EXPLORING THE APPLICATION OF CASE-BASED REASONING TO COMPUTER-ASSISTED CONSTRUCTION PLANNING CBR for Construction Planning

Computer-Assisted Construction Planning (CACP) is under development in support of Total Project Systems (TOPS). CACP, as a prototype application, employs a CaseBased Reasoning (CBR) tool, to address the requirements of information retrieval and subsequent reuse for preliminary project planning. The unique aspects of CACP include: 1) a design with respect to an integrated construction management system based on emerging industry information standards (i.e., Industry Alliance for Interoperability), 2) the consideration of quality, organizational, and procurement aspects of planning in addition to time, cost and scope, and 3) the application of CBR to facilitate the re-use of captured planning knowledge. CACP's data structure builds on past efforts of developing data standards within the AEC industry (e.g., ISO STEP and IAI IFCs) and contributes to current efforts with a focus in the construction management domain. With a solid data structure, CACP's planning approach can use organized specialization and aggregation constructs to promote efficient storage and retrieval mechanisms. The CBR tool is then used to guide the user to a past plan that best meets the current project requirements and presents this information for modification to meet all project requirements. The paper briefly describes the data structure and planning approach used and primarily focuses on the application of CBR to achieve a scenario where the re-application of past planning knowledge is possible.