The Most Effective Civil Site Solutions

Greg Patch, Vice President Site and International Groups, LJA Engineering, Inc.

In my 50 years of development, contracting, and engineering, finding effective civil site solutions still remains a challenge despite our technologies, programs and construction seminars. The old saying that many of the problems we face are overly obvious and the solutions are embarrassingly simple still holds true today. Early in my career I worked in the development arm of a restaurant chain which was opening a store a day and with that came all the issues of managing the development of the construction process. In one instance the foundation plans used in California for seismic activity ended up in the building plans for a restaurant in upper New York where seismic design was not required or needed. During construction, no one questioned the apparent overuse of steel reinforcement. I think all of us have seen the picture of a residential development where a home was built four feet above the street with no means of access into the garage and they even poured the driveway. Over time we all come to realize that common sense, in many instances is not that common. So, what do we do?

First and foremost, you must recognize critical moments in the development and construction process that requires your undivided attention, and these are long before you set foot at the job site. Warren Buffett and Bill Gates both stated that you must provide blocks of time to do your planning and critical thinking, and this is true to have the most effective site solutions. We have all heard the expression there is never enough time to do it right but there is always enough time to do it over. Creating those blocks of time for critical thinking and review is a time saver. The more time you dedicate at the right moments, the more you will save hours, problems and money at the site. If you are always putting out fires, you are not spending your efforts at those critical junctures. So, what are some of the critical moments? Having spent years in the design build construction and development arena it always started with site familiarity and taking time to walk the site with the construction documents. This is that first critical moment and what might surprise you is sadly many architects and engineers have never been to the site. So, your visit may bring out many issues to the surface early on.

Now armed with the site knowledge, block out time to study the site’s civil engineering plans (allow 2 hours or more). Many of the site engineering issues are a result of not connecting the dots. These may include boundary conditions that have not been identified often resulting in the need for retaining walls or grade changes, access points within a building or slab plans that do not reflect on the civil plans, and poor coordination of the plumbing and building plans with the civil drawings.

“Develop the habit to spend time at critical junctures in the process because the problems we face can be overly obvious and the solutions embarrassingly simple”

Uncovering the site issues is in direct proportion to the effort spent. Bear in mind that without this effort most of the site issues rarely have simple remedies. In my region of the country, they pour the building pad followed by the parking lot paving and not until the sidewalk construction starts that the issues are discovered and there is rarely a simple solution to fix it. As a construction manager, I would scour over the plans before I bid them with each trade, which is another critical moment in time which often was a two-day event. I was also insistent with each trade about if you see something missing, I better know now and not after the contract is signed if you want to do more work with me. As an engineer, the best site subcontractors thoroughly review each and every grade, inlet, storm drain, and sewer before any work is started. Many site issues never happen by insisting your subcontractors develop the same critical junctures and devotion to detail. The best developers I work with complete plan review to ad nauseum, but they rarely have major site issues. The fact remains, develop the habit to spend time at critical junctures in the process because the problems we face can be overly obvious and the solutions embarrassingly simple