying as a part of construction management in engineering. Interviews were conducted to gather data from the senior quantity surveyors in the fields of construction and project management. The sample was 40 and the selection method was purposive sampling specially based on the direct involvement in the project under the capacity of decision making. The study was done by using only the primary data and the analysis was done by developing a comprehensive content analysis. It was found that there are key issues in the implementation of GIS including the unawareness and the overlapping with other specific techniques. The respondents have proposed the possible ways of implementing GIS to the construction management for enhancing the productivity of the projects specially by doing a proper cost benefit analysis.