How long to put together set of plans? 5

[ttuterry]

Our company just recently added a civil department. We have a client that wants to put in a building in a relatively flat site with no detention. I am an EIT with about a year of experience in site development at another company, but this will be my first full blown site development project with this company. And also i'm the only worker so it's just me working on the project. My boss has asked me to figure out how much time it will take me to put together a set of plans so he can give the proposal to the client. I haven't really a clue how long it will take. I know that we need the basics of notes, site plans, drainage, etc... And then there will obviously be submittals and then revising plans and I would figure as-builts as well. I have never been involved in any of the figuring of times so its all new to me. Anybody have comments on something i'm not thinking of or some advice? Thanks.

 

[cvg]

ask your boss to do the estimating. estimating something like this is not normally something I would trust a 1 year newbie to be able to do.

 

[MSU95]

Are water and sanitary available to the site?
How large is the building?
What is the proposed use of the building?
Local zoning will tell you how many parking spaces are required along with other minimum requirements?

Speaking of that, is the property zoned appropriately for the proposed use? Are any variances required? Will the plan be approved administratively or will you need to present the site plan to the planning commission? Many of these questions should be asked to the local planning dept. or zoning administrator and that will give you an idea of what will be required.

Is a landscaping plan required? Does your firm provide this service? Are there any other consultants that you would need to work with to get the plans approved (traffic studies, geotechnical investigations, Environmental Site Assessments...)

How about a survey? Has a boundary survey been performed? Has anyone pulled title work on the site to confirm there aren't any easements or other restrictions on the property?

You should also have the project manager answer these questions, or ask the Owner yourself, so you can get an understanding of what their expectations are. Talk to the PM before you go calling the Owner, though.

Site Development is generally not rocket science, but if you flat out guess at a scope of work, 99% of the time you will end up not delivering what your client is looking for.

Good Luck!

 

[HawaiianMarine]

I would suggest developing plans with 30%, 60%, and 100% levels. You should be able to develop 30% plans in a few weeks with just a very general site plan. This is the stage where the owner should be giving you feedback on any major changes that they want to make. Developing the 30% plans should give you an idea what you need to send out for design, how long they will take, etc. Use this to determine a time frame for 60% plans, or go straight to 100% plans if easier.

 

[PEinc]

You are an EIT. Who is training you? Who would be signing and sealing the design calcs and plan submission?

However, before you tell your boss that you are not experienced enough to do this work, take a shot at the time estimate. Don't be too aggressive. Be ready to explain your thinking to the boss. Before asking for any help, make sure your tried to get the answers yourself.

Before you guesstimate the time, look at a the plans from a similar project your company has done in order to see what is involved. There could be a lot of previously used details that you can use to save time. You don't need to reinvent the wheel for an estimate.

 

[civilperson]

Are you doing the building or just the site development?

 

[ttuterry]

A little more info..We are just doing the site development. The architect has given us his site plan already. We have already located water, sewer, electric around the site. My boss and I are actually doing the survey but we have already figured up time for that. The site is relatively small, approx. 400' x 200'. I have nothing to go by except what i did at my previous job. And my boss has not worked in the public sector in about 25 years. So i expect things to take a little longer than normal just cause of both of our inexperience.

As MSU95 said, i'll have to look into zoning and all that for the site plan. I'm not real confident in how the platting process works, but hopefully my boss knows more about that than me. Thanks for all the comments so far!

 

[civilperson]

Estimate 80-120 hours for design effort and equal effort for CAD drawings. Survey and site research varies. Total for two acres with drainage, grading utility connections, landscaping and zoning setbacks with site inspection services about $35,000.

 

[TerryScan]

Until one has experience in a specific locale to base the estimate upon, this question is something like "how long is a piece of string?"

 

[GoldDredger]

As my glasses slide down the bridge of my nose and my jaw drops slightly, I contemplate the scarcity of work in my region, and slightly begrudge the 1.8 acre site that I don't have.

Hopefully this PM is just giving you an assignment as part of your training. Estimating the hours, writing scope and fee are his job to manage. If he really is counting on you for an assessment of hours, my guess is he doesn't know his a$$ from hole in the ground...and this one will get ugly.

Basic rule of thumb that I use. For every hour of my PE time, I estimate two hours of technician time.
Then I look at the sheets that will be required. Lets see, cover, demolition, dim. control, grading, utility, plan and profiles, and details. Did I miss any? How about erosion control, or rough grading plan. Will the project be phased, so now you have x2 of those sheets?

Then how about the reviewing agency. Will they require preliminary site plan approval, then site plan in addition to your sheets above. How about the platting, does the property need to be platted?

Does your project propose construction specifications, and does your company have templates for those?

How about quantity estimates? Is your contract going to require you to figure out how much earthwork, concrete, curb, pipe, catch basins...all that stuff the EIT will have to do?

How about changes? What if the City makes you change your layout, or the owner wants this instead of that. Happens more than you might think. Have some hours for that?

One word of caution, hope this PM is setting you up, if you know what I mean.

Good luck.

 

[PEinc]

Work up the esimate. Review and discuss it with your boss. It's all part of your training. If you never do one, you'll never know if you can.

 

[freddieragaas]

experienced designers take up the following duration to put a complete plan:
1. Conceptual stage - 90 to 120 days. at this stage coordination with the owner is conducted to establish what they want in the project.
2. Design stage - 60 to 90 days. at this stage the plan should be already frozen (hopefully). Details of the drawing are being done at this stage.
3. Contract design stage - 45 to 60 days. at this stage all input and revision should already be ironed out. The plans and specifications are being prepared for bidding at this stage.

Please be reminded that this BY EXPERIENCE DESIGNERS. It means they already have templates and specification from previous projects.

 

[kmatte]

Here is my take. I have been doing industrial and commercial site design for the past 6 years. Started with 0 experience. Started helping the PM write proposals at year 2. Full PM at year 4.

In my experience, site grading takes the longest for these projects, as it tends to be very detailed. I can do a 1-2 acre site in about 20-30 hours. The other portion that can take a large amount of time is the storm water rate and quality design. This may also affect how you do the grading plan. You will need to check with local governing bodies to find out what the requirements are. I normally slot about 10-15 hours for this. Could be more or less depending on the site.

My company does a set of plans for submittal for the city and watershed reveiw. The plans sheets typically are: Topographic survey, demolition, grading and erosion control, geometric and paving, utility, details, and a SWPPP. You may have more or less depending on the site and local ordinances.

I typically say it will take about 6-8 hours per sheet. We have a pretty good set of templates, so that helps. If you do not have a set of templates, you may want to increase the time for each sheet.

For a project of your size, i would need approximately 80 hours for plan production. I would add about 3-4 meeting at about 2 hours apiece, 10 hours for pre-design exploration, and some time for misc correspondence. This would typically get me a set of plans ready for a submittal. I would then budget about 10-20 hours to address comments from the governing body. This would typically get me to close to construction documents.

On top of this I would add 10-20% for construction admin.

In the perfect world, this would work, and could do the design for the hours I mention. However, I have yet to see a perfect project. There will always be hidden things, such as contaminated soils, wetlands, unknown utilities, flooding concerns, etc. If you are the only engineering firm, you could use the higher hours, or if you are bidding on the project and need the work, you could use the lower numbers and hope it all goes as planed.