In the architecture, engineering and construction industry, site management during construction is a key phase. Scheduling activities and monitoring their progress allow any deviations from the schedule to be identified so that timely action can be taken. Until now, the monitoring phase has mainly been characterised by inspections in which the construction site manager manually collects data and produces a summary report. This proves to be a time-consuming process and is prone to errors. The authors propose an innovative construction progress monitoring method that combines BIM-based construction scheduling (4D BIM) with periodic geometric surveying using an indoor mobile mapping system (iMMS). Ten surveys were carried out on a real case study, producing point clouds to be compared with the 4D BIM, thereby comparing the as-built with the as-planned. The comparison was carried out using Sitemotion exploiting a custom class, the work breakdown structure (WBS), added to the BIM to associate each element with its scheduled construction date. The results show how the proposed method can effectively support the evaluation of construction progress, allowing the monitoring to be performed digitally and linked to the BIM. The paper details the proposed methodology, highlighting the problems encountered and suggesting adjustments for future implementation.

The state of the art of 3D surveying technologies, if correctly applied, allows to obtain 3D coloured models of large open pit mines using different technologies as terrestrial laser scanner (TLS), with images, combined with UAV based digital photogrammetry. GNSS and/or total station are also currently used to geo reference the model. The University of Brescia has been realised a project to map in 3D an open pit mine located in Botticino, a famous location of marble extraction close to Brescia in North Italy. Terrestrial Laser Scanner 3D point clouds combined with RGB images and digital photogrammetry from UAV have been used to map a large part of the cave. By rigorous and well know procedures a 3D point cloud and mesh model have been obtained using an easy and rigorous approach. After the description of the combined mapping process, the paper describes the innovative process proposed for the daily/weekly update of the model itself. To realize this task a SLAM technology approach is described, using an innovative approach based on an innovative instrument capable to run an automatic localization process and real time on the field change detection analysis.

The paper presents the first part of a research project concerning the creation of 3D terrain models useful to understand landslide movements. Thus, it illustrates the creation process of a multi-source high-resolution Digital Terrain Model (DTM) in very dense vegetated areas obtained by integrating 3D data coming from three sources, starting from long and medium-range Terrestrial Laser Scanner up to a Backpack Indoor Mobile Mapping System. The point clouds are georeferenced by means of RKT GNSS points and automatically filtered using a Cloth Simulation Filter algorithm to separate points belonging to the ground. Those points are interpolated to produce the DTMs which are then mosaicked to obtain a unique multi-resolution DTM that plays a crucial role in the detection and identification of specific geological features otherwise visible. Standard deviation of residuals of the DTM varies from 0.105 m to 0.176 m for Z coordinate, from 0.065 m to 0.300 m for X and from 0.034 m to 0.175 m for Y. The area under investigation belongs to the Municipality of Piuro (SO) and includes both the town and surrounding valley. It was affected by a dramatic landslide in 1618 that destroyed the entire village. Numerous challenges have been faced, caused both by the characteristics of the area and the processed data. The complexity of the case study turns out to be an excellent test bench for the employed technologies, providing the opportunity to precisely identify the needed direction to obtain future promising results.