Roles and Responsibilities

This chapter summarizes various roles and responsibilities of the parties. The owner should provide adequate funding and time to complete the subsurface exploration program prior to or while the geotechnical baseline report (GBR) is prepared. Under design-bid-build delivery, the design team (geotechnical engineer or engineering geologist, and design engineer) must possess appropriate experience in the type of design and construction involved in preparing and reviewing plans, specifications, and the GBR. The contractor must bid the work with a clear understanding of the GBR information, the contractual baselines, and the anticipated subsurface conditions. The construction manager should be given the opportunity to participate in the review of the GBR during its preparation and in a compatibility check with the other contract documents during GBR finalization. If called upon, the dispute adjudicators must deny the merit of a claim if encountered conditions are shown to be consistent with or less adverse than the conditions described in the GBR.