The suggestion to make a Chinese translation of Megaprojects and Risk: An Anatomy of Ambition was particularly welcome. The book is about how to plan and deliver megaprojects in ways that secure successful outcomes. Megaprojects are highly risky and often go wrong, even in China. Some have gone...

A major source of risk in project management is inaccurate forecasts of project costs, demand, and other impacts. The paper presents a promising new approach to mitigating such risk based on theories of decision-making under uncertainty, which won the 2002 Nobel Prize in economics. First, the...

Managing large-scale transportation infrastructure projects is difficult due to frequent misinformation about the costs which results in large cost overruns that often threaten the overall project viability. This paper investigates the explanations for cost overruns that are given in the...

"Over budget, over time, over and over again" appears to be an appropriate slogan for large, complex infrastructure projects. This article explains why cost, benefits, and time forecasts for such projects are systematically over-optimistic in the planning phase. The underlying reasons for...

This special issue asks, “Do classics exist in megaproject management?” We identify three types of classics: conventional, Kuhnian, and citation classics. We find that the answer to our question depends on the definition of “classic” employed. First, “citation classics” do exist in...

This paper takes stock of megaproject management, an emerging and hugely costly field of study. First, it answers the question of how large megaprojects are by measuring them in the units mega, giga, and tera, concluding we are presently entering a new "tera era" of trillion-dollar projects....

It is useful to distinguish between “causes” and “root causes” in explaining cost overruns, benefit shortfalls, and delays in major projects. Conventionally, the following are listed as causes of project underperformance in the literature: project complexity, scope changes, technological...

This paper explores how theories of the planning fallacy and the outside view may be used to conduct quality control and due diligence in project management. First, a much-neglected issue in project management is identified, namely that the front-end estimates of costs and benefits -- used in...

A main problem in the decision-making of major infrastructure projects is the high level of misinformation about costs decision-makers face in deciding whether to build the project. Reduced public funds and misallocation thereof were the main reasons for the revival of private financing in...

Megaproject Planning and Management: Essential Readings contains the seminal articles from the growing body of research on megaproject planning and management along with an original introduction by the editor.Bent Flyvbjerg, the leading and most cited authority in the field, has used...