James J. O’Brien, 91, a co-founder and former CEO and chairman of construction management innovator O’Brien-Kreitzberg & Associates Inc. and an early guru of critical-path method (CPM) construction scheduling, died on Dec. 31 in Yardley, Pa., of natural causes, according to his family.
The firm he formed in 1965 with partner Fred Kreitzberg, became the largest pure CM firm in the U.S. in the 1980s. It honed the CPM approach on projects that ranged from fast-track renovation of San Francisco’s cable car system to program management for redevelopment of New York City’s JFK International Airport.