Paradigm shift in construction processes with Industry 4.0

Traditional construction project development processes have greatly evolved in the last two decades. The use of information and communications technology (ICT)-based digital systems suggests that the industry is steadily progressing towards a digitised future. However, the future could witness incrementally unstructured information, generated, shared, manipulated, stored, and archived on diverse digital media platforms. The pillars on which construction projects currently stand comprise visualisation, integration, communication, and intelligence. A typical construction project creates knowledge through pre-construction, execution, and post-construction phases. Bringing all four pillars together and deriving valuable information from the enormous data that is generated throughout the life cycle of the project requires attention. Industry 4.0 demands a paradigm shift from conventional practices, which must take place on many scales including technology, organisation, and policies concerning construction site safety management conservative practices. The issue of data generation, tapping, and data management is central. This research addresses the issue of construction site safety data, its classification, codification capability, and information modelling. The systematic adoption of Industry 4.0 principles for construction site safety management would improve the existing platforms adapted to interpret large volumes and varieties of data, manage, and especially connect them to the existing construction enterprise platforms, allowing the integration of information, processes, knowledge, and stakeholders.