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1. Introduction
Construction projects have been a centre of attention due to many reasons. The construction of pyramids could be considered as the strength of the Egyptian people, Eifel Tower as the symbol of French pride and the construction of Taj Mahal as the gift for an immortal love in India. These magnificent and mighty structures have now become the symbol of pride for the nations; however, there have been many mighty projects, which were constructed on the economic need basis. Amongst these projects are the construction of the Panama Canal in South America and the construction of Palm Diera Island in the Middle East. Both of these two projects are opposite in scope to each other. The Panama Canal project involved excavation whereas the Palm Diera Island project involved reclamation after dredging; the canal was constructed for transportation needs whereas the Palm Diera as the residential place, a mixed-used development project.
Today 14,000 ships to pass through Panama Canal each year and contributes to about 10 per cent of GDP of Panama (World of Information Business Report, 2005). The canal handles 5 per cent of the words trade (Kurtz and Peake, 2009). In the year 2003-2004, it earned US$1 billion (World of Information Business Report, 2005). The canal was first constructed by French team from 1879 to 1888, however, after their failure to complete the American management team came to start constructing it in 1893 and completed it in 1914, within time and budget. The French did not succeed in completing the canal due to deaths of the French managers, engineers, workers and their families. This led to the dissatisfaction of investors and the French public. Finally, the financial dry-up led to the termination of the project (McBridge, 2002). The Americans, on the other hand, were more organized in planning, setting project objectives, supported by the US Government, and resolve to complete the project, which helped achieve the miracle of completing construction of the canal.
The Palm Diea Island project has a design length of 12 km and width of 8.5 km, involves a reclamation of 1,000 million m3 of dredged material (MEED, 2008a), and is considered to be the largest manmade island in the world. The project was put on hold in 2008...