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Construction is repeatedly criticised for its low productivity based on statistical data that do not represent the output of construction adequately. The purpose of this paper is to improve the understanding of construction output – being the numerator in construction productivity calculations – by focussing on changes in quantity of the products, product characteristics and composition of the aggregate rather than as changes in price.

The research design of this study applies statistical data from the national accounts along with data from four paradigmatic case studies of social housing projects covering a period of 50 years.

The results indicate that while construction output prices have increased threefold over the past 50 years, improvements in performance can only explain approximately 20 per cent.

The developed four-step method has demonstrated its value as a means to measure changes in the characteristics of the product, but more studies on the actual figures and results over time and regions are required before solid conclusions can be drawn.

This study has added new knowledge of construction output that supports the development of a more accurate construction statistics, which in turn can assist the design of more effective and evidence-based policies for improving construction productivity.

This paper describes and demonstrates a novel performance-based methodology for addressing changes in the characteristics of the products in a longitudinally perspective, which can potentially provide a better understanding of changes in productivity.

With various challenges in the digital era, stakeholders are expressing growing interests in understanding the impact of emerging and disruptive technologies on freight transportation. This paper provides a systematic literature review of the current state of affairs as well as future trends and aims to support stakeholders' decision-making in logistics management in the era of disruptive technologies.

Several recent and representative articles from academic, industrial and governmental perspectives were investigated to set the scene for this research and to serve as a baseline for electing nine emerging technologies, which were then used to conduct a systematic literature review covering the literature within the area during the past twelve years.

3D printing, artificial intelligence, automated robots, autonomous vehicles, big data analytics, blockchain, drones, electric vehicles and the Internet of Things were identified as the emerging technologies. The current state of existing research and potential future opportunities were analyzed.

Since the potential literature body is almost impossible to fully cover, a tradeoff between the number of emerging technologies and the related literature reviewed has been performed. However, the paper provides a novel approach to select the emerging and disruptive technologies and a systematic literature review to fill the identified research gap in the related literature.

The research support various stakeholders to better capture the current status of and the future opportunities in freight transportation and gain a clearer understanding of the disruptive technologies as well as to guide them in how to deploy these initiatives in future decision-making.

By providing a systematic literature review on the trends, themes and research opportunities in the era of disruptive technologies, the papers bring about broad and comprehensive review on the impact of disruptive technologies on logistics and transportation as well as opportunities to support management decision support in the logistics industry.