Commercial Site Design

[arellanoma]

Hello,
I accepted a new job with a firm who specializes in commercial real estate design. Can anyone share their design process? For example, most of the projects are infill sites with existing edge conditions. I would like to hear how other engineers begin their design process (especially grading)and important things to look for.

Thanks

 

[civilperson]

Plot the possible building envelope from setback and green space requirements. Locate driveway according to trafic rules and use landscape buffers to separate different zonings. Grade according to ADA requirements and when all the rules are followed, (parking spaces, turn lanes, side walks, storm water detention and height restrictions), you will find the design is half done!

 

[bpattengale]

Civilperson makes some good points about knowing the rules and regulations. Another important item to note is to note the existing utility infrastructure. Sure you can design a storm drain on your site for a 100-year storm event, but when the existing is only designed for a 5-year you're going to have problems. Get your hands on as many record drawings, permits, and any other information you can find on the existing site conditions. Note the locations, sizes, and depths of the storm and sanitary sewer and watermains, these will often control your design. Be prepaired to come up with some creative solutions especially for stormwater management. The rules and regulations are only becoming more strict and the treatment practices can take up a large portion of the space available.

 

[jeffcivil2]

Congratulations on the new job. Study the local and state applicable fire codes. For example, it may be 2006 International Fire Code, 2006 international building code, and **** Local Fire code.

Get a list of rules, like fire hose spacing for commercial and FDC distance to Hydrant requirement(usually within 100 feet). YOu'll need a 6" fire line, etc.

http://www.civiltips.com

 

[GoldDredger]

Make sure you contract is well defined to avoid scope creep (Ie, constant changes to site plan as financing, anchors and tenants shake out)

Also, keep good documention of your correspondence with architects. There maybe more than one for varous buildings (if a large site). There is a tendency to keep changing footprints and locations of utilities. Also door locations which affects your ADA requirements. This was very labor intensive for me on one project.

Developers will naturally want more available land for development, rather than detention if it's required. This tends to cause conflicts as they squeeze detention into smaller spots. Make sure you have a paper trail exlaining increased costs due to retaining walls and sheer pond walls if they tell you 'it just has to work in this area'. Also, you'll find they want detention ponds way out of the way, but oftentimes not condusive for detention (Ie, located at the uphill side of the site)

Truck loading docks are sometimes problematic. At first they won't be there, then later the architecural footprint includes them. Recessed loading docks need to be drained, so beware of having to extend a storm line, or go to a pumped system with added costs.

Be very very carefull about matching grades of architectural drawings to your finished grades on the civil plans. They will use a relative datum to a finished floor of 100, so you have to do some math. When they don't match in the field, the finger pointing begins.

Restaurants will need grease traps. Be sure to find out who is responsible for their design. Usually the MEP, but they are located will outside the buidling, so their could be some overlap.

You may get your cut and fill to balance on paper, then the actual dirt guy looks at it and says 'we show a net cut or fill of so many thousand yards!!'. Then, to balance, they will want to raise or lower the site by some constant incriment, say, 0.63 foot raise. Make sure you anticipate how to deal with this, aside from you changing every spot elevation you have. Your driveway slopes will be affected, cover over shallow utilites, a whole host of items.

Each one of these items burned me at one point. Live and learn. The key is to anticipate the items that will burn you and deal with them proactively.

Good luck.

 

[cvg]

you should do a quick analysis of the existing condition drainage early on so you can make a determination of any drainage improvements that might be needed. This info should be reported to the architect as soon as possible so they can plan for it. Nothing like trying to squeeze the site retention basin in a 10' building set back strip behind the building because they don't have any other place to put it.

 

[GRANITE80]

Invest time in organizing all the variables that will effect your design, just like the other posts said. That's the best place to start. I also want to throw out there that you might consider the use of Autodesk Civil 3D. There are some excellent tools that speed up the process.

 

[arellanoma]

Thank you all for the advice.