key: cord-0981688-wy3h9azp authors: Araya, Felipe title: Modeling working shifts in construction projects using an agent-based approach to minimize the spread of COVID-19 date: 2021-03-18 journal: nan DOI: 10.1016/j.jobe.2021.102413 sha: 80994621fc15ec182caa607571b9055db4f6c98f doc_id: 981688 cord_uid: wy3h9azp The spread of COVID-19 has modified how we relate with other people and our built environment, changing from in-person to primarily virtual activities. However, some activities are impossible to be virtually performed, such as construction activities. Consequently, the construction industry has been highly impacted by the pandemic due to COVID-19. In response to the impacts of the pandemic, the construction sector must identify alternatives that can minimize the spread of COVID-19 among workers in construction projects. Given this context, this study explores the alternative of managing the workforce of construction projects using multiple working shifts as multiple shifts may reduce construction workers’ density in the field, and with that, reducing the probabilities to spread COVID-19 among workers. This study presents an agent-based modeling approach to assess the impact of using two shifts to reduce the spread of COVID19 among construction workers. The model is supported by data found in the literature to simulate workers’ behavior regarding multiple shifts and by international institutions to simulate the pandemic context through multiple scenarios. This study found that the more workers are assigned to a night shift during a project, the higher the average number of workers classified as healthy (i.e., without COVID-19) is going to be. Namely, by assigning approximately half of the workers involved in a project to a night shift, the average number of healthy workers can be increased by 20% on a project. Quantifying the impact of alternatives that may reduce the spread of COVID-19 among construction workers can incentivize the implementation of such alternatives by construction managers. This study contributes to quantifying the benefits of using multiple working shifts to minimize the spread of COVID-19 among construction workers. • Agent-based modeling approach is used to assess multiple shifts to reduce the spread of When it comes to the literature on construction and COVID-19, recent studies have found that 100 COVID-19 has impacted the construction industry at different levels (Alsharef et a., 2021; Raoufi 101 and Fayek, 2020). These levels can be classified as impacts on the construction field (e.g., safety 102 and health of workers) and impacts outside of the field (e.g., contractual consequences of the 103 pandemic context). Impacts outside of the construction field have been focused on understanding 104 the applicability of the force majeure clause in the current pandemic context (e.g., Casady and 105 Baxter, 2020; Hansen, 2020; Kabiru and Yahaya, 2020). Kabiru and Yahaya (2020) discussed the 106 impact that COVID-19 has had on the Nigerian construction industry. Kabiru and Yahaya (2020) 107 suggested that given the highly disruptive events COVID-19 has placed on the Nigerian 108 construction industry (e.g., by slowing down completion of projects due to social distancing ABM's capacity to focus on the behavior of the individual components of a system, the capacity to 214 include stochasticity of processes, and the capacity to simulate multiple scenarios, make ABM the 215 simulation tool that best fits with the objective of this study, which is to quantify the influence of 216 using multiple shifts in construction projects to minimize the spread of COVID-19. (SME). A researcher with more than ten years of experience, a construction worker and a civil Table 3 The proposed agent-based model simulates the impact of including two shifts to minimize the 385 spread of COVID-19 in a construction project using six scenarios (see Table 4 Scenarios 2 through 6 show the impact of gradually distributing construction workers into two shifts 399 (i.e., day and night). In scenario 2 (Figure 3) , it can be observed that the low peak of the percentage 400 of healthy workers is a bit higher than for scenario 1 and that the average number of healthy 401 workers throughout the project is also higher compared with scenario 1 (Table 4) . When looking at 402 scenarios 3-6 ( Figures 4-7) , it can be observed that as the percentage of construction workers 403 assigned to the night shift increases, both the average percentage of healthy workers and the lowest 404 percentage of healthy workers on the project improve (Table 4) . Moreover, this trend can also be 405 observed in Figures 2 to 6 . Specifically, the best results from a workers' health standpoint were 406 scenarios 5 and 6 ( Figures 6 and 7) , where the percentage of workers assigned to the night shift was 407 40% and 50%, respectively. In these two scenarios, the average percentage of healthy workers and 408 the lowest percentage of healthy workers were roughly 20% higher than in scenario 1 (Table 4) In practicality, this study shows that by using night shifts, the average number of healthy workers 430 during a construction project can be increased by roughly 20% compared with the case in which 431 only one shift is used to develop a construction project. 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