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As more architects and contractors move toward working together throughout the process of designing and constructing a building, pressure is mounting to allow this type of collaboration in the public sector.

Iowa is one of just a handful of states that only permits the design-bid-build method of awarding contracts to the lowest bidder for government projects. Meanwhile, other states have recently passed or expanded laws that allow design-build, construction management at risk and other collaborative methods, which architects claim can deliver a project faster, more efficiently and with better-quality results than keeping the two parties separate.

Though most architects agree that an integrated approach is effective in private projects, there is some debate locally over how it would work in the public sector.

“There’s a major thrust in the architectural and construction world, especially in the private sector, to adopt a highly collaborative approach to design and construction,” said Bill Dikis, a former partner at RDG Planning & Design, who now runs his own consulting firm, Architectural Strategies LLC. While the Iowa chapter of the American Institute of Architects has some concern over how different delivery methods work, he said, any law that would allow testing these concepts in the public sector should be considered.

“We see the benefits in it, and we want to embrace it,” said Mike Benck, business development director at Beringer Ciaccio Dennell Mabrey (BCDM), an Omaha-based architectural firm that has offices in Des Moines. “It’s just a little slow to evolve.”

New delivery methods

Whereas the design-build approach was used in about 5 percent of projects in 1985, compared with 82 percent that used the traditional design-bid-build method, the Design-Build Institute of America (DBIA) expects these methods to be used equally by 2010 in all nonresidential design and construction projects in the United States. Federal departments are already using design-build for more than half of their current construction projects.

Because many states have legislated changes on this topic recently, it’s hard to track where each state stands. About half permit integrated project delivery methods, around 20 states limit the use of integrated methods, and five still don’t allow them.

In 2007, Iowa passed a law that allowed the Iowa Armory Board to enter into a design-build contract for certain National Guard facilities so long as it used federal funds. Because the law was so specific – allowing the Camp Dodge Armed Forces Readiness Center to become the first public-sector design-build project in the state – many experts claim Iowa law still doesn’t allow integrated project delivery.

The different project delivery methods also are complex and often defined differently depending on the organization. The main concepts are design-bid-build, design-build and construction management at risk. The traditional design-bid-build approach separates the parties involved; architects submit a design, and then contractors bid on the selected design based on their interpretation of the design documents. Design-build means that the builder and architect are hired as one entity by the owner to deliver the project. Construction management at risk means the owner hires a firm to manage the project before the design and that manager works with the architect, contractor and owner to complete the project.

Many architects believe that the two integrated delivery methods are effective in saving time and money by bringing the major players together early on in the design phase to discuss any issues up front. Contractors can begin work while the architect is still finalizing designs.

In the design-bid-build approach, said Dirk Westercamp, president of Woodruff Design LLC and a member of the DBIA, the architect is forced to be as specific as possible in its design documents and the contractor tries to base its bid on doing the bare minimum so it will submit the lowest bid and win the contract. If something has to be adjusted during the construction phase, often the contractor’s budget goes up.

Though the design-build and construction management at risk approach don’t define costs up front, they can be better estimated by having a contractor involved in the designs, and many owners place a maximum guaranteed price on the project.

Pros and cons

The Iowa chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) believes the construction management at risk method is worth using in the public sector but opposes legislation that would allow design-build, according to Dikis, who chairs the AIA chapter’s government affairs committee. He noted that the national organization sees both methods as valid, but doesn’t specify if one is better in the public and private sectors.

Dikis said the main problem with the design-build approach is that it doesn’t involve the owner until late in the design process. Often a few architect-contractor teams are selected based on experience and capabilities and then those teams submit design proposals that the owner evaluates based on the design with the best quality, not necessarily the lowest cost. The construction management at risk model brings all the parties together before design.

Also, Dikis said, “in the private sector, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with (design-build), but in the public sector, it starts to raise issues of loss of competitive pricing and potential favoritism. It’s not too likely, but certainly could pop up.”

Westercamp said his firm prefers the design-build model because it eliminates the fourth party of a construction manager. To make the contract awarding process fair in the public sector, he said that in many states, the agency will award a contract based on a formula that gives points for meeting certain criteria; the proposal with the most points wins the bid. This also helps give architects direction early on in how to design the building.

The other problem Dikis has with the design-build approach is that it can require the architect to submit a detailed proposal before the contract is awarded, which can place a lot of financial burden on one party, especially if the team doesn’t win the bid. Many states will give stipends to architects who don’t win the bid, but even that might not cover the total costs.

In all of the approaches, the project’s success often depends on how well the teams work together, Dikis said, but getting along is especially important in the integrated approaches. On some integrated projects he’s worked on in the past, he said the construction managers tended to blame the architect for problems. “For design-build, it just depends on the people involved,” he said. “It’s really good if it’s people who you trust and who trust you; it can go extremely well.”

Firms that have an integrated design-build practice within their company, such as Woodruff, tend to be the biggest proponents of that method. Woodruff Design does the majority of its projects with its sister company, Woodruff Construction LLC.

“It makes it easy,” Westercamp said. “I know all the superintendents on the construction side on a first-name basis.”

Rick Snyder, a principal at FEH Associates Inc., which served as the owner’s adviser on the Camp Dodge Armed Forces Readiness Center, prefers this method on most projects. “It’s definitely an advantage to have all the team members working together to solve issues,” he said. “Also having the contractor on board early on, you have better cost control during the design phase.”

Benck of BCDM said some architects may hesitate to try the integrated project delivery method because it makes them assume more risk by placing them in a team with the contractor, versus the contractor assuming most of the risk in the design-bid-build method. “Architects by nature are kind of risk-averse, so that’s something that has kind of caused it to be a little slower,” he said.

Efforts under way

The local DBIA chapter is working with other parties that may have a stake in design-build legislation to try to get more people on board with the idea. It supported legislation that would allow the Iowa Board of Regents’ institutions to use design-build, but although its institutions supported the proposal, the board is against it.

Westercamp is hopeful that if a few groups can rally behind a bill, something will get passed that will at least allow the design-build method to be tested on some smaller projects, such as schools.

Benck’s firm said Nebraska has taken a similar approach in allowing design-build contracts with schools. But this approach has been slow to take off, Benck said, because it requires the owner to hire a performance criteria developer to develop specifications before asking for proposals from a design-build team. Because architects can make more money on the designs, few have agreed to be performance criteria developers.

“I think overall, integrated practice is the direction the industry is going, whether it’s actually design-build,” Benck said. “I do see that the construction team and architectural/engineering team will be working collaboratively as one from the very beginning more and more, because the efficiencies that can be derived from that are considerable.”