Project Management : Pitfalls Of The 1989 Denver Airport

This whole case was a public administrator’s nightmare for several reasons. As Rubin stresses, the mere fact that a clear budget process wasn’t planned out and executed within the confines of the allocated funds for the project. The only time Boeing addressed the plan in respect to the budget, was when they won the bid for the job and were awarded it. After that, it was more ‘trial and error’.

The Denver International Airport project consists of designing and constructing a new airport, based upon a

The land that was chosen for the Airport site was in Adams County but it lacked infrastructure development. This means DIA will need to create that infrastructure like water, power, and sewage disposal. In turn, this will increase DIA project costs. In the case study from Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling and controlling, Adams County also negotiated an agreement with DIA but it limited DIA “to such businesses as airline maintenance, cargo, small package delivery, and other such airport-related activities” (Kerzner, 2001, p. 643). In both the examples, we see that negative stakeholder involvement was detrimental to

Regardless of the type of project being initiated, planned and implemented, building a culture of risk management is indispensable for the successful completion of the project.

The Walterdale Bridge started construction in Edmonton, Alberta, July 2013 with an estimated completion of fall 2015. The year is now 2016 with a completion date of 2017. The project was first established with a purpose to replace the pre-existing bridge built between 1912 - 1913, which according to the city of Edmonton (2016) is reaching the end of its service life. The Walterdale Bridge will connect the intersection of Queen Elizabeth Park Road and Walterdale Hill on the River’s south side, to the River Valley Road/Rossdale Road/105 street intersection on the north side. By conducting a critical analysis of the project, from the project management perspective and using the project management methodologies as stated in the Project Management Body of Knowledge, this case analysis will analyze the issues, failures, and causes that plague the Walterdale Bridge project.

1. Why don’t information systems projects work out as planned? What causes the differences between the plan and reality?

In the technological risk was that is the customers were involved in design and development of the Boeing 767, they would gain from much greater involution and feedback from users of the aircraft. In the very new airplanes they are first to tested then to implement the designed. These tested approved the safety test in the laboratories and too much used of computer they are useful in techniques. For the last project they learnt many of lessons which are not used in the 767 product airline. This airline is much better than the competition promotes.

*This was a build/design project. The idea of making design decisions after construction was underway is an recipe for catastrophe in a project of this magnitude. The city's insistence that this be held to a tight schedule yet allowing multiple design changes was unfortunate. There were too many players, lots of pressure, and the whole project was run by committee with differing agendas. The project administrators had to balance administrative, political, and social imperatives.

Shared leadership between city of Denver & Consultant team created many inefficiencies, duplicate work and lack of real ownership. Additionally no organizational structure change at DIA was ever made to accommodate this new baggage system project. Further complicating the matter was the communication channels and roles between city, PMT and consultants were not defined or controlled. All were working in silos.

1. How would you describe Boeing’s approach to project management? What are its strengths and weaknesses?

Its operational capacity was severely limited by runway layout; Stapleton had two parallel north-south runways and two additional parallel east-west runways that accommodated only commuter air carriers. Denver’s economy grew and expanded greatly in the early 1980s, consequent to booms in the oil, real estate, and tourism industries. An aging and saturated Stapleton Airport was increasingly seen as a liability that limited the attractiveness of the region to the many businesses that were flocking to it. Delays had become chronic. Neither the north-south nor east-west parallel runways had sufficient lateral separation to accommodate simultaneous parallel arrival streams during poor weather conditions when instrument flight rules were in effect. This lack of runway separation and the layout of Stapleton’s taxiways tended to cause delays during high-traffic periods, even when weather conditions were good. Denver’s geographic location and the growing size of its population and commerce made it an attractive location for airline hubbing operations. At one point, Stapleton had housed four airline hubs, more than any other airport in the United States. In poor weather and during periods of hightraffic volume, however, its limitations disrupted connection schedules that were important to maintaining these operations. A local storm could easily congest air traffic across the entire United States.3

While BAE was already working on United’s baggage system, the PMT recognized the need for a fully integrated baggage-handling system for all of DIA. Since no other airlines were emerging with plans to develop their own baggage system, airport planners and consultants drew up plans for an airport wide baggage-handling system and sent out request for bids to several different companies. Initially BAE declined to bid on the project due to one main reason; the technology required to operate a system of such a large size and complexity should be determined very early in the project life cycle. BAE had the technology that was needed (destination-coded vehicles moving at high speed) but implementing this technology into such a complex project would have required much more time then was available.

From the city of Denver’s perspective, it was an easy choice to award BAE Automated Systems with the contract. The initial project design (as cited in Montealgre et al, 1996, p. 8) did not incorporate an airport-wide baggage system; the city expected the individual airlines, largely consisting of United and Continental Airlines, to build their own systems in their respective concourses as in most other American airports. The city sent out initial requests for bids to take on the first attempt at implementing such a complex baggage system, with not much response. Eventually they had no choice but to approach BAE, whose superior reputation in the field of baggage handling had already motivated United Airlines to contract them to design their baggage handling system. This system was to be implemented in United’s Concourse B without integration with the other concourses (Montealgre et al, 1996, p. 8). In return, BAE offered the city of Denver a proposal to develop the “most complex automated baggage system ever built” (Montealgre et al, 1996, p. 9). The whole DIA project was to be a public works project involving many shareholders with various financial sources and intentions. The main shareholders

1.1 In developing the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, Boeing executive management’s initial decisions and project management strategies did not control the four major measurements of project success: time, budget, performance and client acceptance (Pinto, 2013, pp. 35,36). This report analyses the methodology and project management decisions that led to a project crisis and risk to Boeing’s reputation.

Lack of project management clarity: the planning activity had lot of material but lacked content, clear action items and lack of consensus on the milestones. The difficulties in the project only increased with time and a more performance driven style would have kept things on track if introduced early on.