Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
4th International Civil Engineering & Architecture Conference, Trabzon, Türkiye, 17 - 19 Mayıs 2025, ss.1642-1652, (Tam Metin Bildiri)
Time Cost Trade-Off Problem (TCTP) is an important problem in construction management since its optimum solution minimizes the total project cost. Although there are meta-heuristic and mathematical programming algorithms for the optimization of the problem, optimum or near-optimum solutions can also be obtained with heuristic methods with very few operations and computation. In this study, an spreadsheet application that automatically performs most of the operations and logical tests required for the solution of TCTP with heuristic methods was developed and TCTP was solved with minimal human effort. At the initial stage, the project diagram of the problem was drawn in Activity-On-Arrow type. The nodes of the networks and crashing alternatives are defined to the application. Since the application is coded to have the feature of determining the critical activity with the lowest crashing cost, it offers the most suitable crashing option to the user. If the number of critical paths is more than one, the critical activity with the unit cheapest crashing alternative is accelerated first, but the project duration does not change. However, the number of critical paths drops to one and the cheapest crashing alternative of the remaining critical path is suggested by the application. In this way, although the best solution cannot be guaranteed, the near-optimum solution can be obtained with very little human effort. As a result, the developed spreadsheet application offers a practical and accessible approach for the solution of TCTP by heuristic methods. The created spreadsheet application solves the entire problem again after shifting the crashing modes of the critical activities, which minimizes user mistakes, speeds up decision-making processes and enables projects to achieve cost and time targets more effectively. Although the best solution cannot be guaranteed, the proposed approach stands out as an effective and applicable alternative for engineers when considering the constraints and time pressure encountered in real life.