Establishment of Effective Project Scoping Process for Highway and Bridge Construction Projects

The execution of highway and bridge projects commonly subjects state transportation agencies (STAs) to challenges that cause schedule delays and cost overruns. Changes made to the project's scope are critical root causes of these delays and overruns. The main objective of this study is to develop an effective project scoping process (PSP) for highway and bridge construction projects, using the integrated definition (IDEF) modeling technique. To this end, the research team investigated and evaluated the current practices of the PSP by conducting a comprehensive literature review and various in-depth interviews. Three PSPs were developed using the IDEF; then they were analyzed by the research team to select the PSP that best represented key scoping activities and had the highest level of details for further development. The three main functions of the proposed PSP were to select the project, analyze it, and advance the preferred alternative. This process included 20 main activities. This study would assist in the adoption of the most appropriate practices and strategies that lead to mitigating costly scope changes and prevent unnecessary delays for highway and bridge projects.