Determining the Level of Ambiguity and Uncertainty in Transportation Projects Using the Experiences of Large Companies

Managing complex projects is one of the most challenging tasks in the business world. These types of projects require specific approaches for effective management due to the large number of components, diverse stakeholders, complex dependencies, and resource constraints. Despite the widespread use of value-based management in companies, studies that examine the reasons for the differences in complexity are few and mainly focus on environmental and intra-organizational aspects. Using factor analysis, this research concluded that the hierarchical structure of complex projects or the “cube” of complexity in transportation consists of six dimensions (components): socio-political complexity, environmental complexity, organizational complexity, structural complexity, technological complexity, and domain complexity. The fuzzy analytic hierarchy process was used to determine the weights of the components and parameters of project complexity. The results showed that the most determining complexity in the transportation structure was political complexity. The level of complexity is a useful indicator for managers and engineers to assess the level of complexity in transportation projects. Companies can better anticipate potential problems, risks, and uncertainties in complex transportation projects and better plan for construction.