tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.comments2015-08-11T10:29:25.882-07:00My Strings, Connections and LinksAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comBlogger24125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-63802805314319714912015-08-11T10:29:25.882-07:002015-08-11T10:29:25.882-07:00I've been invited to look at a number of my id...I've been invited to look at a number of my ideas in light of the healthcare delivery system. From my vantage point as a designer and business consultant and past CIO of a small insurance company I'll be rewriting / amending the Design Age posts as I see how healthcare measures up to the needs of their stakeholders. I trust you will find the new series helpful as you continue to work through some of these knotty problems many of us deal with on a daily basis. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-81686334747781347762014-05-31T15:23:43.415-07:002014-05-31T15:23:43.415-07:00John,
The articles you reference have significant...John, <br />The articles you reference have significant impact on larger scale infrastructure projects, which have enormous economic impact on regions over a long time span. I find the Willingness To Pay (WTP) discussion interesting on that scale, but it also may have a similar kind of impact at the individual building scale as well. If you look at an amenities center in a condo project, what is the willingness to pay for different amenities and how does that affect the overall unit values and salability during initial phases and for following resales. By trying different models deriving cost to develop / revenue over a time span a reasonable index for value could help a developer decide which kind of mix could perform best. <br />Point being CBA does not have to be limited to infrastructure scaled projects, but can help decisionmaking at building scales as well. I'd welcome your thoughts on application John. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-44415873913968012502014-05-31T15:05:51.000-07:002014-05-31T15:05:51.000-07:00John,
Thanks for keeping up on this line of think...John, <br />Thanks for keeping up on this line of thinking. I'll review the references and get back to you. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-81560506391929485642014-05-30T06:34:06.883-07:002014-05-30T06:34:06.883-07:00Andrew, I have been posting some research that sho...Andrew, I have been posting some research that should form the basis of "to move beyond guesses to informed decisions."<br /><br />Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) in BIM paper - http://impactinfrastructurellc.com/blog/?p=417<br /><br />CBA-BIM presentation at Globe 2013 - http://impactinfrastructurellc.com/assets/ii_globedeck_v7_03272014.pdf<br /><br />Literature review for using CBA in a GIS context - http://impactinfrastructurellc.com/blog/?p=548<br /><br />Linking the willingness to pay CAB concept with BIM - http://impactinfrastructurellc.com/blog/?p=643<br /><br />Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15387459025023520862noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-72513400972300587362014-02-28T09:34:48.636-07:002014-02-28T09:34:48.636-07:00John, thanks for the comments. I'm looking for...John, thanks for the comments. I'm looking forward to the additional content you will have to add to the discussion. AndrewAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-63849826878063953142014-02-28T06:55:14.799-07:002014-02-28T06:55:14.799-07:00We at Impact Infrastructure have been thinking alo...We at Impact Infrastructure have been thinking along similar lines. I have published some ealy work on our blog and am compiling the information into a more polished paper that should be ready to share soon. In the meantime my early thinking is here: http://impactinfrastructurellc.com/blog/?p=368. Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15387459025023520862noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-60704684310013814212014-01-17T10:17:55.417-07:002014-01-17T10:17:55.417-07:00Putting a radio and a couple of lamps on timers no... Putting a radio and a couple of lamps on timers no longer keeps the boogie man away, I fear. Hopefully we can use grid power to build home-grown power gathering/storage systems, with perhaps at most "neighborhood sized" micro grids. Of course that would require my actually knowing and trusting my neighbors! Not there yet....pjarmstronghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05669764972817177868noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-63310646908851582242014-01-17T08:04:05.505-07:002014-01-17T08:04:05.505-07:00I'm not so worried about the power company usi...I'm not so worried about the power company using the device to shut my house down as I am about the data being hacked to gain access to information about how my activity patterns evolve and use that for other invasive purposes. <br />As to the power company cutting back your power, they can already do that with the smart meters that monitor your daily usage where they are installed and the balancing control software is installed in their distribution network. They don't need Nest for that.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-69593207533845994022014-01-14T09:09:00.134-07:002014-01-14T09:09:00.134-07:00I hope all my neighbors get one!! But seriously, ...I hope all my neighbors get one!! But seriously, having some Dark Overlord shut down my electric oven to avoid a brown/black-out is better than the power grid going down completely.pjarmstronghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05669764972817177868noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-69421494735445027632013-11-13T16:12:07.545-07:002013-11-13T16:12:07.545-07:00If we could just get Phoenicians to stop watering ...If we could just get Phoenicians to stop watering their lawns, it would go a loooong way....Erikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05930332092459194929noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-81652401954957967182013-08-05T11:19:29.274-07:002013-08-05T11:19:29.274-07:00Andrew,
As an F1 fan, I applaud Peter van Manen o...Andrew,<br /><br />As an F1 fan, I applaud Peter van Manen of Mclaren electronics and his discussion of applying real time data acquisition to pediatric wards. F1 is a performance contest driven by hundredths of a second. Teams are able to invest in real time data acquisition because the alternative is lost time and position on the race track. Building owners do not compete in a similar climate. In general buildings are a passive system of components that silently perform until they fail. Convincing an owner to invest in real time building component data reporting would have to show some ROI that justifies the investment. Power consumption and production monitoring capability are offered with many current HVAC systems. Adding additional reporting capabilities for the remaining building components is a long term goal that can be achieved, but currently offers diminishing returns to the owner. F1 and babies are extremely time sensitive, buildings not so much.<br /><br />Bruce WilliamsAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-51090696288900518832013-03-29T17:49:48.129-07:002013-03-29T17:49:48.129-07:00Andrew, I think that ever 20 or 30 years, somethin...Andrew, I think that ever 20 or 30 years, something comes along in construction, that more or less defines the landscape for what professionals are asked to do for their working lives - and bearing in mind, that relative to the longevity of the working lives of many professional - the results of their activities, and their thinking lasts around for a lot longer. <br /><br />I am much too young to remember this, but a professional here in Ireland commented in a key note not so long ago, that the thing that defined his early working life, was the coming of the metric system in construction. <br /><br />I am of a different generation, but it is still 20 years now, since I was a young teenager, taking my first classes at architecture school in Ireland. Back then, the big bang, were the building regulations of 1991 that had just come in. <br /><br />It is worth mentioning, that the building regulations were only a set of paragraphs, put down in legal speak, that were required to be interpreted by professionals. That is, there was flexibility inherent in how the regulations had to be complied with. <br /><br />However, to make things a little easier, the department of the Environment introduced a set of 'guidelines', that one could purchase from the government publications office. Those were the technical guidance documents. <br /><br />Very soon, the professionals who were meant to be present in the system, in order to translate the concise wording of the actual regulations, into real interpretations in real projects - began to reference the technical guidance documents - and soon the construction supply chain in Ireland became convinced that the TGD's were the 'regs'. <br /><br />Which is not the case. <br /><br />There was one particular instance, I do recall, where one of the TGD's showed a wheelchair user beside a light switch, and a dimension of 1200mm shown to the centre of the light switch. <br /><br />I worked for a development company in Ireland, and we had completed construction of 1500 new apartment units in Dublin city. <br /><br />The architects showed up on site one day, and requested that all light switches be moved down approximately two inches, because they were 1200mm to the bottom of the light switch, and not to the centre of the light switch. <br /><br />'It said so in the regulations'. <br /><br />However, it didn't say anything like that in the regulations. Instead of making an honest assessment of the situation, as required by the professional, in the actual regulations (not the TGD's), instead the professionals out of sheer laziness began to use the TGD's as a club, with which to hammer the Contractors and trades with. <br /><br />The TGD's refer the professionals, in their bibliographies to relevant British or European Standards, to which professionals are supposed to go, in order to gain a more complete understanding of the technicalities involved. <br /><br />But the problem appears to be, that when regulatory bodies do try to be 'good', and publish things - it only has the impact, that it moves professionals who ought to study relevant codes of practice - one more step away from that, and one more step towards a very hostile, zero sum game vis-a-vis Contractors and trades persons who have to carry out work. <br /><br />The technical guidance documents, had been intended for use by small practitioners involved in small works, who may have needed a guide in regards to basic small problems that they may encounter. <br /><br />But it was a far extreme from that, when you had the largest consultant firms in Ireland, making copy and paste judgements based on guidance documents, on multi-million euro developments - without bothering to go and actually consult with relevant standards and codes. <br /><br />Sometimes, the regulators would be better had they NOT made things so easy for large consultants, who really should be investing more effort into their interpretations of the simple legal paragraphs, which the regulations actually are. Brian O' Hanlonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09185216066875647495noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-82996061437727003742013-02-15T11:35:20.824-07:002013-02-15T11:35:20.824-07:00One interesting pandemic, that had spread outward ...One interesting pandemic, that had spread outward from construction and the architectural profession from the late 1960s onwards, can be traced back now to international meetings and conferences, such as the one documented in (Moore, 1970).<br /><br />The pandemic began in the rainforest environment of the construction industry which was being ripped apart in post WWII America, and it later spread outward finding an intermediary host in the new software industry that was being born in the 1970s. New ideas about how to use programming language, latched on to thinking which had been nurtured in the architectural profession.<br /><br />Nowadays, we are likely to see architects who were original hosts of the pandemic, such as Christopher Alexander, Stewart Brand or Nicholas Negroponte, being cited in modern academic writing about software or social networking, and not so much in anything construction related. The ideas and contributions to that ground breaking 1968 conference in Massachusetts, by Frank Duffy, John Chris Jones, Chuck Eastman, Horst Rittel and so on, found the most fertile soil outside of the construction industry.<br /><br />What we are witnessing with BIM, is that same pandemic which started in construction in the post war years, and which spent so much of its life outside, is being re-introduced back into construction gradually, in the 2010s.<br /><br />The idea I am getting at, is that the pandemic could not sustain itself within construction in the later half of the 20th century. It had to find a better host to survive for those intervening decades. But it is essentially the same set of ideas that were incubated in architecture and construction many years ago, which are now coming back home.<br /><br />The same is witnessed with Lean manufacture in Japan nowadays, where plants which became under productive in the last few decades, are re-introducing ideas about Lean organisation (from north America to Japan, rather than the other way around).<br /><br />Work cited:<br />Moore, G. T. (1970). Emerging Methods in Environmental Design and Planning. Proceedings of the Design Methods group, First International Conference, Cambridge, MA, June 1968. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Brian O' Hanlonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09185216066875647495noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-4512290773908740002013-02-15T11:34:09.775-07:002013-02-15T11:34:09.775-07:00Andrew, I wrote a couple of thoughts today about i...Andrew, I wrote a couple of thoughts today about ideas, and how they pass between different continents, different industries and different decades. I think it ties together in some way, with the notion of re-using skills obtained in one industry, to benefit in another. <br /><br />First, some theoretical background.<br /><br />Many commentators speak about a construction 'Industry'. <br /><br />Industry I find, is too high a level to use to think about things such as BIM technology and collaboration in a useful way. Industries are hard to move. Usually they don’t move or manage to overcome their own inertia. Normally, what has happened when ‘movement’ finally happens, is that some foreign body has arrived into the environment that creates havoc on some level.<br /><br />I.e. Like a virus, a mutation, an un-welcomed species or cultural wave (British punk rock??).<br /><br />(Quammen, 2012) is a highly recommended read to expand one’s thoughts on this. The text looks at how modern pandemics really operate, and how the various strands of viruses etc exist dormant in certain species for a long, long time until they somehow ‘spill over’ to a new accelerator host.<br /><br />What (Quammen, 2012) describes is the destruction an existing intact habitat by human beings, which leads to the pandemic jumping from the thousands of years old host, to some intermediary, and then to the much larger host, of the human population. (Quammen, 2012) compares it to the pandemic having ‘won the host sweepstakes’, in terms of opportunity for expansion, mutation and multiplication.<br /><br />In terms of construction professions, the pandemic of collaboration (and from there, to greater adoption of BIM for instance), will probably be found in one of those ancient rainforests, where it has lied dormant for centuries. When one of those environments becomes disrupted (one of the major professions), the species will spill over and expand outward to the rest of the industry.<br /><br />This is essentially what we saw with Lean manufacture, from its emergence of the rubble of the post-WWII Japanese host environment, to its spread into the north American continent (via intermediaries, a few book translations and individual carriers), followed by its spread into mainstream 21st century management culture.<br /><br />It jumped from manufacture to construction, and today Lean is now jumping from ‘Construction’ into ‘Design’ in a latest mutation.<br /><br />Works Cited<br />Quammen, D. (2012). Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic . New York: W. W. Norton & Company.Brian O' Hanlonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09185216066875647495noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-24874645819826600172013-01-02T02:55:53.084-07:002013-01-02T02:55:53.084-07:00Andrew,
Something that Ralph Montague commented o...Andrew, <br />Something that Ralph Montague commented on, on CITA BIM LinkedIn group a while back. Very nice diagrams in Laura Lee's report for South Australia state. The download link is a bit slow, but it works. <br /><br />Lee, L. (February 2011). An Integrated Design Strategy for South Australia: Building the Future. Adelaide: Department of the Premier and Cabinet, State of South Australia.<br /><br />Regards, <br />Brian O' Hanlon<br /><br />Ralph wrote (3 months ago), <br />Professor Laura Lee, author of “An Integrated Design Strategy for South Australia - Building the Future”, addressed the RIAI conference in RDS Dublin yesterday. <br />See a copy of the report here: <br />http://www.thinkers.sa.gov.au/lib/pdf/LLreport.pdf Brian O' Hanlonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09185216066875647495noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-45479046655008959012012-07-27T06:08:01.704-07:002012-07-27T06:08:01.704-07:00Its always great to take a moment and understand t...Its always great to take a moment and understand the process we're managing. While a young man - I would walk up the Highrises I managed floor by floor - After the first few floors I noticed I sudenly had more time to look at each floor (out of wind) and started to visit and learn a lot from the craftsmen. It was amazing how problems, logistics and efficiency improved as both I and the workers discussed the process on the way up. Any excuse to walk the project is a great ideaAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-36254297019122724942012-06-26T07:42:35.779-07:002012-06-26T07:42:35.779-07:00Nick,
Thanks for the reply. Our conversation isn&...Nick, <br />Thanks for the reply. Our conversation isn't focused so much on related data as to the metrics regarding performance/use of BIM as a contributor to the overall process. The use of COBIE as an interface would be closer to what we are referring to than the data directly related to the project housed in COBIE. I hope that helps others frame the discussion as it was intended.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-12162681147561574162012-06-26T03:05:13.496-07:002012-06-26T03:05:13.496-07:00Metrics are already been applied to COBie as the k...Metrics are already been applied to COBie as the key data deliverable in US and UK design and construction projects. Metrics measure the likely utility and completeness and accuracy of the information provided. We will also soon be assessing 'continuity' between data deliverables, as assessment of changes and deltas are also important to the client.Nick Nisbethttp://www.aec3.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-52640922636427988872012-06-01T12:58:19.772-07:002012-06-01T12:58:19.772-07:00Thanks, friend. aaThanks, friend. aaAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-92178500622669725762012-06-01T10:52:13.129-07:002012-06-01T10:52:13.129-07:00Another well done post. Keep 'em coming.Another well done post. Keep 'em coming.Erikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05930332092459194929noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-33058593597772867992012-05-27T01:40:43.456-07:002012-05-27T01:40:43.456-07:00Anonymous, thanks for the compliment. Continue to ...Anonymous, thanks for the compliment. Continue to watch for more on this topic in the future.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-66629514002132205912012-05-15T04:17:14.649-07:002012-05-15T04:17:14.649-07:00I quite agree "Collaboration is the Glue of S...I quite agree "Collaboration is the Glue of Success" Yes crowd colud be deceptive but a reflective mind can derive creative pleasure from it. Nations of the today's world had harnessed the beauty of crowd, China for instance. My commendation to Andrew Abernathy -A thoughtful piece [Design Age]Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-29491581651419339482012-04-16T23:21:27.281-07:002012-04-16T23:21:27.281-07:00Hey man, feel free to write on it yourself. I know...Hey man, feel free to write on it yourself. I know you will have your own turn of phrase on this.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04859435693999265491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7153562463600056232.post-41693401872211988612012-04-13T08:19:29.211-07:002012-04-13T08:19:29.211-07:00Darn, ya scooped me. :) Awesome possibilities he...Darn, ya scooped me. :) Awesome possibilities here.Erikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05930332092459194929noreply@blogger.com