A “BIM” example
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Veterans Enterprises Technology Services, LLC in Knoxville, TN received a $9.8 million firm-fixed price contract for the construction of a Center of Standardization program and dining facility. Work will be performed at Fort Sill, OK and is expected to be complete by Sept 30/09. Web bids were solicited on Oct 4/07, and 4 bids were received by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Norfolk District, VA (W91236-07-D-0043).

Centers of Standardization is an important part of the US Army’s base construction program, which could reach $40 billion between 2004-2013. The idea is to have facilities of the same type share the same design standards across all US Army bases, even if they look a bit different from the outside. The intent is to lower costs and speed up construction, and the new approach is also linked to recent Army Corps of Engineers process improvement efforts. One aspect of that approach is to begin making use of “Building Information Modeling” (3D computer models) as a regular part of its construction processes. Another is the removal of needless overhead like specifications for particular bolt sizes in construction contracts. Taken together, these and other improvements can cut the expected time to build new facilities from 5-7 years from initial planning through completion to 2-4 years. See the March 2006 issue of the US Army’s official “Soldiers” Magazine [PDF format] and the March/April 2007 issue of US Army IMCOM’s Public Works Digest Magazine [PDF format] for more.