Construction Spending In December

The indefatigable Calculated Risk is reporting via the Census Bureau that outlook for construction spending remains weak. Overall, residential construction spending is down 61.5% from the 2006 peak. While non-residential spending is up slightly, but still down 22% from it's peak in October 2008. Sadly, the trend in non-residential construction points to further declines.

On the bright side (?), CR is predicting very modest growth (read: sluggish) in residential investment for 2010. I'll keep an eye out for the new Architectural Billings Index (ABI) for updates. An uptick in the ABI generally means construction spending will be up a few months down the road as architecture billings are a leading indicator for construction spending. So far, the index has been stuck in negative territory.

Work and Morality

Found this on the usually great, occasionally ridiculous TED website.

I found Mr. Schwartz's talk a nice complement to some of what I would like to say on this blog. I especially liked the idea that rules and incentives in school and the workplace tend to stifle creativity and encourage mediocrity. Mediocrity is one thing we need less of.

It is a video, but is not very demanding visually. You could easily put it on as a background to whatever else you are doing. Enjoy.

Better Luck Next Year?

According to Architectural Record, the AIA's Consensus Construction Report is not
giving us much hope for a better 2010. It appears that more pain is in store for us all.
Public Safety (?) may be the only specialty of the industry showing very modest
growth.

I think there is still plenty of bad news to come out of both residential and commercial
real estate.  We've already gotten off to a bad start with what may be the largest real 
estate default in history.

Hope I'm wrong.

We Suck

This is something that, as a profession, we need to address. In my office we do a ton of tenant improvements and many other architects drawings make it to my desk. They are almost always uniformly horrible. All I need to do is compare the floor plan to the structural framing plan to see if the set is going to be any good. I often find columns on the structural plan missing from the architectural drawing. If not that, then the size of the columns drawn on the architectural sheets does not match structural. If not that, then shaft openings are shown on the architectural drawings are not shown on the structural plans. I could go on and on. Not to only mention the things that are not there, many of the sets are totally over drafted. Why are we showing generic wall and building sections when we end up blowing them up to a larger scale (sometimes twice)? We are producing and printing whole series of sheets of drawings that are of absolutely no use to the contractor.

We moan about our lack of monetary reward in comparison to other professions (I know I do), but we often do not ask ourselves why this might be so. The fact is, our incompetence costs us and our clients (sometimes lots) of money. All architecture firms are struggling these days, but there will always be a demand for firms that can bring value not just during the design phase, but during construction as well. I work at one such place and while we have had a tough year things have picked up for us lately.

So, why do we suck? I think this is the result of numerous factors. One of which is the way architecture is taught in schools. The concentration in nearly all architecture schools is on design, with technical pedagogy taking a backseat. Now, I enjoyed studio classes in college. I learned much about myself in the long hours in studio and made lasting friendships, but my first day in an architecture firm I realized I did not know a damn thing about construction documents. The second problem is that fresh out of school we are asked by our employers to put together drawing sets and create details. In my experience, mentoring and developing talent at the intern level is non-existent. Unfortunately, so is meaningful quality control. With no one teaching interns how to develop drawing sets and no one checking their work, disaster ensues. The construction administration phase of projects becomes a painful and costly back and forth between the architect and general contractor with the owner in the middle.

Is there hope? I don't know. I'm intrigued by the idea of design-build, but there's been no demand for this type of project delivery in my corner of the industry and I have no experience with it. We need to realize that, in order to survive, we have to do a better job conveying our design intent to the contractor. Our clients will be happier and so will the contractors we work with and there's enormous value to making the contractors lives easier.

If you’re out there, what’s your take?