Construction Quality Controlling for

Urban Metro Projects based on CIC

Haichao Ding
Ph.D. student
School of Civil Engineering & Mechanics, Huazhong University of Science and
Technology, Wuhan, Hubei 430074, China
e-mail: yoyiyou@163.com

Xinggui Lin*
Master student
School of Civil Engineering & Mechanics, Huazhong University of Science and
Technology, Wuhan, Hubei 430074, China
e-mail: linxinggui.hust@gmail.com
*Corresponding author

Hanbin Luo
Professor
School of Civil Engineering & Mechanics, Huazhong University of Science and
Technology, Wuhan, Hubei 430074, China
e-mail: lhblhb1963@vip.sina.com

ABSTRACT
At present, urban metro construction accidents occurred frequently in China are
accompanying with the rapid growth of metropolis and infrastructure investment.
Clear quality control during urban metro construction has become extremely
important but is very difficult, time-consuming and chaotic due to the lack of product
parameters, clear organization and process information. This paper presents the
development and application of a CIC-based system for quality risk early warning in
urban metro construction. The system is consist of coding the sub-project of urban
metro by computer technology, using integration technology to make the each control
process correspond to responsible and standards, and a data fusion system based on
multisource information (monitoring measurements, standard parameters, and visual
inspections) is employed to give quality risk assessment and early warnings
automatically for participants. Further, we apply the system to quality control of a
metro project in Wuhan to confirm that the system is scientific, applicable and
effective.
KEYWORDS: Urban metro; CIC; Codes/Standards; Construction quality
control

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INTRODUCTION
As China maintains a long-term rapid economic development, the need for infrastructure is
increasing significantly. Thus China is paying high attention on construction of metro networks in
metropolis. A report by the Comprehensive Transportation of the National Development and
Reform Commission shows that at the end of September 2012, there are 15 cities have urban
metro operation lines (a total of 59 metro lines with about 1746 kilometers, the total number of
metro station are 1143) within the scope of the Chinese mainland. And at the end of 2012, a total
of 28 cities have the metro project under construction, a total of the extension line are 63, about
1399 kilometers, 970 stations. According to China's urban metro development planning from
2013 to the end of 2020, China will have 34 cities to build new urban metro lines, 6889
kilometers, which on construction and identified commencement date are 3431 kilometers,
accounting for 49.7% of new metro lines.
Under such a rapid growth, quality accidents occur frequently in urban metro project, as
shown in Fig. 1. For example, early in the morning on July 1, 2003, serious quality accidents
occurred in the cross-river tunnel of Shanghai metro line 4, leading to some structural of the
tunnel damaged and land subsidence of the surrounding areas, three building skewed heavily and
part of flood control wall of the huangpu river collapsed and caused piping. Investigation and
demonstrated by experts, the Shanghai government announced that it was a serious engineering
accident, causing direct economic losses of 150 million yuan, those responsible persons for the
accident has been investigated by the judicial organs. Investigation showed that the cause of the
accident is: ①Danger signs appeared after the malfunction occurred in a refrigeration equipment
of the freezing method construction, and engineering has been shutdown, but failing to take
effective measures to eliminate dangerous; ②Led directly to the occurrence of the accident is
site manager violated the rules and regulations; ③At the same time, the construction unit is not
check the new construction plan according to established procedure, and the new construction
plan has defected; ④Site management of total package units out of control and site supervision
of supervision unit dereliction of duty.

Figure 1: Accidents and deaths of under-construction metro projects in China

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Therefore, urban metro projects are extremely high-risk due to complex construction
equipment, methods, geological & hydrological conditions, and the lack of experienced
managers. At present, the research for the construction quality control of metro project has
focused on the technology which affecting the construction quality and various elements’ analysis
of management. Construction quality is defined as the conformance to the customer requirements
according to plans, specifications, contracts, and applicable codes and standards [1]. And along
with the globalization of the construction activity, pursuing high-rise and mega-size building
projects require that contractors carry out an effective quality management system (QMS) to
acquire competitive superiority[2]. Tarek Elghamrawy et al. reported that total quality
management (TQM) has become a successful management philosophy that can be implemented
in the construction industry effectively[3]. Husrul et al. found close relationships between safety
and quality in TQM (Total Quality Management) programs and showed clearly that safety leads
to quality[4]. Several of quality studies focus on the influence of the management[5] and how to
find latent managerial errors based on obvious operative errors[6]. Waheed, Adeli considered that
developing an expert system should classify the information obtained from audits in a consistent
way and that quantifies the content of a QMS [7]. Site monitoring is an effective method in
construction quality control, not only minimize errors of construction & human, but also supports
project team members making correct decisions at critical points throughout the construction
stages[8]. Jerald L. Rounds proposed comprehensive quality control and the idea of quality
control circle that quality control can’t be viewed in isolation, it need to integrate each sub-part of
the quality control of urban metro and to use the idea of overall control to analyze, to avoid the
shortage of local analysis and the problem of inadequate quality control that local analysis may
bring [9]. Kamyar C. Mahboub believe that contractor is the most important part in quality
control, and they found that the contractor's quality control is much better than they expected, so
giving more confidence to the contractor in quality control is better [10]. Babu A.J.G[11],
Khang[12] and Atkinson[13] through the establishment of the linear model to study the balance
of the relationship among the construction period, cost and quality. Gardiner put forward the net
present value method for continuous monitoring of project healthy construction [14]. C.K.Kwong
through clearly define the fuzzy concept of the quality control, as to determine the weight of all
factors [15].
In summary, the researches of construction quality control have developed to a very advanced
stage, and made a series of achievements. However, inadequate in how to achieve information
sharing of all project participants and lacking in integrated management among participants
responsibility, construction process, product parameters. Therefore, this paper put forward that
using the Computer Integration Construction (CIC) technology to solve the issues above-
mentioned, it can link the different project participants in different stages, forming a collaborative
team of across organizational and the project life cycle. It’s to build a 3D model which take
object-oriented project as the center, and B/S, J2EE, Flex, Java to set up the construction quality
control system. This paper is organized as follows. Firstly it reviews the development of metro in
China and work that has been done by others. Secondly it sums up the current issues in the metro
construction quality control through analyzing the metro quality accidents. Thirdly it reveals the
architecture of the system and the process of construction quality control, and study of the system
in Wuhan metro construction. Finally the paper presents conclusions and future research
directions.
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QUALITY CONTROL DEFECTIONS IN METRO

CONSTRUCTION
ACCIDENT CAUSATION ANALYSIS IN METRO
CONSTRUCTION
Recently, a lot of accidents resulting from many complex reasons happened. Not only did the
accidents harm national assets, but also caused casualties. There are plenty of reasons causing
urban metro accidents, such as urban metro construction in itself did not satisfy requirements with
codes and standards, or existed design defect, construction unreasonable, mismanagement and the
rejected materials. In addition, external factors should also be kept in mind, such as complex
geological, rainfall et al. There are 89 accidents during 2003-2011 by collecting data from the
website of State Administration of Work Safety and Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural
Development of the People’s Republic of China, and reference to Classification Standard for
Enterprise workers casualty (GB6441-1986), a classification statistical figure is drawn, as shown
in Fig.2.

Figure 2: Classification statistics for accidents of under-construction urban metro

As can be seen from the figure, collapse, object strikes and high-altitude falling is the main
accident types in the urban metro construction, accounts for about 66.3% of the total of the
accidents in under-construction urban metro projects. At the same time, the collapse is not only
occurred frequently, but also the highest accident types of average death toll; compare with object
strikes and high-altitude falling, collapse is often accompanied by the destruction of the
engineering structure, engineering delays and severe influence on the surrounding environment.
Therefore, collapse, as a kind of quality accidents, is extremely high-risk during urban metro
construction, and need to draw high attention.
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QUALITY CONTROL DEFECTIONS IN METRO CONSTRUCTION

After a statistical of the cause of the urban metro collapse accidents, it can be classified into
six reasons[16-17]: ① Construction operations are not standardized(42%); ② Unreasonable
structure design(17%); ③Construction commanding mismanagement(17%); ④Supervision is
not in place(4%); ⑤The substandard building materials(8%); ⑥Uneven quality of construction
workers(12%). Obviously, the function of man is the most important. Then after analysis, the
sources of the construction quality accidents are as followed:
1. The quality control demands of the projects are dispersed in national standards, industry
standards, and local norms, as shown in Fig.3. Designers and construction workers have to search
for several standards, which will increases the difficulty of management and workload. What’s
more, the inconsistent of using quality of standards will result in the diversification of
construction operation, and quality issues.

Figure 3: Standards of overall situ reinforced concrete beams

2. In theory, the most important factor in the construction project quality control is the
employee's control [18]. At the same time, it is important to the implementation of the project
participants to share information and accurate communication, and it is also important to set up
perfect supervision mechanism [19-20]. But it has formed the complex network structure by the
subcontract of the projects in China, as shown in Fig.4. And a large number of participants in
each construction process, including chaotic on-site management. Person who should be blamed
for the quality issues can’t be found easily. This means that the responsibility is ambiguous, the
project participants don’t attach enough importance to the control of quality, which will result in
supervision is not in place, construction mismanagement. Moreover, construction personnel are
not in accordance with the requirements of codes and standards due to uneven quality of the
migrant workers, so quality issues for construction operations not standardized occurred
naturally.
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Figure 4: Chaotic project subcontracting system

3. Process quality control is an important content of quality control, and improving process
quality control has great significance for quality control of construction enterprise [21]. Ignore the
control of construction process, only through the quality acceptance of afterwards, will result in
inadequate during the construction process for quality control, and fail to timely detect the hidden
dangers that may affect the quality of construction, also will increase the probability of
procurement of raw materials not meeting the requirements.

METRO CONSTRUCTION QUALITY CONTROL MODEL

BASED ON CIC
Therefore, this paper put forward that using the CIC to solve the issues above -mentioned,
CIC is a abbreviation of “Computer Integration Construction”, Teicholz and Fisher [22] defined
the CIC as: "the CIC is a business process, it can link the different project participants in different
stages, forming a collaborative team of across organizational and the project life cycle." It’s a
system by build a 3D model which is take object-oriented project as the center, and the
comprehensive utilization of the database management system technology, network
communication technology, artificial intelligence technology, dynamic simulation technology and
robotics to set up the CIC technology framework [23]. At the same time, CIC technology can be
used to build computer integrated construction system (CICS). The most important features of
CIC/CICS: ① It can realize information integration, process integration and integrated-
optimization among the main body; ② It can realize one-to-one correspondence relation between
the construction process and standards, specific persons of responsibility. Then according to the
state of the information and mapping relationship in the information flow of construction control
in urban metro to build the system. The entire control process can be divided into four stages:
decomposition and the coding of the project, organization structure and modeling, acquisition and
processing of information and implementation of project management, as shown in Fig.5.
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Figure 5: Process for integration control of project

According to the process for integration quality control in metro construction to establish the
three-dimensional construction control model based on CIC, it is consist of the organization, the
construction process and the product parameters, as shown in Fig.6, its aim is to set the every
control point can have its specific participants and corresponding parameters, made it possible
that the every construction control process can be responsibility to the people, and construction
according to the product parameters in the codes/standards, to achieve a good construction state.

Figure 6: CIC-based 3D construction control model

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ORGANIZATION IN CIC-BASED QUALITY CONTROL MODEL

Dimension 1: Organization. First, knowing exactly what are the participants in metro
projects, the role of the participants, responsible for the matters and specific time period of
participate in the project et al., achieving integrated management among participants, work
content and liability distribution; Second, making it clear and systematic storage for each specific
participants, such as the number of staffs (include age, sex, education et al.), division of labor and
time interval of involved in the project; Third, establishing a logic relationship with the other
dimensions and pre-service training for each type of work, all levels of management to ensure the
quality of personnel; Moreover, according to the project schedule and quality control
requirements to irregular random inspection for each participant, staff, including job satisfaction,
effect of quality control, performance evaluation, level of construction technology and
psychologically healthy condition et al., and application of incentive mechanism to let
participants to do quality control actively for preventing the man-made factors happened which
may cause quality problems. Finally, all of these integrated into the computer.

CONSTRUCTION PROCESS IN CIC-BASED QUALITY

CONTROL MODEL
Dimension 2: Construction process. First, in order to find the key unit projects in metro
construction, it is extreme importance to clear construction process of the entire project and carry
out construction quality risk analysis. Therefore, the determination of the key unit projects can be
based on the quality issues occur frequently in the similar projects for a long time by statistical
analysis; Secondly, it also can be based on the presence of high-risk part of the project due to the
checking of structural design of the projects; Next, it can be based on the demand collected from
the codes/standards. Through expert discussions to confirm the final list of quality control, then
systematic storage. Finally, establish the logic relationship between construction process and
staffs, product parameters, then integrated into the computer.

PRODUCT PARAMETERS IN CIC-BASED QUALITY CONTROL

MODEL
Dimension 3: Product parameters. First, make sure that what are the codes/standards should
be observed in metro construction, what parameters are included in the product. Through a
systematic organization of data, established the relationship between the codes/standards and unit
project to achieve every quality control point has corresponded requirements, preventing quality
issues occurred for operating only with experience; Secondly, according to the requirement of the
codes/standards to make it clear that who should be responsible for the produce, so that different
staffs can be remembered clearly in responsibilities himself to prevent the occurrence of passing
the buck; Moreover, it should be construct with the most authoritative codes/standards when there
are several kinds of codes/standards’ quality requirements for the same product conflict, and in
the standard specification will involve by authority of importance, when the standard
specification requires that the conflict in accordance with the higher authority requires clear;
Finally, establish a clear logical relationship between codes/standards(product parameters) and
staffs, the construction process, then integrated into the computer based on CIC.
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SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT AND APPLICATION

SYSTEM DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT
Metro construction area is wide and it is not easy to management under complicated
circumstances. Moreover, the operating system, running platform of participants may be
different. Therefore, the system should have strong compatibility and convenience, because B/S
is not only has the characteristics of the OA system, but also has other advantages, so it became
the first choice. Next, J2EE platform is more suitable after considering the need of neutrality and
compatibility in the platform. At the same time, Java and Flex can be used across platforms and
has good compatibility for the needs of the project of 3D modeling, so choose a combination of
the Java and Flex. Flex is responsible for the front desk processing and J2EE is responsible for
office platform and the background operation. All of these constitute the technical system of the
system.
The second step is need for the design of the system. First of all, dividing the metro project
into unit projects, while coding each part of the project, the code sequence is that divided the
project from bottom to the upper space, and through coding to identify each sub-segment’s
construction sequence of the urban metro in order to count and apply in the computer, as shown
in Fig.7.

Figure 7: Coding system of urban metro sub-projects

 Vol. 19 [2014], Bund. B 398

Second, focus on the assurance of the requirements of quality control points through
encoding the unit projects of the urban metro projects, because the core of construction process
quality control is the quality control points. Quality control points are focused on control object,
the key parts or weak links to ensure process quality. The structural parts which are constructed
with difficulty, the key processes which affect the quality and the operating construction sequence
can be used as quality control points, it can be selected as shown in the Fig.8.

Figure 8: Determination process of quality control points

After confirmed all of the quality control points, then doing the process control according to
construction sequence and time arrangement. At the same time, make sure that the process control
is crystal clear. Develop detailed node-time of all part’s term of construction time, and time of
quality acceptance. Construction process quality control of all control points are shown in Fig.9.

Figure 9: Quality process control and acceptance

Third, according to the urban metro projects’ design and operating requirements, this article
presents an analysis which is summary of thirty five codes/standards of national, local and
industry in urban metro field. Then set out the dominant and the general items of every control
 Vol. 19 [2014], Bund. B 399

point in detail, including geometric dimensioning, quality requirements, deviation range,

operational requirements and construction methods et al. Ensuring the accuracy, integrity,
scientific and uniqueness of the parameters. At the same time, making the quality responsible
person is corresponding with construction process clearly and keeping record and updated the
information in time. The quality control parameters of the overall casting reinforced concrete
girder are given as an example in Fig.10 below.

Figure 10: Standards of overall cast-in-place reinforced concrete beam

SYSTEM APPLICATION AND VALIDATION

And according to the demand of the quality control points based on the corresponding
control parameters of codes/standards, which can do simply by filling out the quality acceptance
spreadsheet to know the quality of control points is good or bad.
Through the above operation, this paper can compile the digital schedule of the metro
construction process quality control and the check acceptance. It is not only added the encodings
of every part of the metro projects, but also listed the standards and form-filling explanation of
every control point. It makes the quality control during the construction standardizing and
scientifically simply by quality process control and check, and ensures the construction quality in
metro projects. The details are as follows:
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Fill out the construction quality check/record sheets. The input surface of the sheets is
consistent with the manual report, so it is in line with operating habits of the technicians. It’s easy
to learn and use, just input the information according to demand of the sheets. The main
information is consist of the name of the quality control point, the person in charge, the
parameters of the quality control, the approval of the parameters and so on.
Check the integrity of the gathering data to avoid the unscientific data get into the system.
According to the requirements in the metro construction quality control, the data gathering system
will automatically estimate the relationship of the data with the upper and lower specific values
based on the demand of codes/standards, and gives visualized mark (circle means out of the
critical value and triangular means out of requirements). The construction quality analysis surface
could also set a stricter checking range on the basis for the user’s demand.
Through the above operation, it is get all-sided checking results of the quality control points
simply. And based on the results, divide the construction quality statement into six levels,
distinguishing by different colors. Through the use of gray to represent the project of “No
construction”, with purple to represent the project under construction, using blue to represent the
finished project of waiting for acceptance, with yellow to represent the project is accepting, by
red to represent the project did not pass acceptance, and with the green to represent the project
through the acceptance. And all of these are shown in the sub-projects’ coding systems, making it
intuitional and accurate to find the quality issues. We also make the solutions and the key points
of the next construction, preventing the rise of the quality issues.
To sum up, through filling the quality control/check sheets, it can show the construction
quality condition clearly, precisely and scientifically, and solves three issues efficiently. Through
this system, construction quality control can be simple and efficient. And it can control the urban
metro construction quality effectively in Wuhan metro line 4.

CONCLUSIONS
Metro construction quality can’t be controlled by single specific information, technique, or
humans. It requires diverse and systematic information to be integrated by computer technology
as a basic source for management in relation to construction quality control. So the endeavor of
this paper focuses on designing an active control system to provide a practical significance
solution on quality control for metro construction projects. With the development of a CIC-based
system for quality issues early warning and treatment in urban metro construction makes it is
possible to collect specific project information, product parameters based on codes/standards and
measurement data through the spreadsheets of quality control. Then achieving a quick treatment
when there is not conform to the construction control data feedback timely, making it clear and
easy for quality control and confirming the corresponding responsibility of humans. In addition,
clearly define the responsibilities of the participants, increasing process quality control and
standardization construction. Consequently, all the participants can take preventive or corrective
countermeasures collaboratively and quickly through communication and information sharing in
the CIC-based system. Although the application of this system can effectively guarantee the
quality in metro construction, it is equally clear that further research is needed in the following
aspects:
1. This paper only from the angle of the codes/standards for quality control, but it is not
enough comprehensive, no systematic consider the influence of staff, machinery, material and
environmental for construction quality, so it is need to consider these factors in the further
research.
 Vol. 19 [2014], Bund. B 401

2. The system described in this paper is a single quality control system of construction based
on 2D, the system can be extended to an nD system by BIM technology to monitor evolving
quality risk in metro construction.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This research was supported by China 12th five-year scientific supporting project (Grant no.
2012BAK24B01).

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