I am involved with a construction Company that operates in the Gulf area. The average hotel we have been involved with is about 50 stories high.
On a multinational Team from design to construction it can take a minimum of 36-50 months. Yes time can be cut -- certainly not to 15 days -- but not with the way large developments are currently build. The average rate of floor construction (with a prestressed slab) is 4-7 days, so the absolute minimum time required to get just the structure going will be >57 weeks. The average rate to get a single bath tub approved by the Consultant, Engineer, Client, Finance etc., is normally 3 months. To get a Hotel room approved down to the last fitting, carpets, access systems, IPTV, media hub, lighting, air conditioning and everything co-ordinated is anybody's guess, but again not less than six months.
On the current Project we are just finishing (5 luxury hotels), we have over 100 km of steel piping just for fire protection and chilled water for the air conditioning systems. There are over 50 systems involved, such as data, IPTV, WI-Fi etc. At peak we had over 5000 people working on the Project.
No chance in hell that an up to standard hotel can be finished in 15 days.
Also, they're being slightly disingenuous by omitting the time it took to fabricate all of the various parts that they then assemble on site.
Still, it probably comes down more to standards. I really like this article from the Atlantic comparing Japanese and Chinese methodologies for filling a plane with fuel:
There was an old news article talking about how this Chinese guy started a factory. He had a plot of land, and went out with a contractor, paper pad in hand, roughly drawing the outline of the factory, as well as where the offices were going to be.
Construction started two days later.
No approvals, no drafting, every decision was made on the fly. That's what I call agile.
Agile indeed. It works with software b/c you can change it on the fly. Once you pour concrete and realize you made a mistake you're in for real problems.
I'm sure they'd have change in requirements, but that happens in any project. However, the obvious distinction here is there is no development application, or approvals from government. This is the wild west.
On a multinational Team from design to construction it can take a minimum of 36-50 months. Yes time can be cut -- certainly not to 15 days -- but not with the way large developments are currently build. The average rate of floor construction (with a prestressed slab) is 4-7 days, so the absolute minimum time required to get just the structure going will be >57 weeks. The average rate to get a single bath tub approved by the Consultant, Engineer, Client, Finance etc., is normally 3 months. To get a Hotel room approved down to the last fitting, carpets, access systems, IPTV, media hub, lighting, air conditioning and everything co-ordinated is anybody's guess, but again not less than six months.
On the current Project we are just finishing (5 luxury hotels), we have over 100 km of steel piping just for fire protection and chilled water for the air conditioning systems. There are over 50 systems involved, such as data, IPTV, WI-Fi etc. At peak we had over 5000 people working on the Project.
No chance in hell that an up to standard hotel can be finished in 15 days.