Practice Periodical on Structural Design and Construction

The future success of the construction industry relies heavily on students and emerging professionals obtaining the requisite and desired skills necessary for a career in the field. The path to obtaining a career in the heavy civil sector of the construction industry in particular is not well documented. A number of challenges in obtaining the skills, experience, and career path in the heavy civil sector are presented and discussed from the perspectives of educators, the industry, and students. Primarily, the relationship between the educational and industry sectors is explored, and suggestions for improvement are developed. For students and emerging professionals, information is presented to assist in determining their desired career path and creating a path toward achievement of their career goals. The critical points are for students to determine which route is most interesting and to gain preliminary experience in the field. Lastly, recommendations are extracted to enable better relationships between industry and educational professionals that foster collaboration and continuing education in the heavy civil sector.

With the increased interest in applying integrated forms of project delivery to complex and uncertain construction projects, the building industry has been experiencing an increased demand for integrated project delivery (IPD). With the trend, many empirical studies have examined the collaborative characteristics of IPD and reported that participants must make the necessary transition for its contractual, technological, and cultural requirements. However, little study has been done to investigate relevant education, training, or professional experience that can support the transition. In response, this study used an online survey that was designed to investigate the level and type of education, training, and professional experience of project members and their corresponding level of background knowledge for each IPD requirement. The key survey findings include (1) project members have the highest level of background knowledge on the cultural requirements of IPD, but the lowest level on the technological requirements; (2) the group with more design-build experience has more background knowledge; (3) the group that received an IPD kick-off training has more background knowledge; and (4) having a lean construction class can prepare students for the IPD environment. It is expected that the survey findings will advance the education, training, and levels of background knowledge of IPD participants, which will enhance their IPD experience accordingly.

Working on construction projects can be complicated and challenging. There are many different entities and individuals involved with a project, and no two projects are the same no matter how similar the design may be. Construction engineers today need to be able to competently communicate, address complexities, and team with the different parties that each project possesses. In addition, the construction industry continues to evolve and advance with the use of new technologies, materials, and practices. For new, inexperienced construction engineers to succeed in the construction industry, they need to become well-educated in the core knowledge of construction and engineering as well as understand how to use new technologies and practices effectively and efficiently, such as building information modeling, sustainability, and lean construction. Communicating and working with the entities that construct a project, called subcontractors and trade partners, needs to be as important as learning construction and engineering knowledge and skills. This paper enhances past research on the core elements of construction knowledge that new engineers need to acquire in higher-education programs. These core elements are related to emerging technologies and practices; also, the combination of elements, emerging technologies, and practices then are related to subcontractors and trade partners. The knowledge of construction engineering and emerging technologies and practices will assist inexperienced construction engineers to successfully and effectively communicate and team with subcontractors and trade partners during construction on a daily basis as well as when issues arise.

Lean construction theory proposes a servant leadership model for project organizations in which the individuals who perform the physical work are supported by design engineers and project managers, acknowledging that value is only added in the construction process when materials are converted into improvements. The LastPlanner system of construction task planning and coordination proposes that trade foremen are in the best position to determine task durations, coordinate sequencing, and promise completion commitments. Consistent with lean thinking to involve trades in management, this paper focuses on the importance of specialty trade contractors and their foreman who supervise most of the physical construction work, especially in the commercial construction sector, by investigating the relationship between construction engineering and management education and specialty trade contractors. This paper promotes an increase of employment within specialty trade contractors by bachelor-level, construction engineering and management graduates by bringing attention to the significant opportunities available for students with specialty trade contractors, both as field supervisors and project managers. A survey of 148 construction students at five universities and 60 industry professionals representing 34 specialty trade contractors shows that additional exposure to specialty trade contractors can result in greater employment opportunities within this vital component of the construction industry. This research also reveals that construction management and construction engineering students have an interest in employment with specialty construction firms and that the specialty construction sector desires greater inclusions of academic content related to their work as part of university construction curricula. Furthermore, a road map of improvements is proposed that construction engineering and management programs could follow in order to encourage more of their students to seek future employment within the specialty contractor sector.

The Construction Industry Institute (CII) was established to improve the cost-effectiveness, safety, timeliness, and quality of the construction industry. Through research, more than a quarter of a century after it was chartered, CII has been able to establish 15 best practices and to document their effect in making significant strides to improve the delivery of capital projects in the United States and around the globe. In 2007, CII began an effort to formally expose graduate students to these best practices by developing a graduate-level course taught by industry professionals from CII member companies. After its sixth offering in 2012, more than 800 students distributed across the United States and Canada in multiple universities have learned about CII and about the role that CII’s best practices have played in improving the construction industry. The course has proven itself to be a win-win-win-win for students-faculty-industry-CII. This paper describes the course evolution as well as its significance; it shows positive feedback from the students with respect to the value as perceived by them.

The construction industry is experiencing an array of significant, rapid, and revolutionary changes driven by forces such as globalization, advances in engineering technologies and information systems, sustainability requirements, and the multidisciplinary and complex nature of the problems in the 21st century. These changes require the higher education system to follow and prepare the next generation of professionals for success in the variety of professions supporting the life cycle of the project. Integrating design and construction experience into the typical academic curricula is at the core of this requirement, which gives students the required vision to understand and appreciate the industry, its challenges, and its needs for innovation. This paper presents a number of practical options to bring design and construction experience into the undergraduate level construction engineering and management programs. Some of the options presented in this paper have been widely practiced in major universities or colleges. This study aims at reviewing and summarizing these practices and presenting them through separate guidelines for construction faculty, students, and practitioners. Although the major focus of this paper is on undergraduate education, the presented guidelines can also be adopted for graduate programs. A case study of a successful student engagement in industry practice is also presented, and additional remarks and suggestions are discussed.

Teaching construction project management is a challenging task. This difficulty comes from the fact that students typically lack background information (i.e., project experience) to fully understand how newly introduced materials/concepts relate to real project situations. In fact, the lack of background information to relate new concepts acts as both a motivational and cognitive deterrent. For example, if information cannot be related or linked to existing concepts, it will be located on the periphery of memory as an island independent of all other cognitive processes, and as such will have a very short shelf life. The objective of this paper is to present an educational method that can integrate the vast experience of construction industry professionals into effective teaching practices. Hence, this paper proposes an education approach that is based on (1) presenting a construction method as applied by practicing engineers (i.e., a case study); (2) developing a generalized principle of the concepts (i.e., an abstract representation); and (3) illustrating the concept using its manifestations in situations students can easily relate to (i.e., examples from everyday life). Recent studies have shown that critical thinking can come from linking the concept to personal and not directly relevant experience. This educational approach is illustrated for the earned value (EV) method, a commonly used method for control of construction projects, and supported by an industry practitioner’s data.

The construction industry represents around 5% of the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP). The scores of baby boomers beginning to retire in the engineering and construction industries are taking a lifetime of institutional knowledge with them. This scenario results in a relatively limited supply of experienced personnel. Partnering is one potential solution to overcome this problem. This paper makes the case that advancing the emotional intelligence (EI) of project participants can improve the partnering effort and ultimately result in increased project performance. This improved performance, to some extent, mitigates the effects of the loss of institutional knowledge. This paper introduces a people-based model that holistically illustrates the components and activities necessary to take a construction project from inception to successful completion. The authors also evaluated contractors who have partnered with the Virginia DOT (VDOT) and found that managers of successful projects exhibited high EI scores. Improving the EI of project participants is for the good of the individuals and provides the additional benefit of improved relationships. This paper sheds light on the state of practice of sociopsychological concepts in the construction workplace to create awareness and develop behaviors that promote productive project relationships.

Research spending by the private industry within the construction, engineering, and management domain is notably low. This paper explores the domain of academic–industry alliances, or research centers, which are wholly funded through private sector support. Through semistructured interviews with both industry and academic representatives from three such affiliations, which have been in existence for more than 15 years, critical factors affecting their success and longevity are explored. The interviewees represent academics with more than 10 years of experience in a leading role, or industry members with 10 or more years participating on an advisory board or similar capacity. The issues discussed include the following: consistent characteristics of the academics and programs, which lead to creation of a sustainable model; methods of integrating industry involvement; appropriate research topics; and the opportunities and obstacles of starting an industry research program. The results suggest that successful programs are not built around extremely specific research topics, but have the ability to continue to draw participation with new research questions at the appropriate stages. The engagement of industry should be early in the process to allow industry opportunity to shape the research problem and direction. However, even the industry members noted that the problems should not be immediate issues, but the underlying problems that will improve practice in the long-term. Also important was for faculty to facilitate an environment that allowed open sharing of research ideas and advancements. Industry participants who are not actively engaged, or who attempt to control the research scope, discourage other industry participants from supporting the project and program. Programs that appropriately manage relationships and balance the concerns of the industry experience symbiotic benefits, ranging from an abundance of project data, to consistent funding streams, and the resulting deliverables, graduates, and publications on which they are commonly evaluated.

One of the challenges faced by young academics is to perform industry research in a way that university requirements for academic tenure are fulfilled. This paper provides ideas for assistant professors in the construction disciplines for integrating industry into their research programs. The paper provides insight on connecting with industry, administrative issues to consider in industry research, traits of industry research, and advantages and challenges of industry research. In addition, the paper looks at specific industry research examples and describes the outcomes of this involvement. The final component of the study provides industry's perspective of academic research.

The coordination of mechanical, electrical, plumbing, and fire protection systems involves locating equipment and routing heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning duct, water supply piping, sanitary drainage piping, and electrical conduit and raceway, as well as fire protection systems in a manner that satisfies many different types of constraint. The process has historically been a major challenge for the specialty contractors who fabricate and install these systems. Prior to the development of building information modeling (BIM) technology, the coordination of these building systems involved sequentially comparing and overlaying shop drawings to detect and eliminate spatial and functional interferences between the numerous systems. With BIM, which is able to provide a virtual construction solution where the design (three-dimensional), schedule (four-dimensional), cost (five-dimensional), and life cycle analysis (six-dimensional) can be interlinked, the process has been able to evolve, and the challenges of identifying and resolving physical interferences have been significantly reduced. However, many challenges still remain, and without adequate background and knowledge regarding the functionality of these systems, the likelihood that the results of the process will yield a poorly coordinated system is still high. Factors including systems performance, safety, and constructability must also be taken into account. Lack of knowledge and faulty assumptions often mislead personnel during the process to accepting results produced using BIM technology. This paper describes the development of a meaningful building systems coordination. Exercises for construction engineering and management students were designed in collaboration between academia and industry to enhance awareness and the knowledge required to produce a well-coordinated system.

Capstone courses, where students collaboratively apply their knowledge to solve realistic project challenges, are a common component in many civil engineering programs. The participation of industry partners in these capstone courses is also common. However, the configuration of these courses and the role the industry plays in them vary across the engineering programs, and there is not a clear best practice. This paper describes the experience of a company participating in capstone courses and summarizes the lessons learned.

Because of the negative environmental and social impacts of built environment activities, several rating systems were developed in the last two decades to help professionals evaluate the sustainability of their design and construction decisions. A recent study revealed that industry leaders reported the shortcomings of these rating systems to provide accurate valuation of the return on their green investments. The study suggested the development of new evaluation processes that consider the triple-bottom-line (TBL) aspects (social, environmental, and financial) of project sustainability in a more holistic approach. Accordingly, this paper identifies the gaps between current practices and envisioned TBL-based practices through the following three main tasks: (1) surveying industry professionals to identify their current practices and required skills of sustainable design and construction; (2) surveying a sample of national academic engineering programs to identify current offerings of required sustainability courses; and (3) applying needs assessment to highlight the gaps and needed actions for achieving envisioned practices. It is proposed to implement a top-bottom action plan to develop new TBL-based processes that better inform sustainable/green investors and owners.

The architecture-engineering-construction (AEC) industry faces increasing demands on its projects while budgets appear to be shrinking. Building owners and operators seem to want their buildings to do more for less cost. Although this may seem counterintuitive, it aligns nicely with a sustainable-architecture approach of less is more. Moreover, in a shift from exclusively considering first costs for a project, the AEC industry seems to be moving in the direction of life-cycle cost considerations, furthering the opportunity for a more sustainable built environment. Often sustainable is synonymous with achieving certification [e.g., Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) and Infrastructure Voluntary Evaluation Sustainability Tool (INVEST) certification]. Whereas the authors acknowledge that certification can improve particular aspects of sustainability, it is necessary to take a broader approach and consider economic, environmental, and social dimensions of sustainability. In this paper, the authors explore each of these dimensions and present examples of how the AEC industry can measure, balance, and monetize them.

In today’s architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry, building information modeling (BIM) technologies and practices are making a significant difference in how building projects are delivered. BIM models and tools let stakeholders visualize, simulate, and analyze how a building might behave, perform, or appear—with more precision than ever before. BIM technology and practices are not only improving design and construction processes by delivering projects faster, more cost effectively, and more sustainably, but are also helping BIM professionals by expanding career possibilities within the field. This paper identifies key personnel in AEC industry who are taking advantage of BIM technologies and practices and explains how BIM has enhanced their career paths. The study found that new processes of BIM enhance the careers of existing professionals and create new career paths for young professionals. Until recently, positions like BIM engineer/BIM manager did not exist, but now they are key positions in many companies. BIM is also opening up positions for young engineers in nontraditional industries like manufacturing, energy, media and entertainment, healthcare companies, and facility management.

Building information modeling (BIM) has started to become a common practice in the architectural, engineering, construction, and facilities management (AEC-FM) industry. The benefits of BIM have been recognized in the AEC-FM industry, and numerous design firms and contractors reported benefits of utilizing BIM in their projects. However, the potential of BIM technology to facilitate design-construction collaboration and to reduce the construction coordination costs, schedule, and request for information (RFI)s has not yet been achieved. In current practice, design and construction phases are not well integrated. Conventional practice is to produce a conceptual design based on no particular construction sequence, means, or methods. Construction knowledge must be deployed to support design. In doing so, BIM that is suitable for construction documentation at fabrication level of detail also can be exploited. The term high-definition building information modeling (HIDEF BIM) is used to describe BIM that is detailed and precise enough to create shop drawings directly from the model. Additionally, the use of HIDEF BIM offers the opportunity to examine construction sequence to produce a design that can be less expensive, save time, and be of a higher quality. This paper explores the benefits of utilizing HIDEF BIM and the lessons learned through a case study.

This paper aims to identify the impact of building information modeling (BIM), or Virtual Design and Construction (VDC), technologies on construction education and the architectural, engineering, construction, and facilities management (AEC/FM) industry, as well as the career implications for a person proficient in BIM. To identify the impact of BIM technology, an extensive review of the literature on BIM utilization in higher education and the AEC/FM industry was conducted. In addition, the lessons the authors have learned from years of BIM practices were introduced to further identify the specific benefits and challenges of adopting BIM in construction and engineering management (CEM) education as well as in the AEC/FM industry, for both vertical and horizontal projects. Surveys also were conducted to measure the estimating time contractors would save with a BIM-based estimating strategy compared with a traditional estimating approach. The findings concluded that personal skill sets in BIM have a significant impact on a student’s career opportunities. The authors also emphasize that first and foremost CEM faculties need ubiquitous access to the latest technologies as well as accompanying training to produce confident graduates for the AEC/FM industry, eventually improving students’ career opportunities. It is expected that a BIM-based paradigm shift in the classroom and the AEC/FM industry would be highly achievable when the identified benefits and challenges of BIM adoption are well known to the educational institutions and the AEC/FM industry, followed by the implementation of the recommended approaches in this study.

Design-to-fabrication is an innovative process where the structural engineer of record develops both structural and shop drawings for a project using building information modeling (BIM). This research studies two real-world projects where such a process was applied to the design and installation of concrete reinforcing for the buildings’ foundation and structure. Findings evaluate performance outcomes across two case studies, and compare outcomes to a theoretical baseline estimated by professionals if a standard, design-detail-fabricate process had been applied. Evaluation reveals benefits from design-to-fabrication for both projects. In the case of the federal project, the primary benefit was the ability to start construction a month early and avoid potential liquidated damages. The design-to-fabrication process created several challenges as the result of the out-of-phase delivery of structural and shop drawings to the general contractor. In the case of the medical pavilion, several tangible benefits were directly realized from the implementation of design-to-fabrication, including a streamlined drawing review process and increased accuracy in the shop drawings produced. The contribution of this research is to document, detail, and evaluate the impact of an emerging technological application of BIM on overall building delivery performance.

This paper examines the potential of value engineering (VE) as a problem-solving tool for addressing various challenges in the marine construction industry. Through a review of large numbers of challenging engineering problems in the marine environment, the authors identified various complications caused by dynamic and uncertain marine environments in both the prebid and postbid stages of construction projects. These unexpected challenges required the project team to identify optimal solutions in a comprehensive and efficient manner. In past construction projects, a 10-step approach was designed and used by the authors to identify solutions for unexpected engineering problems. The approach has three limitations: (1) it is an informal and time-consuming process involving possibly redundant communications and coordination; (2) it is not specific and detailed enough to ensure that the optimal solution is in fact considered and selected in a comprehensive and efficient manner; and (3) it does not integrate standard metrics other than the estimated cost that can be used to quantitatively evaluate the performance of a solution in terms of productivity, quality, safety, and environmental impact. This paper first presents the current 10-step process for solving marine construction problems and limitations of this process. The paper then describes the VE seven-step process and highlights how the VE process and the 10-step approach share the same structure. All steps in the VE process can find correspondences in the 10-step process, whereas VE methodology formalizes the value of a solution and quantitative performance metrics to harvest and evaluate ideas from groups of engineers in a more systematic manner. Based on this shared structure, the paper discusses how to augment the 10-step approach with the VE methodology to achieve more comprehensive and efficient problem solving. Using a case study, the authors explain how such augmentation can effectively integrate the knowledge and experience of groups of engineers with diverse backgrounds in marine construction. Finally, the paper suggests future directions for using VE for marine construction projects.

Technological innovation. Lifelong learning. Two forces—continual and interwoven—that not only define the workplace in the 21st century, but also demand that workers in every discipline exhibit a commitment to lifelong learning as a fundamental necessity and ingredient for success. For construction companies, the use of computer estimating programs, building information modeling, the Internet, advanced communications devices, and platforms such as Facebook and Twitter has provided more flexibility and connectivity and a need for continued learning.

Fostering the development of the next generation of construction engineers requires broad input from both industry and academia. The 2014 Construction Engineering Conference (CEC) aimed to bring industry and academic leaders together to recognize emerging challenges in the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry and present ideas for a path forward. The conference papers showed the following three emerging themes: (1) the need for industry-academia integration in the delivery of case-based learning; (2) the role of building information modeling (BIM) in project coordination and construction engineering education; and (3) the increasing need for integrated project teams. This paper summarizes the current state of the AEC industry, trajectory, educational opportunities, and future directions of each theme drawing upon the papers submitted to the 2014 CEC. This aggregation yielded compelling conclusions that the industry is facing an exciting but challenging path forward. Potential methods for achieving success include enhanced collaboration between industry and academia focused on skills needed to adapt to change and increasing project complexity; using BIM and other technologies to support project team integration; and the involvement of multiple disciplines early in project development and in educational activities.

The increasing use of the design-build project delivery method has resulted in it now being one of the most popular nontraditional methods for delivering road, bridge, mass transit, and rail projects in the United States. However, although the use of design-build is widespread, there remains a substantial lack of information about how to effectively plan and implement design management procedures for design-build transportation projects. In particular, transportation agencies lack information about how to shape appropriate design management roles for various contractual parties and to manage design activities for design-build megaprojects. To fill this gap, this paper presents a case study of the SR 99 Bored Tunnel project in Seattle, Washington. It provides detailed information on how the owner, the Washington State DOT (WSDOT), incorporated design management procedures into its requirements and how the design-builder, Seattle Tunnel Partners, implemented them within its project management processes.

The construction industry requires motivated and highly skilled people. The very nature of engineering and construction places an equal or greater requirement on oral and written communication skills, as it does on technical skills. To ensure young engineers are successful in construction, it is crucial that timely feedback and evaluations are provided in an effective and positive manner, which underscores the need for effective communication skills. Feedback should be provided to students and young engineers to inspire motivation, support personal and professional growth, and foster engagement. This paper provides survey and interview results from 13 CH2M HILL interns, two early career CH2M HILL engineering professionals, and 19 Bachelor of Science Construction Engineering graduates from Iowa State University(ISU), and summarizes the critical link between feedback and engagement, both in businesses and universities, to fostering successful career paths in construction. It is suggested that proactive partnerships between industry and academia are necessary to promote and nurture many elements critical to the success of young engineers in the construction industry and related businesses.