ASSESSMENT OF DELAY ON ROAD CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS: THE CASE OF ADDIS ABABA CITY ROAD AUTHORITY

Abstract

Time is a very critical indicator, a key resource, in the life cycle of project management and a crucial criterion for the success of a project in the construction industry. In construction industry, delay can be expressed as an elongation of time beyond what the contracting parties have agreed up on for the total completion of the project. It is well recognised that most road construction projects are exposed to time and cost overruns in Ethiopia and Addis Ababa region or both. As a number of delays rise from time to time, the need to assess and identify the cause of these delays and their effects also rises. Hence, the objective of the study is to identify the causes and effects of delay causing factors in Addis Ababa City Road Authority road projects. 36 potential delay causes and 16 effects were selected from the reviewed literature and the causes were divided in to 5 as client related factors, consultant related factors, contractor related factors, material and equipment related factors and external related factors. These factors were ranked using the Likert scale by a total of 116 professionals from 3 target population and analysed using Relative Importance Index (RII). The research indicates that the top major causes of delay in road construction were delay in relocating utilities, escalation of the material price, delay in paying compensation to land owners, shortage of foreign currency for importation of materials, inadequate management & supervision by contractors. In addition to these, lack of high-technology mechanical equipment, shortage of construction materials, late in revising and approving design documents, slow decision making and ineffective resource management were also mentioned to be among the top major causes of delay. The study further determines that the major effects of delay were time overrun, cost overrun, financial loss, poor quality of work, compromised quality, company’s bad reputation, loss of other facilities, disputes, loss of wealth and capacity and breaches of contract.