I have a BuildingSMART contact, Brok Howard (he’s @Brokhoward on Twitter), at HOK in the USA, who was looking for some designers’ views on how the UK AEC sector is moving from paper to full digital model delivery.
He asked me about views expressed by speakers at recent conferences (for example, I attended ThinkBIM in Leeds on 9 July, a HP BIM event at the RIBA in London last week, and a Constructing Excellence event on asset management last month), and I thought I would share the “casual, shoot from the hip perspectives” (many of them Twitter soundbites) I quoted….
When do you think the professional standard of care will require design professionals to provide 3D models for all individual scope instead of paper 2D drawings? Full BIM and only models.
- “Project life doesn’t start when you appoint an architect … you need to make a business case first”
- “For those working in the public sector (and private sector clients adopting the UK government BIM approach), it will be 2016.”
- “Defining deliverables at the outset helps you plan your future data needs. … BIM execution starts ‘at the end’, with consideration of the asset’s future use (OpEx)”
- “BIM is not just 3D, or 4D (sequencing) or 5D (cost), but 6D – it includes asset operations.”
- “Our BIM standards are still work in progress. The picture will be clearer by March 2015.”
What are the major challenges design professionals face in this transition?
- “Getting support from the top – if processes fail to get embedded, users soon revert to 2D and workloads grow.”
- “Challenges include a poor understanding of company BIM capabilities, regional differences in these, and continuously developing BIM strategies”
- “Trusting the data is a challenge to some businesses.”
- “Let’s have a single shared project objective. Collaboration is about having the same objective – it’s not a process.”
- “Poor interoperability is a major factor. Autodesk and Bentley don’t help.”
What opportunities do you see opening up when contracts required modeling from everyone on a design team and paper goes away?
- “I know an electrical contractor using BIM because it makes him more productive, not because it’s going to be mandated.”
- “If we give clients great buildings (with data), they can lead future projects that more effectively push the boundaries.”
- “Buildings that are well constructed for ‘business’ productivity will more than offset the costs of FM, BIM.”
- “Nobody is yet handing over asset information upon completion. The real value will be in this data.”
- “In the context of BIM, the ability for us to provide exportable services is one of the main drivers for UK adoption.”
(If you have any more quotable quotes that might help Brok, please add them via the comments.)
