Technology News Gap Filled I want to commend ENR for recent articles on technology, including the Soldier Field 3-D CAD cover story, Steel Sector Plans Paradigm Shift (ENR 4/14 p. 10); the article on the International Alliance for Interoperability (ENR 5/26 p. 14); and the cover story on scheduling software (ENR 5/26 p. 30). ENR is beginning to cover the business use and big-picture aspects of technology with clarity and insight. There is a serious need within the industry for this type of business-oriented technology coverage, written for the field team and the boardroom. Industry-savvy, business-oriented technology coverage is more
Choose Sides I read with interest the article "Project Delivery is Still Evolving" (ENR 6/16 p. 38). I was in the engineering and construction businesses for 28 years, and my biggest problem in providing those services was a consistent lack of adequate and qualified owner representation, or Program Management, as it is now called. So three years ago, when my general contracting business was sold, I founded a new company to exclusively represent owners. One of our main responsibilities is pre-qualifying, hiring, and managing the design and construction firms for each project. Interestingly, we have little competition except from architectural,
Strategy Applied Too Late In response to Jeffrey A. Sells and Timothy P. Cohens article Value EngineeringCutting Corners Can Shortchange Kids , I would like to suggest that these comments are severely critical of a methodology that does improve the value of any product if applied properly (ENR 7/14 p. 55). It has been my experience that, too often, the value engineering team is called into the project too late. That is usually after the expensive design choices have already been made and it is extremely difficult to make changes that would improve value without eliminating some of these expensive
The rain found me yesterday. I was sitting in my kitchen enjoying my morning coffee when the streaming drips reminded me that I had ignored those curling shingles and cracking tar patches on the roof for far too long. So I drove to the local golf shop and bought one of those really nice 64-in.-dia double-shell wind-vented umbrellas. It was expensive, but the salesman told me it was worth the cost because it was the best way to stay dry. Thanks to my fancy new umbrella, I can now stay completely dry as I sit in my kitchen. Okay, Im
Canoe Details We were surprised that your story on the ASCE/MBT National Concrete Canoe Competition did not provide more detail on the competition or on the winning canoe from The University of Wisconsin-Madison (ENR 7/14 p. 20). The American Society of Civil Engineers and Master Builders Inc. formed a partnership 16 years ago to organize and sponsor the National Concrete Canoe Competitions, bringing together teams from colleges and universities across the country that had been participating in regional competitions since the early 1970s. Each year, more than 2,000 engineering students participate in ASCE regional competitions. The competition reaches students who
Look Again To attribute the tragic Maryland garage collapse on a "flawed design-build process" suggests an inadequate understanding of the methodology (ENR 6/16 p. 12). The essence of true design-build delivery is an integrated team approach where all members of the project team are able to exchange and agree to ideas at every phase of the project. Choices on material or process should reflect the collective wisdom of the design-build team and must always embed safety as a prime consideration. Under truly integrated design-build, if a design is to be modified, the team must consider the structural and financial impact.
Value engineering frequently endangers American education. This claim may seem far-fetched, but a strong argument can be made that many common value engineering decisions have harmful effects on school building quality that also adversely impact our childrens learning experience. These days, the term "value engineering" often seems a misnomer when applied to school construction projects. Value engineering is supposed to identify a decision making process where the owner and the design/construction team controls costs while maintaining the buildings long-term value. Unfortunately, construction managers frequently present value engineering choices that shorten school buildings life spans, lead to a higher incidence of
The State of CPM Schedules Your cover story, Critics Can't Find the Logic in Many of Today's CPM Schedules, paints a disheartening picture of the current state of CPM schedules (ENR 5/26 p. 30). It's only 46 years since Morgan Walker and I first worked out CPM for duPont and yet project people are still falling into some of the same scheduling traps warned against during CPM's childhood. The use of features like "leads and lags," "multiple calendars" and "assigned constraints" do provide some levels of schedule flexibility. In practice, their use too often leads to inconsistent schedules and misleading
Team Effort The article "With Lego Logic, Army Engineers Wage Peace One Block at a Time" (ENR 6/9 p. 16) was a super article, but you gave way too much credit to me. The projects vision was that of the V Corps commander, Lt. Gen. William S. Wallace. But the guys who really made it happen were: Lt. Col. Paul Grosskruger, commander of the 94th Engineer Battalion/130th Engineer Brigade; Major Bernie Lindstrom, S3 of the 94th; and Capt. Alex Deraney, commander of the 535th Engineer Company. Lt. Col. Chuck Eassa, G-39 at V Corps, was responsible for pulling together all
Redesign Brings ENR A Fresh New Look All new and still the same. As ENR keeps up with the news every week, it has always kept up with the latest trends in publication design. In this issue and the issues to come, you will find all the content that you always count on ENR to deliver. But underneath our plain brown wrapper, we are putting new thinking in publication design to work to make the magazine more readable and give it a fresh new look. The design was created by New York City-based Shostak Studios, which has done much of