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The GSA Public Buildings Service swept the 2008 BIM Awards,
winning in 4 categories: Creating Stellar Architecture Using
BIM, Design/Delivery Process Innovation Using BIM,
Outstanding Sustainable Design Using BIM and Support
for Human Use and Innovative Program Requirements Using
BIM.
Charles Matta, FAIA, Director of Federal Buildings and
Modernizations, agreed to share with the TAP Knowledge Community
GSA’s roadmap to BIM success. According to Matta, GSA’s
Public Building Service focused on its business challenges first
and researched how advanced software could contribute to meeting
those challenges.
The initial impetus for a BIM program came in 2003 to ensure
continued success of the Design Excellence Program: a confluence of
designers pushing the envelope coincided with a volatile period in
construction costs with the result that GSA was plagued with cost
and schedule overruns. GSA analyzed the reasons for this situation
and, rather than reining in the design firms, decided to tighten
budget control through BIM technology. The continuation of the
Design Excellence program, supported by BIM technology, is
exemplified in this year’s Creating Stellar Architecture
Using BIM award to the Wayne L. Morse U.S. Courthouse in
Eugene, Oregon, designed by Thom Mayne, FAIA, of Morphosis.
GSA identified the cost overrun problem as a quality control issue:
GSA staffing has shrunk from 42,000 in the 1970s to fewer than
13,000 now. PBS staff is 5,600. Yet PBS owns 1500 buildings and
builds or modernizes approximately 20 per year. Three decades ago,
there were many more PBS staff available to check drawings and
ensure conformance to standards. Today, GSA is looking to automate
checking of building models.
GSA knows that a major cause of cost overruns is that the space
designed exceeds the program. Since 2007 all new projects have been
required to submit a Spatial Program Validation BIM. This
year’s Support for Human Use and Innovative Program
Requirements Using BIM award recognized GSA’s initiative
in automated Circulation Design Validation for U.S. Courts. The
U.S. Courts Design Guide defines occupant-based rules for
U.S. Courthouse circulation design. In the past, GSA validated
circulation design using visual inspection. This process was both
time-consuming and error-prone. By using a Circulation Validation
BIM, GSA will be able to automate the circulation validation
process to ensure that all designs in the Final Concept phase
adhere to the circulation requirements. Two hundred sixteen
circulation rules were extracted from the U.S. Courts Design
Guide and implemented in the validation program.
A second major challenge for the GSA PBS is legislation dealing
with sustainability and high performance of buildings. In some
cases, the solutions necessary to meet these mandates have yet to
be invented. To find the best possible design tools, GSA conducted
energy performance pilot projects that used seven different
building analysis tools related to building energy performance. In
these pilot projects they assessed both the maturity of energy
analysis technology and the interoperability of the specific
software tools. They ran the same analysis in two different
programs and compared results. This thorough and thoughtful
exploration was recognized with the Outstanding Sustainable
Design Using BIM award.
Another area where advanced hardware/ software systems have
improved efficiency and quality is in the capture of existing
conditions building information. GSA’s pioneering work in
laser scanning captured the Design / Delivery Process
Innovation Using BIM award.
GSA avoided the major pitfalls in BIM implementation, which Matta
describes as “trying to do too much and believing that BIM
technology is ready out of the box.” A step GSA took, which
Matta believes to be indispensable, was the developmental of BIM
knowledge and leadership in all its 11 regions. These “BIM
Champions” ensure that, when a BIM deliverable is requested,
the agency is getting what it asked for.
Matta offers this BIM adoption advice to other owners:
- Understand how BIM and related tools can help you achieve your
business mission.
- Establish distributed in-house expertise and proponents
throughout your organization.
- Focus on specific problems and identify real-world
solutions.
- Test those solutions.
- Document shortcomings and best practices.
- Apply to pilots on actual, ongoing projects. These pilots can
be as short as one month.
- When the technology has proven to provide value, share it with
other project teams.
For more on GSA’s BIM initiative, visit www.gsa.gov/bim.
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