Analysis of change orders in geotechnical engineering work at INDOT.

Details

• Alternative Title:
  Joint Transportation Research Program : Civil Engineering
• Creators:
  Mohan, Varenya Kumar Duvvuru ; Prezzi, Monica
• Corporate Creators:
  Purdue University. Joint Transportation Research Program
• Corporate Contributors:
  Indiana Department of Transportation ; United States. Federal Highway Administration
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  • Savings
  • Economic conditions
  • Geotechnical engineering
  • Civil engineering
  • Errors
  • Change order
  • Cost savings
  • Geotechnical change orders
  • Reason code
  • Errors and omissions
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• Publication/ Report Number:
  FHWA/IN/JTRP-2011/10
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  Indiana
• Corporate Publisher:
  Purdue University. Joint Transportation Research Program
• Abstract:
  Change orders represent a cost to the State and to tax payers that is real and often extremely large because contractors tend to charge very large ; amounts to any additional work that deviates from the work that was originally planned. Therefore, efforts must be made to reduce significantly the occurrence ; of change orders in order to provide significant cost savings to the state of Indiana and save taxpayer dollars. The proposed research, in this context, developed ; a set of guidelines that will allow the geotechnical office of the Indiana Department of Transportation (INDOT) to minimize the probabilities of having change ; orders in those projects where they are truly preventable. These guidelines include not only recommendations on how to manage the problem of change orders ; associated with the geotechnical construction projects when they are unavoidable but also general recommendations wherever possible for adequate site ; investigation, design procedures, and quality assurance and quality control (QA/QC) processes that could help minimize change orders. ; Based on the analysis conducted on the data collected from 300 INDOT contracts, it was found that the average geotechnical change order amount per ; district per year was 1.34 percent of the total estimated construction cost per district per year. The average geotechnical change order amount per district per ; year was 10.25 percent of the average amount of total change orders per district per year. The average net overrun due to geotechnical change orders was ; $707,000 per district per year. About 28 percent (84 contracts) of the contracts that were considered in this study experienced geotechnical change orders. In ; total, 158 geotechnical change orders were recorded in all the contracts. About 41 % of the total road contracts (155 contracts) experienced geotechnical ; change orders. About 37% of the total bridge contracts (44 contracts) experienced geotechnical change orders. The other contract types of this study’s dataset ; were insignificant as far as geotechnical change orders were concerned. Reason code 206 – Constructability: Soils-Related – was assigned to 101 geotechnical ; change orders. Reason code 405 – Changed Field Conditions: Soils-Related – was assigned to 46 geotechnical change orders. Reason code 108 – Errors and ; Omissions: Soils-Related – was assigned to the 11 remaining geotechnical change orders. INDOT personnel who were interviewed acknowledged the fact that ; the variability of soil is so great that it would be literally impossible to eliminate geotechnical change orders. However, they did recognize the need to address ; the following issues that lead to geotechnical change orders (i) Failure to identify areas of poor subgrade soil (ii) Mismatch in piling quantities (iii) Omissions ; and constructability issues associated with erosion control work.
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• Format:
  PDF
• Funding:
  SPR-3224
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/23598/dot_23598_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 10.59 MB]
• Collection(s):
  US Transportation Collection
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:660b5ab239606d1ea84d435f2a5597032510d3de26df8bb5f488bb902099f8dc229c97d0d35529c611c194a82d04fb0d3e17b09de273e9d30b7be6873b962d1b