The objective of this paper was to have a study on the perceptions of stakeholders of Public-Private Partnership (PPP) projects for factors affecting the attractiveness of road projects in India. A questionnaire survey was conducted among major PPP project participants of Indian PPP road projects. Fifteen attractive factors were shortlisted through a literature survey for designing the questionnaire. Collected data was analyzed with factor analysis and descriptive statistical analysis. The findings resulted in three components: effectiveness of the private sector, effective time and cost management, and the public sector’s economic benefit. Eight factors were identified as highly affecting the attractiveness of PPP in Indian road projects. PPP provides ample diversity of net benefits to both the public and private sectors. During the project development stage, both sectors have to formulate decisions based on appropriate assessment criteria. Therefore, the reflection of attractive factors will assist the public-sector to select PPP in the road sector. It also helps to establish the strategy for road projects using PPP.

In the project management, buffers are considered to handle uncertainties that lead to changes in project scheduling which in turn causes project delivery delay. The purpose of this survey is to discuss the state of the art on models and methods for project buffer management and time optimization of construction projects and manufacturing industries. There are not literally any surveys which review the literature of project buffer management and time optimization. This research adds to the previous literature surveys and focuses mainly on papers after 2014 but with a quick review on previous works. This research investigates the literature from project buffer sizing, project buffer consumption monitoring and project time/resource optimization perspectives.

Since scheduling literature has a wide range of uncertainties, it is crucial to take these into account when solving performance measure problems. Otherwise, the performance may severely be affected in a negative way. In this paper, an algorithm is proposed to minimize the total completion time (TCT) of a two-machine no-wait flowshop with uncertain setup times within lower and upper bounds. The results are compared to the best existing algorithm in scheduling literature: the programming language Python is used to generate random samples with respect to various distributions, and the TCT of the proposed algorithm is compared to that of the best existing one. Results reveal that the proposed one significantly outperforms the best one given in literature for all considered distributions. Specifically, the average percentage improvement of the proposed algorithm over the best existing one is over 90%. A test of hypothesis is conducted to further confirm the results.

This work aims to present the application of Multi-Criteria Decision-Making methods to the process of recruiting candidates for the position of project manager, considering aspects of the decision maker's preferences in uncertain and risk scenarios. Applied, descriptive and experimental, made up of the combined employment TODIM-FSE methods for multi-criteria classification of available candidates, and the method Behavioral TOPSIS, to choose the ideal project manager. The hybrid application of the Multi-Criteria Decision-Making methods TODIM-FSE, method based on Prospect Theory, and Behavioral TOPSIS, which considers the concept of loss aversion of Economic Behavior, is essentially innovative. When using TODIM-FSE and Behavioral TOPSIS, it was verified the explicit incorporation of the risk profile of the decision maker - aggressive, neutral, or conservative - in the context of aversion or propensity to the risks associated with the management of a project. Through the personal recruiting process from a large Brazilian organization, the possibility of adopting the hybrid model resulting from the combination of the two methods in a real situation was validated. Such validation allowed us to conclude that the candidates' classifications and choices, previously normally accepted, were at odds with the profile and risk propensity of the decision makers.

This study assessed the critical success factors (CSFs) of public-sector road construction projects execution from the perspective of definitive stakeholders associated with such projects by drawing on in-depth semi-structured interviews (16) and surveys (372) in Ghana, thirty-four (34) CSFs were identified. Using Relative Importance Index (RII), Spearman Rank Correlation Coefficients, and Kendall’s Coefficient of Concordance and the Chi-square test of significance statistics, the top ten most important factors in descending order are: the absence of political interference, project continuity by successive governments, adequate project funding, support from financial institutions and donor agencies and countries, government commitment to the project, absence of clientelism, absence of nepotism, no political corruption, payments of contractors on time and absence of court injunction or legal suit and land litigations. This study contributes to road construction CSFs in the context of public sector road construction in developing economies.

Risk monitoring and control is often poorly implemented in construction projects because of a failure to monitor and manage identified risks. Construction companies experience significant losses due to project managers' lack of project risk monitoring and control in construction projects. Most studies have concentrated on risk identification, risk assessment, and risk analysis processes while neglecting crucial risk management processes of risk control, risk monitoring, and risk response. The lack of research on these three crucial processes highlights a gap in the literature concerning how these processes can increase the delivery of successful projects. The purpose of this study was to examine whether the utilization of project risk monitoring and control practices was related to project success in construction projects in the United States. An electronic survey instrument was used to collect data from a sample of 50 construction project managers in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in the state of Texas, in the United States. Spearman rho correlation analysis was used to examine the relationship between project risk monitoring and control practices and project success. The results of this study indicated that all project risk monitoring and control practices, including risk reassessment, risk audits, contingency reserves analysis, and risk status meetings, were significantly and positively related to project success in construction projects. One of the recommendations presented in this study was that future research should conduct the same study in developing countries to see if the study’s findings remain the same and generalizable. The study concluded that construction organizations should regularly consider the importance and usage of project risk monitoring and control practices and apply them to improve the success rate of a project.

In recent times, there have been developments in the maritime industry that underscore the need to optimise operations to yield maximum productivity. Apart from this, stakeholders in this industry have also advocated improvements in seaport operations' critical areas. However, there is no known study in which the relationship between performance criteria and seaport operation measures is investigated. This study proposes a framework for selecting operation measures for the maritime industry. It uses stakeholders' expectations for operational criteria and fuzzy logic to design the framework. Nine criteria were considered in the framework, while Fuzzy VIKOR (VIsekriterijumska optimizacija I KOmpromisno Resenje) and fuzzy Shannon entropy were incorporated into it. The framework's applicability was tested using information that was obtained from Tin can port, Lagos, Nigeria. During this process, hinterland traffic diversion (A1), congestion pricing (A2), off-dock container yards (A3), Fast rail shuttles (A4), expanded rail connections (A5) were considered as alternatives for seaport operational measures. When the developed framework was used to analyse the collected information from Tin Can port, Lagos, Nigeria, the fuzzy VIKOR index ranked the alternatives as A1 » A2 » A3 » A5 » A4. Therefore, this study's insights show that mathematical models can be used to make informed seaports decisions.

The objective of this paper is to evaluate factors affecting the progress of completing construction of irrigation projects using state budget funds. To achieve the goal, to research and conduct surveys of investors, contractors, managers of irrigation construction investment projects. Analysis results from 269 valid questionnaires using SmartPLS 3.6 software showed that all 6 factors: Investor, Peripheral, Capital, Contractors, Consultant, Convenience, all factors have a positive impact on progress of completing irrigation construction projects using state budget funds in Thai Binh province, Vietnam.

Government construction projects are vital to the economic development of developing countries. However, although most of these projects suffer from abandonment, little evidence exists concerning the causes that account for this setback. This paper investigates the causes of government construction project abandonment in Ghana. We used a sequential data collection approach, in-depth semi-structured interviews, and questionnaire surveys to solicit the views of project management practitioners, contractors, and clients associated with Ghana government construction project implementation. Using factor analysis and structural equation modelling, we find that Ghanaian government construction project abandonment is influenced by five sets of causes: political leadership, culture, external forces, resources (including funding) and administrative/institutional bottlenecks. Three of these sets of causes – political leadership, cultural and external forces, are the primary causes, while resources (including funding) and administrative/institutional causes are secondary causes.

The current study aims to provide an overview of the research on political risk using the Web of Science（WoS）database as well as summarize research results and put forward some suggestions for research directions of political risk in international construction projects. It is the first time scientometric analysis of political risk research is executed. In this regard, the papers related to political risk in the WoS database have been retrieved and the literature is sorted out by visual and content analysis methods. Visual analysis is used to analyze the research overview, knowledge base, and research hotspots of this field. The content analysis method is adopted to expound the current research focus from three perspectives inducing the influence of political risk, risk assessment, and risk management measures. The results show that in the political risk context, the number of publications has experienced an increasing trend in recent years. Based on the existing literature on political risk for all companies, this overview provides some suggestions to address the political risk in international construction projects in the future. The results contribute to the scholars understanding of the research overview, research hotspots, and future research directions of political risk research in construction projects.