Virginia Tech Land Development Design Initiative

Contract Specifications

2009-03-03T08:50:00.001-05:00

Specifications:

Hey guys, it’s been a while. Let me fill you in on what I’ve been working on recently. I’ve been writing a report (as it turns out, they’re just like the ones you write in college) and I’ve been dealing with specs. If you are like I was in college, you’ve heard of specs but you most likely have no idea exactly what they are. Let me fill you in. Specs are the controlling documents for a job. The specs include the general contract documents that are the same for every job, scope of work, any additional clauses to the contract documents that are specific to the job, and the specifications on what products can be used and should be used. The specs are where the contractor can refer to if he/she has any questions about how something should be constructed. Until next time, enjoy your spring break.

Ryan

Pictures!

2008-12-08T11:06:00.001-05:00

Hey guys,

Here’s an update on what I’ve been doing lately: taking pictures. Now, I know you may be asking yourself, “What’s a civil engineer doing taking pictures?” You’re not alone. I had no idea why I was taking pictures either when I was first given the task. It’s only now, that I’m done, that I realize that pictures are an invaluable resource when it comes to analyzing a site. The pictures I was taking were of existing conditions, so that we know what’s on our site and what might be standing in our way. As it turns out, it’s not easy to put a sanitary sewer line in someone’s backyard if a building is there. That’s where the pictures came into play. They gave me the most update information about the site and all I had to do was take short notes about what I saw and match them with the picture. This helps you remember information about the site later on when you come back to work on the project. My suggestion to you is take as many pictures as possible and take good notes. I took aerial photographs from a local GIS website and wrote down my location and the direction I was looking when I took the picture. Now, go take pictures.

Ryan

Site Impact

2008-09-29T13:50:00.001-04:00

How ‘bout them Hokies? Heart attack kids huh? I think the football team enjoys making everyone squirm nervously in their seats near the end of our games. We got the “W” and that’s all that matters right? Wrong.

Land development, just as in football, has impacts and consequences on the entire site and surrounding sites as the project progresses. These are impacts that you have to be aware of so that you may minimize them. You must consider water runoff, pollutant runoff, site disturbance, etc. Just as you have to minimize penalties and turnovers in a football game to win, you have to minimize the environmental impacts from your site design. I challenge you to minimize impervious areas, steep slopes, and unnecessary development for your sites as you go through your LMs. Consider using smaller road widths or excluding curb and gutters where applicable in your design. Add green-space for a park or recreational area or even use a decorative pond/water garden as your water runoff storage.

From Student to Engineer

2008-09-10T12:03:00.001-04:00

Hey Guys,

First, I want to welcome you back to a new school year and wish you all the best of luck. If you are reading this, I’d like to thank you for taking a look at the LDDI website and I hope that you’ll frequent the website often.

I’d like to tell you a little about myself as we’ll be spending at least a year together here. My name is Ryan Kincer and I graduated from the Via Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering this past spring. I am now a project engineer at Mattern and Craig, Inc., which is based out of Roanoke, Virginia, in the civil engineering department.

As a student, I was always nervous about finding a job. Once I was hired, I was nervous about the adjustments I would have to make from being a full-time student to a full-time employee in the “real world.” Luckily, everyone at Mattern and Craig made it very easy on me to adjust to everything. One of the biggest adjustments that I had to make was the new schedule. Instead of going to class every day, it’s going to work every day from 8-5; with that being said, there aren’t any tests or homework assignments which is awesome. I still have deadlines when projects are due but the timeline is much greater than when I was in school. Another major adjustment I had to make was the company drafting standards that were in place. For example, at school when homework was due in Civil3D there wasn’t a structure for what items in the drawing needed to go on what layer; at work it’s completely opposite in that some organizations won’t even accept some plans if they don’t adhere to their guidelines.

One of the challenges I faced as being a new employee was getting to know everyone and how they function. Everyone here is different; just as everyone at school came from a different background, so has everyone here AND there is a wider range of ages. So getting to know everyone, while still performing on the job, has proven itself challenging yet fun and interesting. The biggest lesson I’ve learned is that team work is essential. We all have to rely on each other in order to be successful. I discovered this at school through group assignments but it is heavily reinforced at my job. Creating a cohesive team and knowing each personality lessens the challenges of the work day.

I hope that you all have an awesome semester and do well in your classes. Don’t forget, I was in your seat only 6 months ago so if you have any questions or if there are any topics that you would like to dicsuss, please feel free to contact me at rpkincer@matternandcraig.com and I will put up a post.

Communicate!

2007-10-31T07:46:00.001-04:00

I'm fortunate enough right now to be working on a few jobs that involve more than one civil engineering firm. Most projects require coordination with the obvious parties - owner, developer, architect, etc. - but adding more than one engineer to the mix really emphasizes the importance of open communication. And, if everyone communicates, there really is a big upside to these large design teams.

The clear advantage to employing multiple engineers is timing. I think the old saying is, "Many hands makes light work," and the lighter the workload the faster it gets done. The faster it gets done, the more money everyone makes. Time is money, simple as that. But keeping it simple (and profitable) requires some level of precision and coordination between the teams. If we're working on a site plan, my design may be dependent on your design, my submittal dependent on your submittal, my plan approval dependent on your plan approval. If you make a change, or find you'll be delayed for any reason, you have to let me know. And you should expect the same from me. That communication is what keeps projects on schedule and budget. Good or bad news, everyone needs to stay informed.

My experience working with large design teams has been pretty positive, and I attribute that to the open lines of communication (and lots of meetings). Engineers are drilled on team work the minute they set foot on campus, and it's not without reason.

On a completely unrelated note, I have to say how impressed I was with Lane Stadium last Thursday night for the BC game. I watched from my couch, and that's the loudest I've ever heard that place on a TV broadcast, bad weather and all. Wish I could have been there, and I wish the outcome were different. Lets hope we turn things around this Thursday night.

Strategy Change

2007-09-20T17:33:00.000-04:00

The Civil Engineering profession is ever changing, and to keep up with the industry and the competition we've got to be flexible. As the demand for residential site development has (for lack of a better word) slowed, the commercial market has steadily picked up and filled that part of my work week that was condos and town homes. That's not to say that all residential development has ceased, but you get my point. From hotels to restaurants to business centers and retail stores, commercial sites are showing up all over and it's caused the adaptation of the business, engineering, and sales strategies to keep up.

I welcome the change. It keeps me from getting too comfortable with one practice or design standard. It's forced me to learn new design tactics as well as become familiar with other parts of the state and local codes. Change keeps things interesting.

Most importantly, the added experience and exposure can only help down the road. The more I learn now the more valuable I am to my employer. Keep that in mind while your choosing classes, too. I know there are templates and course selection guidelines, but it's not all set in stone. Take a class that YOU think will help YOU in the future. Today's decisions are tomorrow's results, right?

Go Hokies.

The Intern Experience

2007-08-20T07:45:00.000-04:00

Welcome back students. With August comes the end of the Summer and the beginning of a new school year (and FOOTBALL SEASON). Hopefully your time away from the classroom - if, in fact, you were away from the classroom - was time well spent. For me, time well spent during the Summer means staying productive, despite all the obvious distractions.

Each of the past 3 Summers we've had the help of a few interns who have exceeded expectations (not surprisingly, each of the interns has been a VT student, which means expectations are already high before they're even put to work) and have been a great asset to the work environment. Interns that I've worked with have done everything from Q/C plan review to lot grading to storm and sanitary sewer design. They've attended meetings with me (and in some cases, FOR me), and I've been able to introduce them to some aspects of land development that maybe he or she was unfamiliar with.

This kind of positive experience benefits everyone involved. As an intern you've got the opportunity to test the waters a little, maybe find out if this is the direction you want to go with your education and your eventual career. You get to test your skills as an engineer, and apply what you've learned in the classroom to real-world situations. You get to test and hone your communication skills. And, if you're lucky, you've found permanent employment once you've got that diploma in hand.

From an employer standpoint, I can say that a productive intern makes it easier to distribute work, which makes it easier to get more done in less time, which makes clients happy, which means we make money! Having responsible, knowledgeable help for the Summer is great for business, and it doesn't hurt to add someone else to my own contact list knowing that he or she could be a great addition to my office when the next Summer comes along or, even better, when they're ready to join the full-time work force.

I hope some of you had the opportunity to work this Summer. Any positive (or negative) experiences to share? Maybe some things you learned that you'll take back to the classroom this semester? Or tips for fellow classmates seeking out internships? Questions or comments, voice 'em.

Good luck with the first round of classes.

Summertime

2007-05-15T14:08:00.000-04:00

First of all, congrats to the Class of 2007! Commencement is an exciting day, albeit tough for those of you leaving the friendly confines of Blacksburg behind. For those of you heading out into the work force, where is your career taking you? Down the path you had envisioned when you first arrived at VT? Or the complete opposite? What steered you in that direction? And what advice would you leave behind for those soon to be entering the job search process?

I ask because, as I meet recent graduates and new engineers, I recall the process I went through during my final semester at Tech. Everyone has a different strategy in seeking out potential employers and exposing themselves to the job market as much as possible. But come Career Fair week, or end-of-semester time, you need something to separate yourself (and your resume) from the stacks of applications the employers will be sifting through when they've got a spot to fill. For me the most valuable section of my resume was prior experience. Don't get me wrong, your coursework is important and it makes for a great foundation. But you can't teach real world experience in a classroom. Internships and/or co-ops are a great way to start networking, and to test out your area of study, to see if civil engineering is the direction you want to head with the rest of your education and eventual career (and, of course, you'll inevitably find that civil engineering is the greatest profession known to man).

The land development industry is as dynamic as almost any engineering line of work and it has the potential to put to use any and all areas of study in a civil engineering curriculum. Couple that with urban sprawl and the booming construction industry and you've got countless opportunities to gain valuable real world experience, expand your contact list, test the professional waters, and put to the test all that hard work in the classroom.

My Condolences

2007-04-17T07:46:00.000-04:00

Yesterday changed everything. I wanted to write something engineering-related, or industry-related, but now seems neither the time nor the place. Watching the story unfold yesterday was horrifying for me, and I am watching from a distance, from the comfort of my own office or home. I cannot, nor will I attempt to, comprehend what the student body is going through today, and it is for that reason that I offer my thoughts and condolences to the families and friends of those injured or lost yesterday. As the campus attempts to piece everything together, and as reality sets in, understand that the well wishes extend far beyond the Blacksburg limits, and far beyond this blog. Virginia Tech is a proud, strong university, with an equally proud and strong alumni, and today that community mourns the loss of some of it's own.

My deepest sympathy, love, and support go out to the campus, friends, family, the City of Blacksburg, and the far-reaching alumni. Stand tall, and be proud of your school. You are all in my thoughts.

Stormwater Management/Best Management Practices

2007-03-26T16:11:00.000-04:00

For the most part, people take for granted the measures we as civil engineers take to ensure a that rain shower or downpour, or even melting snow doesn't affect daily public life. And, for a long time, storm water management design was pretty simple - design a detention pond, make sure what goes out is less than what goes in, etc. (I'm leaving a few important steps out, but bear with me...). Communities were planned AROUND storm water management facilities. Developers knew this, and engineers accepted it. But since I graduated from VT in 2004 and started my trek into the land development industry, much of the theory around storm water management has changed. In my 2½ years as a self-proclaimed professional, county requirements in and around Northern Virginia (the same is true outside of VA, especially Maryland, but I've got no experience with other states and can't speak for their requirements) have placed a heavy focus on Low Impact Development, or LID. The idea driving LID is to provide storm water management and best management practices (SWM/BMP) in a facility or series of facilities that results in less adverse environmental impact and can be incorporated with the site development. The theory behind LID is great, and I think in it we are seeing the present and future of SWM/BMP. However, one glaring problem remains - lack of experience with these measures. This is not only true from an engineering design standpoint, but for contractors and county reviewers as well. The very first subdivision I designed was to include two bio-retention filters on site - no detention pond - per the client's request. My initial reaction was, "what the hell is that?" Since my schoolwork included (limited) pond design training, this was unknown territory for me. Not many people in the immediate area were well trained (or trained at all) in LID design, so it took research on my part to get to a comfort level where I felt confident enough to design an efficient, working facility. Virtually every site I've worked on since then has included at least one LID facility.

My point is this: maybe this is covered in coursework nowadays, maybe not. If not, ask a professor, or a professional in the industry, or the internet (like this blog, for example) how you can learn more about the concept and the numerous design options available for LID facilities. The better educated engineers are coming out of school, the better this industry serves the public need.

Anthony