Stop saying BIM Model!

I had this pointed out to me by Carl Collins at Arup Associates and now I cannot unsee it. When we say "BIM", anyone with a clue is saying Building Information Modelling, or Building Information Model. Occassionally, and let us be clear, only to muddy the waters, people mean Building Information Management or Maintenance which is unhelpful at best. So when you are saying BIM Model, you are saying Building Information Model Model. It's a bit like saying PIN Number or the River Avon. I can forgive, if not forget, so long as you know that you're doing it.

It's a bit like the how many dimensions that exist. Physicists suspect more, but have only discovered four. We've left them in our wake with 11 dimensions. If as I suspect, these are not intended to be actual dimensions, then pray tell what is 1D and 2D BIM? ... Anyway...

MIT Cityscope, technology enabled stakeholder engagement

Engaging with stakeholders such as politicians, developers and the community can commonly be a challenging process. Taking steps to ensure that these stakeholders can truly grasp exactly what development looks like, what its effects would be and critically how malleable these designs are in the early stages is I think a real oppotunity for, and I hate this word usually, the deomcratisation of development. 

There's been a lot of work done along the lines of projectors and the Kinect (other motion sensing input devices are available). They use RFID tags as well. Great stuff. 

Projectors and 3D Models can be combined to make some really engaging scenes

Twitter Activity

Google Satellite Map overlay

Windflow Analysis

BIM Book Author

“I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.” - Douglas Adams

I jest, I'm really excited about writing the BIM book for Landscape. The problem isn't the writing, the problem is finding the right people to talk to. Too many of the BIM books that I've read haven't engaged with the people that the book affects. Therefore, I have made it my mission to get in front of as many main contractors, civil engineers, geotechnical engineers, ecologists, arborists... the list goes on.

I'm also trying to find case studies for the book. I expect to beating them off with a stick. We will see.

BIM Level 2... I can tell you what it is!!

There has been a lot of handwringing, heavy frowns and hairs that were once full of colour falling out or going grey over the UK Government Construction Strategy's requirement for meeting BIM level 2 by 2016. There was good reason for that. The definition of level 2 originally looked like this:

"Managed 3D environment held in separate discipline “BIM” tools with attached data"

Which is a problematic definition in several key ways. It's vague at best for starters... it's also quite prescriptive. So the worst of both worlds then. Highly open to interpretation on one hand, and restrictive by making quite clear requirements on the other.

Okay, so that needs explaining.
Reasons it's vague
What's a "BIM" tool? There are currently 550 definitions of BIM according to the BIM USE Ontology by Ralph Kreider. So that really doesn't help.
Attached data. What's that? What data is that? Who is it for, are they expected to be able to use it outside of the discipline. How is it attached? Is it linked, federated, associated, what what what?!!?

Reasons it's Prescriptive
A Managed 3D environment. A managed environment is one thing, where all information is brought together digitally. You can do that without compatibility issues because you don't try to view the information simultaneously. However, a managed 3D environment implies that you can visualise all geometry regardless of its origin. This is practicable easily within Architecture. It is possible for infrastructure designs. For everything else, less so.


Instead of this difficult to work definition... now we have the SEVEN PILLARS OF BIM WISDOM!.
These are:

1.    PAS 1192-2:2013                     - How to digitally manage a project
2.    PAS 1192-3:2014                     - How to digitally manage a facility
3.    BS 1192-4                                 - How to effectively share information digitally
4.    BIM Protocol                            - The legal underpinning of BIM
5.    Government Soft Landings      - Ongoing support from designers post completion
6.    Digital Plan of Work                - a unified plan of work that spans all disciplines
7.    Classification                            - What is classified as what

It is worth noting that 3 has, I have heard, been rushed through public consultation and at the time of writing the digital plan of work and the classification systems are undergoing development.
However, having studied these emerging standards in detail I am confident that they are much more fit for purpose than a single vague and prescriptive sentence.


For the post that inspired me:
 http://blogs.bsria.co.uk/2014/06/18/the-seven-pillars-of-bim-wisdom/

Landscape BIM Product Data Templates

I've been asked (well actually I asked) to help review the PDTs for Landscape at the Landscape Institute, and having had a preliminary inspection I am inspired to make the case for them.

One of the big BIM benefits has to be persistent and consistent data. We come across persistent data every day of our lives, we expect individual ATMs to be able to access our bank accounts and produce money regardless of who we bank with (well we do in the UK). We also expect to be able to log in to our email on our phones, at home or on the move. There's a lot of underpinning work that supports all of these things. Now let's compare with a landscape specification.

Assuming that the specification is complete, works done and handed over, but remedial work needs to be done. You're a temp working for the company doing the remedial work and it's your job to find out what plants it is you need to replace some recently deceased one. You will need to find out who holds the landscape design documentation, not generally, not usually, but actually, who holds it, for this project, right now. Then you will need to go to them or have them sent to you, you might need permission to access their physical files and you might then be required to physically go to the archive and dig out the document. Of course, back then we didn't have a filing system so it's in one of those boxes... you get the picture. Things get lost very easily and it gets chaotic.

In a perfect BIM world. You could find out who holds the specification, get a link to the document, get a log in for their extranet site. Download the file and open it in excel or equivalent software.

So that's clear. Now, what if, following these remedial works the specification needs to change? I think you can see the difference.

Product Data Templates are the first step to  creating a consistent and persistent store for your project's specifications and other data. These PDTs indicate what can be stored and how. Once these have been complete, the job will be to create databases that hold this information for people to easily create, view and edit specifications in a fraction of the amount of time it currently takes.

For more information on PDTs check out.
http://bimtalk.co.uk/

Landscape BIM & Revit now 900% more efficient (in places)

I often come into contact with consultants who work in the external sphere: Geomatics Engineers, Landscape Architects, Civil Engineers and the like who have been told they need to start using Revit. There is a lot of reticence surrounding this idea, particularly because the software is in no way designed for external design, in fact, designing assets for the external sphere has been explicitly ruled out by the powers that be on the Revit wishlist.


And working with Landscape Reviteers I know first hand a lot of the problems that can arise when implementing this software. Revit is, out of the box and after basic training next to useless for the total novice who works outside of the building envelope.

Furthermore, Revit is not BIM and anyone who says that it is has missed at least half of the message of BIM in the UK.

However, and it is a big however, there are ways to make Revit work for the external sphere. And using some programming skills, I have just managed to make a 900% efficiency gain on some Landscape Architecture workflows within Revit. This wouldn't be possible without the experience of Revit at Colour Urban Design Ltd.,  nor would it be possible without being able to program. I guess I'm showing off really, but who can blame me!

So I'm still not going to tell you that Revit is the perfect software for external works, (but neither does that perfect software exist), but if you do decide to take the plunge (because, after all, there are still a lot of benefits to Revit), then I suggest factoring in a more complex set of requirements than an Architect would need to. Software vendors will always tell you that implementing new software is more than just buying the stuff, and they're right, but many companies muddle through with trial and error. That just won't work with Revit.

OGC's new Urban Planning group releases draft charter

I have just submitted a comment on the following key issue for interoperability.

OGC's new Urban Planning group releases draft charter

Data structures are simultaneously very deep and very wide. There are more professions, professionals, sectors and requirements than a single body can hope to create a set of super specifications for.

Therefore, to fulfil the group’s goal of:

3.       Avoid placing artificial technical barriers on use of Urban Planning data.

I propose that all software companies should commit to opening their data structures transparently and completely, as this artificial barrier of opacity is the single biggest barrier to interoperation within the various sectors that these companies encompass.