Ron reviews design standards, grades, and potential conflicts during the construction staking process.
Design and construction errors that happen on a construction site can be avoided with proper oversight and quality control of the process. A common source of errors is when changes to the original design concept are made “mid-stream” during the design process. A design engineer may inadvertently overlook a necessary revision on one sheet of the construction plans that could cause a conflict with another element of the design. Midwestern Consulting tries to eliminate these types of mistakes by having Ron, a licensed civil engineer, in charge of our construction staking division.
Ron is familiar with local municipality design standards, general engineering principals, and the process of creating a set of construction plans. We utilize Ron’s engineering expertise to review the set of construction plans and make necessary revisions and recommendations while he is preparing the construction staking drawings for our survey crew. It’s a great quality control check to have Ron review design standards, grades, and potential conflicts during the construction staking process.
Quality control is an important value at Midwestern Consulting. Having an experienced civil engineer review a project’s plans while preparing a set of construction staking drawings may add a little cost to the job but Ron helps eliminate errors before they become costly to our clients.
Patrick Hastings, PS, is the manager of Midwestern Consulting’s survey department. Call Pat with your next project at 734.995.0200.
The new Pittsfield Township Costco store would be behind Tyner Furniture
It was only about four years ago that Costco tried to develop on the Washtenaw County Road Commission site in Scio Township. Had that site plan been granted, Costco would have built a store a little bigger than the Lowe’s on the south side of I-94 at Zeeb Road. The Washtenaw County Road Commission would have had a long-term lease revenue stream of approximately $750,000 per year – enough to support an estimated $13-$15 million in road improvement and maintenance bonds. And Scio Township would have realized roughly $9500 in annual property tax revenue.
Now Costco is planning a new store in Pittsfield Township near the Ann Arbor Airport. While site plan approval is far from fait accompli, removing eight industrial buildings to make room for the store will result in a loss of about 140,000 square feet. That should benefit demand for surrounding properties as distribution and service oriented tenants search for space along Ellsworth and State Street. The proposed development probably won’t help the nearby Ann Arbor Research Park as much.
The Miller family, owners of Tyner Furniture which abuts the planned Costco site, will certainly see the value of their real estate investment soar over time. There is room on the site to expand in-line retail space while leaving the furniture store intact. The new Costco project could also spur an interest in redevelopment of the Motel 6 and Cherry Blossom sites near the Ellsworth and State Street intersection.
David Kwan is a development consultant working for Midwestern Consulting. David can be reached at 734.646.7109.
3D building data collected for a previous project generated accurate elevation drawings for a new project and saved the client time and money. Scanning data collected during an initial project can be re-visited to create continued value for the client.
In the spring of 2008, Midwestern Consulting was hired by the historic preservation team of JJR, LLC/HopkinsBurns Design Studio to scan the historic buildings of Fishtown, an active commercial fishing port in Leland, Michigan on the shore of Lake Michigan. Fishtown is also a popular summer destination for vacationers to the area.
The 2008 project was to scan the Fishtown buildings and generate a topographic survey of the site and wire-frame drawings of the buildings for the architectural team. The image below shows the wire-frame drawings on top of the point cloud. The Fishtown Preservation Society and the architects used the drawings to establish building locations and dimensions.
In February 2010, the Fishtown Preservation Society was awarded funding through the National Trust for Historic Preservation from the Jeffris Heartland Fund to finance a Historic Structure Report for the Fishtown buildings and related structures along the Leland River. As part of the project, Midwestern Consulting was again hired to generate new drawings of each building including additional dimensions, detailed elevations, geometric locations, and other fine details. The drawing below shows the north elevation of the Manitou Outfitters building in significant detail.
These tasks were easily accomplished since we already had the data.
Without the initial scan data, we would have had to travel to the site again and do more measurements. That means more time and money spent on the project. With the data in hand, Midwestern was able to give the historic preservation team additional accurate details of Fishtown at a fraction of the cost needed to get the new measurements.
What can trades and design professionals learn from college and university building plans?
Each fall, the Michigan Office of the State Budget invites all of Michigan’s 44 publicly funded community colleges and universities to submit a capital outlay request for state cost participation in new building and renovation projects. Schools submit their list of priority capital outlay projects (often referred to as project “wish lists”) and in December of each year, the Budget Office compiles the projects and sends them to the legislature for debate and possible inclusion in the next fiscal year’s higher education expenditure budget.
Proposed Projects for FY 2011
Listed below are the top priority capital outlay requests for FY 2011 for several SE Michigan schools:
Washtenaw Community College
- Occupational Educational Building Renovations
- Advanced Manufacturing Building
Macomb Community College
- Phase II of Health Science and Technology Building
Oakland Community College
- Orchard Ridge Campus, Building J Upgrades/Renovations
Schoolcraft College
- Simulation Technology Center
Oakland University
Eastern Michigan University
- Strong Hall Renovations
- Integrated Arts, Communication and Applied Technology Village
UM – Flint
- Murchie Science Laboratory Renovation
UM – Ann Arbor
- GG Brown Addition and Renovation
UM – Dearborn (from FY 2010 request)
- Science Building renovation and Computer Information Science Building renovation
What’s in it For Us?
These design and construction projects employ many trades and engineering and architecture professionals. Construction costs for the above projects are estimated to be $439,300,000. Higher education spending is critical for the continued health of Michigan’s economy. Clearly state colleges and universities are looking to renovate and design new science and technology buildings. Higher education appears headed in that direction along with the state of Michigan’s economy.
What this means to trades and professional services providers is that we need to brush up on our qualifications packages for these types of projects. SOQ’s need to be written or improved showing off science and technology projects. We need to show these clients how we can best serve their needs in the design and construction of science and technology buildings.
