With so many moving parts on and around a construction site – deliveries, work crews, heavy equipment and more – there are opportunities everywhere for one aspect of work to affect every other part of operations. DPR Construction’s teams work closely to make sure it all goes off without a hitch. Even in normal times, delivering on-schedule, on-budget, top-quality work is no small job. With a variety of economic and societal pressures to consider as the COVID-19 pandemic continues, finding ways to increase certainty is a top consideration.

While there are things customers can consider before a shovel hits the ground, once work is under way, other factors can help ensure predictable outcomes and truly great results.

“We’ve done research that shows that the most successful projects are the ones with a highly-engaged owner throughout the project,” said Moawia Abdelkarim, one of DPR’s operations leaders. “We think there are questions customers can ask even as the team mobilizes and throughout the job that can contribute to the outcomes they’re hoping for, increase alignment and best position the construction team for success.”

Who’s Doing the Work and are they Involved in the Plan?

Often, customers want to get competitive bids for nearly every scope of work to ensure they’re getting the best deal.

“One thing we strive for is to show the value our self-perform work crews can bring,” says Angie Weyant, DPR's national craft people practices leader. “We rely on subcontracted trade partners on nearly every project for a variety of things. When it comes to critical path, though, we want our customers to know they have the opportunity to leverage DPR’s skilled workforce to perform the majority of work. Having those resources in-house helps us remove unknowns and potential disruptions.”

In an industry that already has a skilled labor shortage, DPR is able to manage available labor and bring workers into planning discussions earlier.

“On a recent project in a very busy Texas market, our team found ways to cut schedule because we were able to bring self-perform foremen to the table much earlier for a critical path element than if it had been put out to the market,” Weyant said. “Our employees can leverage their expertise on everything from phasing to durations earlier and be aligned with the full plan because they’re part of the master contract. It’s a tremendous efficiency.”

Moreover, for elements that are subcontracted, customers should consider when those partners can be brought to the table and make an effort to ensure that payments can be made for early work in a timely manner.

“When subcontractors, especially smaller or growing MWBE-certified businesses, commit resources to planning, they don’t have the capacity to wait for work to be put in place to receive payment,” Weyant noted. “Some customers might wonder what they’re paying for at earlier planning meetings and it’s important to see the value that is gained from them.”

Are We Aligned on Progress?

One of the great joys of working around construction sites is that, every day, the site looks different. “Progress” seems like something that can be intuitively seen. DPR’s Kevin Britt, who leads the firm’s planning, scheduling and production planning (PSPP) efforts, sees things in terms of a road trip.

“Suppose you want to take a road trip from San Diego to Boston,” he said. “It’s easy enough to say the plan is to drive from start to finish by a certain time, but are you going to stop anywhere? If so, where and when? What does that look like and what does it mean for your trip? The steps along the way are what make the journey, not just the destination.”

As such, Britt recommends getting aligned beyond milestones throughout the project and revisiting plans throughout. The larger focus should be alignment on the priorities, goals, risks, opportunities, and quality expectations that are associated with those milestones.

“Working together, project partners should start their work early, understanding the desired outcomes and letting those determine the right milestones, clearly identifying what they are and what they’re not. That way you can prioritize what needs to happen for all the key milestones, not just the ending ones,” Britt said. “It’s not just about putting together the initial schedule and a plan. Just like a sports team adjusting to how a game is unfolding, it’s important that designers, engineers, trade partners, and customers are proactively involved in ongoing discussions and be ready to collaboratively work together when the conditions that were initially assumed change during the life of the project.”

Britt sees that collaboration as key to creating a system for timely decision making by project teams.

“Making informed decisions quickly with the right people at the table, virtually and in the job site trailer, is as important as making sure quality work is then put in place in a safe and timely manner in the field,” Britt said. “Like the road trip, when you can refer to technology and data on a navigation app, you can quickly pivot and adjust. We have equivalent tools that aggregate data to forecast the plan and monitor progress that can serve a similar role.”

The good news is that, overall, there is starting to be enough quality data available to inform decisions at a variety of project stages and apply it in meaningful ways. DPR’s Colin Thrift recently worked with project partners to analyze schedule risks presented by the pandemic for a pharmaceutical facility in the Southeast.

“We were able to show where specific risks were, when we expected the most exposure to them and how the team could work together to mitigate them using our risk planner tool,” Thrift said. “The original plan was great. The risk planner exercise just helped us refine it and led to action we could take in the field immediately to lower exposure later.”

Are we Really Lean and Efficient?

DPR’s Cory Hackler is one of the firm’s Lean experts. He’s seen how easy it is for well-intentioned customers committed to reducing waste in the construction process to oversimplify the issue.

“There’s always a lot of focus on resource management, which basically means keeping every person fully utilized and busy,” Hackler said. “What has to happen first is flow management.”

Brilliantly illustrated in video, flow management is a perspective change Hackler believes the industry needs to shift to in order to see high performing teams.

“In construction, focusing on keeping every person at full capacity ultimately means people are putting fires out left and right,” Hackler said. “There’s an issue with this type of delivery as workers have no bandwidth to do anything but act as fire fighters every day. It affects other workflows on site and everyone ends up in reactive modes. What we need to do is shift to teams focused on efficiency in the entire workflow from design to completion.”

That means opportunities for every person on site, from project managers to superintendents to work crews. Similar to the cross-country road trip analogy, teams need to understand the details of steps along the way.

“For a road trip, our plan would need to include the tasks before leaving the house, packing and what we may need to bring,” Hackler said. “Then there are food stops, side trips along the way and, finally, an estimated time of arrival so people can plan on the time and day at which you will show up.”

Hackler sees the construction version of those stops as things like design management and preconstruction as preparations. Then, there is construction management that is agile enough to adapt to changes and milestones and, finally, completion. The ability to pivot resources when something doesn’t go as planned can bring collaborative problem solving to mitigate the issue without drastically impacting other areas of work.

“Right now, there are plenty of unforeseen factors that can throw a wrench into even the best plan,” Hackler says. “What if there’s a disruption at the end of the supply chain in terms of delivery or fabrication? The traditional system based on resource management breaks down quickly there. Flow management focuses on keeping work moving; having a team that can pivot to troubleshoot an issue that yields a faster outcome with fewer disruptions to the rest of work.”

Staying Engaged Is the Key

“Construction is never going to be ‘set it and forget it,’” Abdelkarim said. “Leveraging data, managing resources the right way and more aren’t just tools for pre-mobilization. These are things to do throughout the lifecycle of the project.”

By fostering a collaborative team culture, customers can set a tone for the life of the project and play a vital role in sharing project success.

“Everyone has an interest in the best outcome on site,” Abdelkarim said. “As a result, everyone should have an interest in collaborating throughout the project to ensure alignment that will enable the best outcome.”

DPR Construction’s Dean Reed knows a thing or two about Lean construction and integrated project delivery (IPD). You might even say he wrote the book on the topic! Co-authoring that book and bringing meaningful data to the fore to show the benefits of IPD, though, took years of practical experience in the field applying Lean methods in collaboration with industry organizations such as the Lean Construction Institute (LCI).

Now, LCI has awarded Reed with its Pioneer Award, which recognizes individuals who have moved the design and construction industry forward in embracing and implementing Lean principles and methods. Specifically, Reed was recognized for the award because of his commitment to advancing Lean thinking as a teacher, mentor and colleague.

Reed shared some thoughts about the award and where he sees the industry going next.

Let’s talk about the award. What does it mean to you?

The award means a lot to me because, in my mind, I think of it as the Greg Howell/Glenn Ballard Award, as they were the real pioneers of Lean construction in the U.S. and the world. To be named a “Pioneer” is to be recognized in line with those two trail blazers. It’s even more meaningful as it came as a surprise; I didn’t know I was nominated. I am humbled by it, especially knowing there are other equally deserving people in the industry.

You’ve connected Lean with DPR’s Ever Forward core value. How do they align?

I left a well-established builder after nearly nine years to join DPR, which, at the time I made the change, was much smaller. I made the switch all because of DPR’s core values and particularly Ever Forward. At that time, DPR was the only contractor I knew of talking that way, about the opportunity to be better and how the company, the industry and individuals like me could be as good as we could be.

By that time, I had already discovered Lean Construction and virtual design and construction (VDC). Like the saying goes, you don’t get to choose your parents, but when you get good ones it’s quite an advantage. I was in an environment where I was able to have access to those concepts and just beginning to understand them, and DPR was a place where I could try to integrate them into my work as a project planner and scheduler. I don’t think I could have done that any other place.

My approach has always been to collaborate with others and I have had many terrific partners as I’ve worked throughout DPR. I have learned an immense amount from those people, like (DPR Management Committee member) Atul Khanzode, who co-authored Integrating Project Delivery and (current DPR board member) Eric Lamb who really taught me what delivering value required in such a fragmented industry. DPR was really committed to providing best value to customers from day one and still is. We must do that first and also earn enough in return to prosper and continue to get better. That means a commitment to Ever Forward and that path leads to Lean.

How far has the industry has come with Lean over your career?

It has become part of the language of construction. When that happens, it influences thinking. I see people throughout DPR as a matter of course trying to be Lean by not wasting time and effort. There is such a baked-in focus on being efficient to deliver better outcomes. I see that throughout the industry, too, and LCI has definitely made a big contribution to spreading Lean thinking.

What do you think is coming next?

I do not believe in being Lean for Lean’s sake or doing VDC just to say we did. DPR continues to be focused on being one of the most admired companies by 2030. I know we’re making a tremendous effort now to reach that goal, and I see Lean within that context. It has become part of our thinking and the way we operate. Lean supports our mission and vision. Lean is all about creating an organizational culture to solve problems to improve performance. I think we will see more and more people at DPR and in the industry go from where I was in 1996, barely understanding Lean, to the point where they help others incorporate Lean thinking and methods into everyday work. Once people internalize Lean and VDC to work together effectively as one integrated team, it will shift the entire industry and the way they see their roles within it.

As nonprofits continue to adapt their crucial work under CDC and local COVID-related guidelines, DPR Construction’s Sacramento office facilitated a “COVID-19 Best Practices” protocol discussion this summer for the leadership team at Habitat for Humanity of Greater Sacramento. A long-standing member of the Sacramento community, Habitat for Humanity is dedicated to empowering and helping low-income families improve their shelter conditions by providing access to specialized resources and trainings. Committed to carrying out its Community Initiatives (CI) vision of Building possibilities for the under-resourced, DPR has expanded upon its CI Pillar 1 offering of “Facility construction and renovation” to include COVID-19-era safety protocols and developing a COVID Pre-Screening App to maintain safe jobsites.

This collaboration between Habitat for Humanity and DPR focused on what jobsite protocols Habitat currently has in place and took a deep dive into how DPR has continued to build safely through COVID-19 restrictions. Due to the nature of Habitat’s community service work, their goal was to host building events and have volunteers on their jobsites, while still following proper safety protocols.

DPR Project Manager, Aaron Schwartz and Safety Manager, Robert Pflueger shared resources and tools that are a part of DPR’s COVID-19 Task Force with Habitat’s Chief Operations Officer, Development Director and Director of Construction. During this discussion, they presented key safety tips, including how to disinfect commonly used tools throughout the day and planning workdays to minimize crowding and congestion on jobsites.

Schwartz mentioned, “We also presented the COVID Pre-Screening App we use for daily temperature and wellness screenings for anyone entering a jobsite.” A few months later, DPR is now in the process of helping Habitat set up the app as an additional tool to safely proceed with their building events.

“DPR was more than happy to support Habitat’s needs during this unforeseen time and our COVID-19 Task Force enabled us with great information to share,” said Pflueger. “We presented our COVID-19 resources and walked their team through DPR’s standard guidelines used to make sure we maintain safe jobsites daily.”

Since 2014, DPR has partnered with the local Sacramento Habitat for Humanity on days they construct homes, also called “build days,” and has financially supported the organization through the company’s CI effort. “It’s been an ongoing relationship where they leverage our technical expertise as builders, and we provide them with unique resources to help them make a difference in what they’re trying to do for the community,” said Schwartz.

When the pandemic began, Pflueger said one of the first calls their CI team made was to their partners at Habitat, extending assistance with any trials and tribulations the nonprofit may have been facing during that turbulent period. “No matter what the challenge was, DPR was going to be there to support Habitat’s needs through it all,” said Pflueger.

Not long after, Habitat reached out to DPR and expressed that they were not comfortable having volunteers on their jobsites, so they opened the opportunity for DPR to help them frame a house. “They know that when DPR commits to a project, we show up with skilled craft laborers that can knock out a ton of work,” Schwartz said, “and our team has fun doing it, as well.”

Habitat for Humanity of Greater Sacramento’s Chief Operations Officer Shannin Stein, expressed her gratitude by sharing, “I continue to be humbled by the amount of support DPR provides our organization.”

Schwartz says, “We were put in a situation none of us anticipated, but DPR has learned a lot along the way and by sharing those lessons, we’re hoping to continue to make progress with how we manage COVID-19 as a community.”

DPR’s work on the VIVEX Biologics, Inc. interior expansion in the City of Opa-locka, Florida offers a key example of how the right plan and solid technical building skills can convert a commercial space into a productive life sciences and pharmaceutical R&D environment.

“This project was unique from the beginning because the outside box of the warehouse could not support all of the MEP components and all of the live loads,” said Ryan Colleran, a project manager at DPR Construction. DPR’s preconstruction and self-perform work teams collaborated with SDS Engineering to come up with a solution that would support the existing roof structure of the 40 feet high and 77,000-sq.-ft. high-bay warehouse space without the need for additional steel. “We decided to have a cold-formed system (CFS) erected by our drywall crew. A cold-formed system is a box within a box and that gave us a lot of flexibility,” said Colleran.

The 40,200-sq.-ft. cold-formed overhead structure was designed by the project team by using the new load-bearing walls and the existing exterior concrete tilt-up wall panels. This process allowed all the new MEP systems and ceiling components to be supported independently of the original structure. “Based on the strength of that system, that will also allow us to put in a second floor in the future if we desire,” said VIVEX Vice President of Operations Tim Maye.

Additionally, the CFS solution saved time in the schedule and created a convenient way to access the new MEP and ceiling systems based on its location just above the new ceilings. “The CFS system was a cost reducer for the customer as well. By using the CFS system, the client would not need to touch or reinforce the existing roof structure,” said Colleran.

The project team utilized as much self-perform work as they possibly could, from drywall, framing, and concrete. “We were able to pour all of our concrete pads and exterior work. We also utilized our specialties group,” said Colleran. The project team was able to make all penetrations and maintain the structural integrity through the CFS work by incorporating header details and even tube steel to span large openings that their light-gauge metal could not span. “One hundred percent of this facility was modeled by VDC. Our preconstruction team connected with our VDC team early in the process to model all of the components related to constructing this cold-formed system.”

Raising the 40-foot-long CFS structure columns also presented a challenge when it came time to raise them to a vertical position.

“We decided to use a pulley system,” said Miguel Boschetti, a DPR MEP project superintendent. “Not only did we do it safely, but we were also able to save a lot of time. When we first started on this operation, we were taking about 10 minutes per column. Once we started implementing our pulley system, we cut that time to about one minute per column,” said Boschetti.

Although the CFS covers more than 50% of the entire project, no changes were made to the original design by the architect and engineer. “After we built the system, we were able to finish it with our acoustical ceiling tile and drywall, so aesthetically you won't even see the system. So, it's very pleasing on the eyes,” said Colleran.

Located in an existing warehouse space in South Florida, the VIVEX project includes clean room, research & development, freezer storage as well as miscellaneous office and administrative support spaces.

“We're all very excited here about getting into the new place and it looks fantastic. DPR has done an excellent job. And when someone from DPR said, okay, we're going to do this by such and such a date - they would do that,” said Maye.

Austin, TX-based superintendents Emory Sweeney and Steve Paredes know the value of good planning and being good partners. Their robust collaboration coupled with a project-wide commitment to aligning everyone on the team, regardless of role, made all the difference on their most recent project, with their team completing a downtown Austin hotel six weeks ahead of schedule. What was the key to success? “Man, there really is no secret sauce,” Paredes said. “It comes down to having good relationships, a good plan, getting the key personnel in early, and having our self-perform workforces alongside us. We’ve had some people really stand out on this project who have now begun leading others, so we can leave saying we’ve executed on a high level and we’ve also built some good builders.”

Q: What are your roles at DPR and describe the paths you took to get there.

Sweeney: I started at DPR as an intern and then became a project engineer right out of the University of Texas at Austin, where I studied Civil Engineering. While I was a PE, I found that I really enjoyed being out in the field, helping coordinate work and interacting with the trades, so on one of my projects I made a switch and started doing both. From there, I progressed to assistant superintendent, then superintendent.

Paredes: I’m a general superintendent, and I’m on the leadership team in Austin. I studied Construction Management in college, but in 2006 I saw a need opening up in the field with a lot of experienced superintendents retiring, so I took advantage of that and went the field route. I’ve been able to do a lot of projects I really enjoy—tall structures in a hectic downtown environment that are logistically challenging—and I get to share my knowledge. What really drives me is building good teams, and I get great satisfaction from knowing we’re not just building projects; we’re building people.

Q: Why do you think being a self-performing general contractor makes a difference on a project?

Sweeney: One of the biggest benefits is that everyone is on same page as far as overall goal for project. There’s no hidden agenda; it’s all DPR and we all have the same goal. There’s an extra level of honesty and transparency that makes things a lot easier. You feel like you’re talking to a friend. The things we do in the field drive the critical path, and we have a massive impact as a team that helps the schedule. That all comes down to communication and that lack of a barrier.

Paredes: On this project, it made all the difference with our schedule. We did all the structural concrete from level B3 up to level 34, and Concrete was able to gain us about a month overall. We used a climbing core system, which used to be unique to Austin. Our concrete lead had a lot of experience with it on the West Coast, where it’s utilized more. It allowed us to keep the form work intact. With limited space around the project, keeping that form work up on the deck rather than having to fly it down after every pour was pretty instrumental. There was a cost upgrade to it, but it allowed us to gain some schedule time back. Now if you look around Austin, I think there are four other projects that have climbing core systems, and prior to this project there were zero.

Our Drywall group performed all the framing and drywall on all the guest room levels, from level 7 through 34. We never missed a drywall hang date throughout the entire project. That was a big milestone, and we hit it on every single one of those floors. Our Interiors group installed every bit of doors and hardware, all of the bathroom accessories, and the shower glass enclosures in the guest rooms. Our Division 7 team performed all the acoustical and firestop, and did all the waterproofing down below grade. They executed flawlessly. We did a really good job with our self-perform group, and we’re awfully proud.

Q: What have you learned from each other?

Paredes: What I got from Emory is a renewed drive. He is intense with planning and scheduling, and with what he expects from people. Part of our job is to motivate others on our team, so it was refreshing to see someone who has that intensity. His persistence with things is never-ending and watching him teach other people has been awesome. I’ve been able to take some cues for how to talk to others; he’s a really good partner.

Sweeney: It’s important for us to be able to give people guidelines but then allow them the freedom to develop plans. We have to manage expectations because we can’t touch everything personally. I needed to develop that skill: to help people grow and develop their own plans, and help them develop professionally. This is the first project where I felt I accomplished that and really helped build some good people. When we encountered difficult situations and tensions ran high, Steve was good about taking a step back and finding ways to keep people on the jobsite motivated.

Q: Talk about a time in your career where you intervened to make the work on-site safer.

Paredes: Our planning throughout this hotel project really aided in that, but we worked hard at it. We wanted to be very intentional, so we called a meeting with all our project leadership and foremen from our concrete crews. We tried to make it personal, and we talked through everything. I wrote on the board every person who was on-site. We drilled down into making the craft part of the process. After that discussion, there was a huge revelation for the entire team on what safety on the jobsite really meant. It wasn’t about me policing it. It was about being a team and caring for each other. It was about being productive, doing our jobs, and making sure everyone went home safely each day.

Q: What is one thing you think everyone can do to make the industry as a whole safer for everyone?

Sweeney: Find partners on your job who make safety personal—who take it seriously and always do the right thing—and then encourage that mindset to spread across the organization. You can’t sit down with everyone, so finding partners to talk about the importance of safety makes it infectious. The other component is not putting up with incorrect behavior. There’s a quote: “The thing about morals is it’s not what you say, it’s what you tolerate.” If you see something, say something and don’t tolerate unsafe activities. Training is a huge part of it, too. Make sure you have all the tools you need, then hold people accountable.

Paredes: For us, it’s about having an unparalleled training program to arm people with the tools they need to make the right decisions and have the entire team brought in on that mentality.

Q: Was this experience different from other projects you worked on? How?

Paredes: This is the first job for me that had my stamp on it 100%. It was really on me and the project manager to set up the project correctly with the knowledge that we were going to utilize our self-perform trades for the critical path work. When Emory came on board, I told him we were not going to allow ourselves to fail. We’ve been on jobs with scheduling issues, and I refused to allow that to happen here. Our SPW teams understood that we were all in this together, and we fought for each other. We set up that mentality from the beginning, and it had a huge impact on our overall success.

Sweeney: This was the first time I had ever done a hotel. I think our biggest success was our self-perform collaboration. We embraced the fact that we’re all on the same team--project management and the craft. We’ve talked about that a lot in the past, but I’ve never seen it as strong as it was on this project. Once we were all able to get on same page, we were hitting our schedule, and that led to this culture of everyone else falling in line. Our SPW team on this project was huge, delivering excellent work.

Q: To be successful in your role, what skills does a person need?

Sweeney: Accountability—to yourself and to others. And communication, which is huge to me. You have to communicate your plan and your expectations around schedule properly. That doesn’t mean talking TO team members, but talking WITH team members and getting them bought in. Once people agree and there’s buy-in, then you hold each other accountable.

Paredes: In my role, you have to be able to set boundaries and let your team make decisions while operating within those boundaries to allow them to grow and succeed. During my career, I’ve learned that I operate better when I can make my own decisions. It’s important to know when to offer more guidance within that matrix and when to hold back and let your team drive.

Q: What would your advice be for the next generation of builders entering this field?

Paredes: For me, I was cocky and arrogant when I started out. I thought I knew a bunch of stuff, but I’m still learning every day. So, take advice from others. Don’t be afraid of criticism and be open to others’ thoughts and ideas. Be a sponge when you’re starting out and know that at the end of the day field operations is pretty damned cool. We’re the builders.

Sweeney: Be humble and admit that you don’t know a lot when you’re just starting out. Be willing to accept that. In the beginning, you don’t know a lot more than you do know, so act upon that. Find the right information. Ask questions. Learn. Be accountable. Trust is such a massive thing in our industry, so walk the talk and do what you say you’re going to do every time.

Mass timber, healthy spaces, adaptive reuse, resiliency and more are leading discussion topics in the realm of sustainability.

We've put many resources in one place as the sustainability community gathers virtually for Greenbuild this week. Through experiences on our own projects and for our customers, we believe a healthy and high-performing built environment can be constructed affordably for any project type in its core markets.

Mass Timber: Lessons Learned from DPR Construction Projects

Mass timber continues to gain ground as an innovative alternative building material. Engineered for loads similar in strength to structural materials like concrete and steel, mass timber allows crews to build tall, with a lighter, natural, low-carbon and high-quality resource. As its adoption grows, questions inevitably arise about the do’s and don’ts of its deployment. Continue reading >

Building for Resilience in Workspaces: A Series

Since the COVID-19 pandemic started, there has been significant speculation about what the pandemic will mean for workplaces in the future. The return to the office will happen, and when it does, it will look different for every organization. What will be important, though, is making sure offices are set up in ways to minimize further disruptions and optimize the health of their occupants. Through the design and construction approaches, businesses can plan for resiliency in the face of not only this pandemic, but other potentialities that could disrupt business for weeks or months at a time. Continue reading >

Revitalizing Urban Areas Through Adaptive Reuse

RENOVATING AGING BUILDINGS TO HIGH PERFORMANCE

In a shift from the midcentury trend of downtown abandonment and blight due to the rise of suburbs, adaptive reuse has been gaining ground—a shift The National Trust for Historic Preservation calls “reurbanism.” Adaptive reuse differs from restoration or historic preservation because it fundamentally changes the purpose of a building to meet different occupant needs. It creates an opportunity to not only update the aesthetics of a structure, but to push the envelope in design and construction by transforming aging structures into high performing buildings. Continue reading >

Creating Healthy Spaces

PEOPLE ARE THE MOST IMPORTANT ASSET IN A BUILDING. BUILDINGS SHOULD SUPPORT THEIR WELL-BEING.

We’ve all walked into a room and been overly distracted by smells, lighting, temperature, noise or other environmental factors. We all know the resulting feeling of a headache coming on and the desire to move to a different space where we can focus. The places where we work should be designed and built to encourage our ability to do the things we’re best at, rather than distract from them. How much productivity is lost when whole groups are working in less than ideal environments? Continue reading >

Miller Hull Studio Earns Petal Certification for Sustainable Design

The Miller Hull Partnership recently received Living Building Challenge Petal Certification for the renovation of its San Diego studio. Built by DPR Construction, the 4,600-square-foot tenant improvement included upgrades to the open office, conference rooms and model shop. Continue reading >

The Path to Net-Zero Energy

HOW DPR'S LIVING LABS ARE PIONEERING NET-ZERO ENERGY BUILDING CERTIFICATION

In the ever-evolving sustainable design and construction arena, many owners and project teams are setting their sights on a goal that seemed improbable just a short time ago: creating commercial buildings that produce as much or more energy as they consume each year, known as net-zero energy buildings. Continue reading >

DPR Helps WRNS Studio Office Seek LBC Materials Petal Certification

DPR Construction played a key role in the extensive efforts of WRNS Studio's Seattle office to seek Living Building Challenge Materials Petal certification, which would be a first for DPR’s Northwest region. WRNS desired a higher standard of sustainability with the project, a concept that aligns with DPR’s sustainability goals. Continue reading >

Earth Day 2020: Data that Counts in the Built Environment

This Earth Day, DPR is taking stock of its impacts on the planet and communities where it operates and reflecting on the environmental performance of its office operations, especially the observation that high-performance buildings at market rates are realistic. Continue reading >

While the world was adjusting to life with COVID-19, DPR Construction sought out its industry partners and customers to collaboratively look forward as we navigate this unprecedented pandemic and its effects on healthcare. These discussions delved deeply into current impacts, challenges, and opportunities that are emerging as the pandemic continues to affect the world.

This is the first in a series of briefings sharing collective insights. This introductory briefing provides an overview of key topics. Upcoming installments will include looks at:

• Changes Due to COVID-19
• Innovations and Technology Due to COVID-19
• Lessons Learned and Silver Linings Due to COVID-19
• Construction Delivery Adaptations Due to COVID-19

DPR would like to thank Banner Health, City of Hope, CO Architects, EYP, HGA, HKS, Jacobs, Perkins & Will, Rady Children’s Hospital, Sharp Grossmont Hospital, SmithGroup, Stantec, Virginia Commonwealth University Health System, WSP, and Site Plus, a communications consultant to DPR, for their participation in gathering these insights.

What Did We Learn?

When these conversations began, DPR and its partners were all just beginning to understand the pandemic's effects and implement changes to address new concerns and ways to continue to provide services by and for the healthcare industry. Throughout every conversation, one thing became clear: the future is not predictable. Success means learning to deal with that unpredictability and also refraining from acting prematurely.

Solutions that health care systems and the industries that support them need to be future proof. Measures put into place now must continue to be of value into the future. How? There was agreement among participants that flexibility is paramount.

The challenges posed by COVID-19 generally fall into three categories: safety, capacity, and isolation.

• Safety considerations must take into account patients, staff and essential vendors, including the design and building team. Separating infectious patients, providing adequate PPE to staff and frequent testing are the primary essential strategies that were identified.
• Surge capacity planning must consider the increase in pandemic cases. This was the first area where design and construction professionals had an impact. Initial temporary solutions yielded to planning that can accommodate on-going patient care concurrently with isolated surge needs.
• The use of portable HEPA filters to create negative pressure rooms quickly accommodated the necessary isolation of patients until better separation strategies could be implemented.
• There’s no one solution for all, every system and facility have a different footprint, a different financial position, and different operational considerations. All these things must be considered within the local context.

Additionally, the discussions yielded that there is a silver lining amongst the effects of COVID-19. The pandemic has clearly accelerated several positive changes in healthcare.

• Foremost is the adaptation to a digital healthcare model, telehealth and telemedicine. There was clear acknowledgement that it was not technology and connectivity that were inhibiting telehealth implementation as much as it was insurance payments and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) lack of coverage. When emergency waivers went into effect, the use of telehealth exploded. When it was offered by medical practices, it was quickly adopted by patients. Now, it is here to stay.
• Data interoperability has also taken a huge leap forward fueled by pandemic reporting. Patients’ electronic health records had still been maintained in silos between doctors, hospitals, and insurance companies. With the onset of COVID-19, data standards are rapidly being developed, adopted, and implemented.
• While not immediately rectified, the pandemic has demonstrated the need for more of a national supply chain instead of relying on international manufacturers for items such as PPE, drugs, and diagnostic tests.
• Some temporary changes may lead to permanent efficiencies in space usage, such as off-site electronic patient registration and PPE donning and doffing in designated anterooms, and alternate clinical workflows.

There is certain to be another pandemic, disruption, seasonal surge or similar critical healthcare crisis. The convened panel of healthcare leaders all agree that planning ahead now for better flexibility in our health care facilities is one thing everyone can and should be doing.

DPR Construction’s self-perform workers (SPW) came together to complete a highly anticipated renovation project for the Boys & Girls Clubs of Tampa Bay’s Belmont Heights club. In conjunction with DPR’s community initiatives commitment to facility construction and renovation, the project scope included a full demolition and build-out of an old, non-reusable locker room to update and expand Belmont Heights’ existing facility.

“DPR and the Boys & Girls Clubs have been working toward fulfilling this renovation for two-years now,” said Erin Knight, a project manager and estimator for DPR’s SPW team (Division 10/Specialties) for the Southeast region. “We wanted to create an open space that helped the club gain 2,200 sq.-ft. back that had become dead space for nearly 15 years.”

Crediting DPR’s SPW crews (consisting of concrete, doors, flooring, hardware, drywall and Division 10/Specialties) and local trade partners for completing the three-month renovation, Knight expressed how this project reflected DPR’s ongoing commitment to supporting the Tampa Bay community.

“Our SPW crew allowed us to control the project environment,” says Knight. “We were able to use our expertise as builders to efficiently and effectively complete the renovation, in addition to saving nearly $8,700 to give back to the Boys & Girls Clubs of Tampa Bay.”

Demolition on the club began amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and, as the project progressed, the logistical changes necessitated by the pandemic increased the significance of DPR’s facility updates.

“This renovation allowed the Boys & Girls Club to have adequate space for the local step/dance team to practice and compete in, and to host essential after-school and summer programs that require social distancing measures,” shared Knight.

DPR’s partnership with the Boys & Girls Clubs of Tampa Bay started more than five years ago, and Knight looks forward to more opportunities for collaboration in the future.

“We are here to change and grow the city of Tampa and want to make sure those goals positively affect the under-resourced as well,” said Knight.

Upfront coordination was critical to success at the Banner University Medical Center Stereotaxis Cathlab in Phoenix, where DPR installed a first-of-its-kind robotic magnetic navigation system used to treat heart rhythm disorders. In this specialized facility, patients can receive expert care with the aid of a new generation of robotics.

The team delivered this project –including the first installation of the new Genesis navigation system in the U.S. –with zero rework under some of the most stringent quality healthcare requirements.

Piecing the puzzle together

As this was one of the first Genesis Robotic Magnetic Navigation systems in the world, the project team had to pioneer its own installation process. The system was also seeking FDA approval during part of the construction timeline, so the team had to plan to accommodate multiple systems due to the uncertainty of what would ultimately be installed. Collaboration with the designer, HMC Architects, engineering partners Pangolin Structural and LSW Engineers, and trade partners was critical.

Nine different pieces of equipment from various manufacturers needed conduit/raceways going through the floor and walls, and elements like air conditioning and lighting had to be incorporated without penetrating the room’s barrier. Additionally, the team could not shrink the room to make the walls wider or lower the ceiling, so there was extensive coordination for overhead infrastructure.

“Just like a traditional MRI envelope with copper shielding, this space had steel shielding and lead around the room,” said DPR’s Cody Murata. “In a normal room, you can just move an outlet. In this room, we would have had to rip off the drywall, steel shielding, and lead to make changes. We had to get it right and we had to get creative because everything had to stay inside the room.”

Starting with three different vendor drawings of the various systems and a floorplan of the room, Murata pieced together a single plan and sketched out all the conduits in the space. The team took this coordination effort further by leaning on DPR’s Virtual Design and Construction (VDC) capabilities to do clash detection and specific routing within the 3D model.

Perfectly level

The facility will enable procedures where a doctor makes an incision in the leg and carefully maneuvers a catheter through the body. The system uses small rotating magnets and magnetic fields to navigate remotely, and thus requires very tight tolerances for floor flatness because of the way the magnets glide during operations.

Using a laser scan of the floor and underneath the floor, the team created a model to avoid structural steel. Next, they conducted a floor flatness analysis and scanned the floor before leveling material was poured to reduce variations and confirm it was within the tolerance. In the end, it was 0.008 inches within tolerance – exceeding the standard.

“The team went above and way beyond with major attention to the smallest of details and design coordination,” said Greg Borden, Banner University Medical Center’s project manager. “Stereotaxis [the Genesis system vendor] didn’t even need to shim the base plates to achieve laser alignment between the two robotic magnets. This goes along with DPR also having zero rework.”

Using all the tools in the virtual toolbox

Integrating DPR’s VDC capabilities into the workflow of its Special Services Group, which was enlisted for the renovation project, proved beneficial to this highly complex endeavor. Prior to construction, the team’s VDC specialist, Ted Barnes, worked with all stakeholders to evaluate, scan and model site conditions, as well as coordinate with design and trade partners.

“Integrating with the team early enabled us to review issues that would directly impact the project and communicate and resolve them before they could cause problems during construction, “said Barnes. “It helped foster an environment of decision-making and collaboration that made coordinating this project successful.”

Adding to overall efficiency and quality control, DPR self-performed concrete, drywall and other special scopes. Ultimately, the project was completed in just seven months and came in under budget, but the ultimate indicator of success was the fact that nothing had to be redone. “Zero rework is the goal,” said Murata. “How you achieve that is upfront coordination. If you have no rework then you will have zero defects.”

The Georgia Tech women’s basketball team has a new space to enjoy pre-and post-game, practices and training sessions as DPR Construction completed a new locker room space for the Yellow Jackets, an addition and renovation of 2,610 sq.-ft. located between McCamish Pavilion and Zelnak Center.

“DPR over-delivered and I know our student-athletes and coaches are so happy with their new home. I can’t say enough about the insight, creativity, attention to detail, and passion the DPR team brought to the project,” said Todd Stansbury, Georgia Tech director of athletics.

Georgia Tech’s move to upgrade its outdated women’s basketball locker room facility was based on ensuring that its players would have a unique and memorable college basketball experience.

“It’s a beautiful space, we’re super excited about it. It has a championship feel to it, so it immediately sets the tone for who we are as a women’s basketball program,” said Nell Fortner, Georgia Tech women’s basketball head coach.

The renovated space includes a staff lounge, game lounge, nutrition lounge, and a new hydrotherapy tub for player recovery. For many project team members, the project was a labor of love, too.

“As a Georgia Tech graduate and former student-athlete, having the opportunity to come back to campus, and contribute to the growth of Georgia Tech Facilities through DPR Construction is both a blessing and honor,” said Brian Oliver, a DPR Sr. Project Manager.

Georgia Tech chose custom made Hollman lockers that feature individual engravable name and number plates with substantial space for player uniforms, equipment and personal items.

“One of the core focuses was to upgrade individual lockers to give players an all-star experience,” said DPR’s Heather Taylor, a project engineer.

The existing exterior storefront was dismantled by the project team to extend the space by 172-sq.-ft. for the addition of the new recruiting cove area. DPR leveraged its MEP expertise, as well, especially on a new sprinkler system in the locker room connecting to McCamish Pavilion that was installed to bring the space up to code. This heavily coordinated process required draining the entire existing McCamish Pavilion sprinkler system.

The locker room was revealed and turned over to Georgia Tech in time for the team’s first practice of the 2020-2021 season.

“There’s no question it helps long term for recruiting because if you’re a big-time player, you want big-time facilities. You want to play in a beautiful arena like McCamish Pavilion. You want to practice in a facility like Zelnak Basketball Center and you want a locker room that you’re proud of and one you want to go to every day,” said Fortner.

The project is DPR’s latest on the campus. DPR made its building debut at Georgia Tech in 2008. As Georgia Tech’s building landscape continues to expand and flourish, DPR’s project construction completion footprint at Georgia Tech includes:

• Georgia Tech I School of Applied Physiology and Student Competition Center
• Georgia Tech | Physiological Research Lab Renovation & Expansion
• Georgia Tech | School of Molecular Science and Engineering | 1st and 2nd Floors
• Georgia Tech | Technology Square

The second installment of the COVID-19 Healthcare briefing series delves into the insights provided by DPR Construction's industry partners and clients as they navigate changes to the healthcare industry.

Many facilities altered safety, capacity, and isolation protocols in response to COVID-19. DPR Construction’s conversations with customers and partners identified universal challenges to responding to the pandemic. Industry leaders consistently agreed that new solutions must be future-proof as we prepare for pandemics and ongoing care to co-exist and recapture patient confidence.

Acuity Adaptability was a hot topic prior to COVID-19, and continues to be discussed in many ways

• A universal room model could be designed and built to the highest level of acuity and allow for flexibility over time. With this model, rooms could be reassigned from an intensive care unit to general acute care, or vice versa, without staff going into the room and making physical changes down the line.
• With regulatory agency approval, outpatient and ambulatory facilities could provide greater flexibility in the future. Lower acuity facilities can flex into negative pressure spaces for higher acuity demands (i.e. up license for surges).
• In the future, MEP systems can be designed or retrofitted to support increased capacity within existing rooms, including power and med-gas.
• With changes to current codes, ORs and ERs could be designed to flex between positive and negative air systems. Alternatively, by modifying space within hospital walls, ante rooms could be added to ORs.
• Modularization can be utilized to quickly create additional triage space and beds. This is particularly relevant for rural and remote areas where there are additional challenges with scaling labor and material procurement.

An important distinction with many of the temporary and makeshift conversions deployed to flex to alternate acuity levels during the early stages of this pandemic is that they do not meet all of the required codes and are identified as “negative pressure rooms,” not “isolation rooms.” As further refinements and adjustments to the concept emerge, the acuity-adaptable room may find a place as a standard in future healthcare facilities.

Infrastructure Flexibility strategies to accommodate rapid change were identified.

Having correctly scaled systems in place within a facility are vital to allow for adaptability and agility. Looking closely behind the walls of healthcare facilities will be an important focus for both future renovations and new construction.

• Robust mechanical systems support surge preparedness while providing flexibility to also manage seasonal census and non-surge times. Potential areas of focus include:
  • Negative air pressurization
  • Outside air
  • Increased air exchanges
  • HEPA air filtration
  • UV solutions
  • Medical gas infrastructure

• Additionally, IT and communication systems must be in place that can flex to monitor, treat and communicate outside the room of the highly contagious patients.

Patient and Staff Flow changes were among the fastest adjustments healthcare facilities made during the pandemic and will continue to be fundamental for future safety protocols.

A safe and secure flow pattern is a key to regaining patient confidence in healthcare environments.

• ERs should not be the first stop. Screening, testing, and triage were identified as front-line services that could be separated and occur outside the hospital walls or in a designated, isolated location within the existing facility to create a safer workflow. Modular facilities are a fast, economical way to accommodate this change.
• Future entry sequencing, wayfinding tools and waiting rooms will be shaped by technology. Waiting rooms could be smaller, less populated and self-regulated by patients and families. Features that can be improved upon, made socially distant, and therefore safer, by technology include:
  • Kiosks
  • Self-check ins
  • Health checks
  • Wayfinding
  • Off stage, just-in-time paging
  • Micro waiting areas
• Sanitation stations and sinks for handwashing will be expected throughout the facility, including at entrances and exits.
• Separate areas for sick and healthy patients may be prioritized to regain confidence of the public. This will be an important part of bettering the patient experience through signage, wayfinding and public health education. The importance of increasing consumer confidence in safety while not losing touch with the headway that has been made in the patient experience will be an area for all to consider.
• Elevators remain challenging. Limiting the number of people and where they stand on elevators needs to be worked out. How we queue up for the next elevator is also an issue.

PPE requirements have broad effects to spatial changes that need to be made within facilities, including:

• Donning and doffing areas
• Ante rooms
• Storage for required inventory (especially in light of PPE shortages when the just-in-time delivery chain was under strain.)

How did customers initially respond to the pandemic?

Sean Ashcroft, one of DPR’s national healthcare leaders, shared that “early in the pandemic, most of the facility modification requests from DPR’s healthcare customers were temporary walls for additional triage and isolation space, tents for screening, modified entrances, and converting existing space within facilities for additional patient rooms. It was amazing how our industry and partners jumped into action with us and were ready to help.”

Now that the industry has learned more about facility needs during a pandemic, projects that are in planning or early in construction stages have an advantage. Teams are able to quickly respond by tweaking infrastructure, evaluating new workflows and patient flows, incorporating technology, and even changing to adaptable or universal rooms. Existing facilities have many innovative options to retrofit.

How do we address change when uncertainty remains?

A known result and action for DPR's healthcare customers is being future ready for pandemics and other disruptions.

“Emergency preparedness, surge planning, and implementation of new regulatory requirements will impact all healthcare facilities,” said Hamilton Espinosa, one of DPR’s national healthcare leaders.“Collaborative design and construction solutions are more important than ever, and this will require collective action by our industry.

“We have all learned a lot over the past many months. Sharing intelligence and the industry’s willingness to collaborate has been humbling and our shared knowledge will lead the industry to the best path forward. As this industry group consistently repeated, with flexible solutions around safety, capacity and isolation – we can stay ahead, be ready, and find solutions to provide a patient centered environment of care for everyone at any time.”

Everyone has ended up in a sticky safety situation because of excitement or being in a rush. Perhaps no one has been there more than holiday antihero, Clark W. Griswold, whose family’s festive activities featured in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation ran the gamut from setting a Christmas tree on fire to a variety of ladder mishaps, resulting in Clark sliding down his gabled roof and hanging from the gutter, sending an icicle through his neighbor’s window and Clark making an unceremonious landing in a snow-covered bush.

Clark (and his whole family) would have benefited from safety tips from a company that holds safety as a value, informing the way it operates every single day. In other words, the approach DPR Construction’s Environmental Health & Safety (EHS) professionals put to work on complex jobsites every day could have helped Clark.

Clark was lucky. In fact, the Consumer Products Safety Commission says that there are nearly 18,000 emergency room visits from holiday decorating every year! Planning like a construction pro, though, means the typical household tree decorator or light stringer can avoid trips to the ER.

“We work at height every day,” said John Hogan, one of DPR’s EHS leaders. “We know how to handle hazardous energy and fire hazards. It’s the table stakes of doing construction work and the best practices we follow on the jobsite can certainly keep people healthy and safe at home.”

Ladders

“We always say ‘ladders last,” said DPR’s T.J. Lyons, another one of the firm’s safety leaders. “The best first step is seeing if you can use something more stable than a ladder to work from height. For us, that means things like scissor lifts. In many households, though, a ladder is the choice and that means being extremely vigilant.

The CPSC says the majority of holiday ER visits come from falls and those tend to involve ladders. If you must use a ladder, Lyons recommends these steps for household ladder use:

• Inspect your ladder and ensure it is securely placed on the ground before climbing it
• When on the ladder, keep your body inside the ladder frame. If you find yourself stretching off to reach, you need to climb down and move the ladder.
• Moving a ladder? Don’t “hop” the ladder Griswold-style. Climb down, maintaining three points of connection with the ladder and only move the ladder once on the ground.
• Never stand on the top two ladder rungs.
• Know where electricity comes into your house from the pole and keep your ladder far from it.

Fire

From the kitchen to the living room, the holidays bring fire hazards. The CPSC says that, from 2014 to 2016, there were about 100 Christmas tree fires and about 1,100 candle fires that resulted in 10 deaths, 150 injuries, and nearly $50 million in property damage each of those years. There are also thousands of cooking fires every year related to holiday cooking.

“On the jobsite, we believe the best way to stop a fire is not having one,” Hogan says. “Taking the steps to make sure one never starts is as important as making sure you have a fire extinguisher ready to go.”

Among other steps Hogan recommends are:

• Water live Christmas trees daily and make sure that electrical cords and lights are in good condition.
• More than half of home decorations fires are started by candles, so:
  • If using candles for decorating, in a menorah or kinara, making sure they are far from flammable items and never leave them unattended.
  • When possible, try using battery-operated candles instead.
• Keep combustible materials at least three feet from heat sources (e.g. fireplaces, space heaters.)
• Never use propane or gas heaters that are made for outdoor use inside the house.

Electricity

Most homeowners do not work around the types of electrical hazards construction workers do. But, even the smaller sources of household electricity are enough to be fatal or to cause a fire.

“You don’t get time to negotiate with hazardous energy,” Hogan said. “We also have a lot of electrical cord protocols that serve as best practices in any household.”

Hogan recommended starting with the basics:

• Make sure electrical decorations are labeled with approval from Underwriters Laboratory (UL), which should be clearly displayed on the tag and indicates the product has been inspected for potential safety hazards
  • Red UL marks mean the lights are safe for indoor/outdoor use
  • Green UL marks mean the lights are only safe indoors
• Use heavy duty extension cords that are designed for outdoor use for exterior decorations.
• Just like on a jobsite, inspect cords for frayed wires or cracks and replace any damaged cords.
• Do not “daisy chain” extension cords and do not overload circuits.
• Keep lights away from flammable surfaces such as drapes, furniture or carpeting
• Turn the lights off when not at home or overnight
• Eliminate slip and trip hazards by placing cords and decorations in low-traffic areas. Also, do not run cords under doors where they may get crushed and never over the sharp edges of a gutter.

Half of DPR Construction’s employees are craft workers in a variety of trades. That means DPR is able to leverage the benefits of being a self-performing general contractor to better control schedule and quality, and to react quickly when conditions change in the field. While maintaining a strong commitment to local trade partners, DPR project teams and their talented self-performing crews are making big things happen.

Building a state-of-the art plant research facility in Southern California

DPR’s self-perform capabilities were instrumental in the recent construction of the $22 million, 31,500-sq.-ft., two-story Plant Growth Environments Facility on the University of California, Riverside campus—the first new greenhouse facility built on the Southern California campus in nearly 40 years.

The design-build team of DPR and Perkins+Will, along with design-build subcontractor Stuppy Greenhouse, created a research facility that puts science on display. The facility was constructed with concrete walls on the first floor and glass-encased greenhouses elevated above. Individual growth chambers on the first floor will house plants, pathogens and insects in separate, controlled environments. DPR concrete crews self-performed roughly 15% of the project volume, while self-perform drywall crews played a key role in pushing the schedule forward.

Early on, the team faced some challenges with the greenhouse framing. At the time work was to begin on the greenhouse portion, DPR’s concrete crew was on-site completing the cast-in-place structure that would serve as the first-floor foundation for the glass building. The site was tight, with only one point of access and limited space between the site wall and finished concrete structure to receive and offload material for the entire project. Because of the high risk of loading and offloading materials and the lack of a certified forklift driver on the part of the greenhouse vendor, DPR’s self-perform group was able to quickly pivot to take on the scope of managing the hundreds of thousands of intricate pieces making up the state of the art research facility. “Given the small site and elevated work platform, material management was no small task,” said Damon Hole, who served as superintendent on the project.

DPR team members received load after load of metal, glass and other components from the greenhouse vendor’s Midwest location to keep the project on track. “They also went above and beyond to keep the work environment clean and safe to keep other trades effective and efficient,” said Hole.

Once the greenhouse vendor started erecting the structure, DPR’s concrete and drywall corps supplemented their crew to push the project forward.

“For months these carpenters traded their concrete formwork, chop saws and metal studs in for aluminum glass extrusions, ridge vent systems and bug screens on the 100% exposed structure,” said Hole. “Every screw, bracket and brace here is exposed to view through the glass walls and corridors. The team essentially plumbed and squared the building up, took over structural framing activities in their entirety, and corrected existing issues,” explained Hole.

Once framing was complete, SPW team members were divided among the greenhouse crew and assisted with the various greenhouse components that make the building so unique. They learned, assisted, then led the crews with installation and built 100% custom evaporative cooling systems with large vertical vent sashes that automatically open and close according the cooling demand of each individual plant house. Additionally, the DPR team installed custom-designed direct drive worm gear shade systems that open and close based on sunlight exposure and heat control requirements of each room. Operable glass ridge vents that allow fresh air to be pulled into the building when needed, along with thousands of feet of exposed flashing and 60 large greenhouse benches to support the plant research and growth were also completed by the DPR crew. “Perhaps the biggest lesson we learned on this project is that no matter how big or small the job, you can’t do it alone. We were lucky that we have so many talented craft men and women at DPR. Our client recognizes the monumental effort they have put into this success, and it is a testament to what our self-perform work can do for our clients to help ensure their projects will be successful,” said Hole.

Attention to detail saves schedule at The Center for Advanced Healthcare at Brownwood

In The Villages, Florida, DPR recently completed The Villages Center for Advanced Healthcare at Brownwood (CAHB) and Brownwood Hotel & Spa, a unique 31-acre project that includes over 400,000 sq.-ft. of interior space. The four-story medical facility is the first phase in the development of a long-term ambulatory care program that will provide a host of comprehensive services ranging from Dermatology to Urology. One notable tenant, the AVIV Clinic, offers a first-of-its-kind hyperbaric oxygen treatment center featuring two 138,000-pound hyperbaric chambers, making it the largest hyperbaric medicine operation in the United States.

The adjacent Brownwood Hotel & Spa connects to the specialty center on the second floor, allowing patients to receive outpatient procedures and then check into the hotel ever without leaving the premises. Inspired by the nearby Brownwood Town Square, the hotel utilizes a warm, rustic interior and an exterior facade that features locally sourced stone and prefabricated wall panels on the hotel tower.

DPR actively embraces such innovative design and construction methods that can positively impact project schedules, and by paying close attention to specific details, project teams are able to adapt and overcome real-time challenges in the field that often prohibit construction advancement. On this project, the team’s diligence and proactive solutions allowed for an efficient and fluid construction sequence. The team was proactive in seeking out solutions and collaboratively developed an actionable plan to address finite details.

An example of this was related to the Doors, Frames and Hardware (DFH) in the Brownwood Hotel & Spa. Setting the appropriate budget and schedule from the outset, DPR’s self-perform group was able to get into the details both virtually and in the form of physical mock-ups. A mock-up hotel room was created for early approvals and team alignment. Often overlooked, the entry doors had unique features that included a small rubber cap between the hotel corridor carpet and the entry suite LVT rather than the typical detail with a transition strip. Originally, the team planned on using a small transition strip, but the mock-up enabled and informed some early decisions, including incorporating the ½-inch rise strip. With the short time frame between mock-up approvals and the release of materials, DPR was able to make adjustments in the field without disrupting critical procurement milestones.

“We called the manufacturer and were able to change the size of the entry doors in time, just as they were about to run them through the mill. If we hadn’t done so, we would have spent hours modifying doors, or potentially having to order new ones altogether,” said Chris Lowe, who served as a project manager on the build.

Pushing schedule with self-perform work in Texas

In Austin, Texas, DPR’s concrete, framing and drywall, interiors/DFH and Division 7 (firestop & waterproofing) self-perform crews were instrumental in the early completion of the Austin Marriott Downtown, a 32-story, 613-key hotel project six weeks ahead of schedule.

“On this project, SPW made all the difference with our schedule,” said DPR’s Steven Paredes, a general superintendent. “Concrete was able to gain us about a month overall.”

In a dense, downtown environment, logistical challenges are many and construction crews look for innovative ways to build. The team in Austin decided to utilize a system that was uncommon there at that time but was familiar to DPR’s concrete lead from their time on the West Coast.

“We used a climbing core system,” Paredes said. “It allowed us to keep the form work intact. With limited space around the project, keeping that form work up on the deck rather than having to fly it down after every pour was pretty instrumental.”

In addition, DPR drywall crews performed all framing and drywall on the hotel’s guest room levels, from level 7 through level 34. Additionally, DPR’s interiors group installed all doors, hardware and bathroom accessories throughout the building and installed the shower glass enclosures in all of the guestrooms, while the Division 7 team performed all the acoustical and firestop, as well as all below-grade waterproofing. “We never missed a drywall hang date throughout the entire project. That was a big milestone, and we hit it on every single one of those floors,” said Paredes.

Utilizing DPR self-perform trades for the critical path work made this Austin project a success not only because of their skill and the presence of a solid plan. The high degree to which everyone was aligned, regardless of role, played a huge role in their success. Paredes and his team simply decided they would not allow themselves to fail. “We refused to allow that to happen on this job. Once we all agreed that we were in this together, we fought for each other. Having that mentality set up from the beginning had a huge impact on our overall success,” shared Paredes

Virtual design and construction (VDC) software might not seem like an equivalent to a smartphone translation app, but don’t tell that to DPR Construction’s Peter Schneider. Schneider and his colleagues are wrapping up work on a 10mW data center project near Zurich, Switzerland.

“Most of our trade partners speak Portuguese and Italian, most of the project management on this project speaks German or English,” Schneider said, “but everyone speaks VDC. Having a 4-D model of the project means everyone is looking at the same thing, no matter what language they speak.”

In fact, leveraging technology tools has yielded several benefits for the team on this 194,000-sq.ft. (18,000-sq.-m) facility for a global technology firm.

“In the data center sector, time-to-market is important,” Schneider said. “Often, the customer wants work to start before design is completed. VDC tools helps us get to a constructable design that can be built in a more efficient manner.”

For the Zurich project, VDC also enabled a more efficient sequencing of the building envelope, mechanical/electrical/plumbing (MEP) elements and the structural steel needed to support that equipment.

“There was a challenge of getting a trade partner to perform his work within a certain time frame,” said Alex Hood, a DPR superintendent. “VDC visualizations helped the entire team buy into a sequenced approach that got each trade started as work areas were ready for them. It was a significant schedule savings and, again, VDC was the language that got everyone aligned.”

Two other tech tools have worked together to verify as-built conditions: laser scanning and StructionSite.

On this project, for example, more than 1,800 pictures of ongoing progress have been uploaded to the StructionSite platform in real time, a significant efficiency compared to old methods of file-by-file uploading. And, in 2020, there are added benefits.

“It really helped us with the COVID-19 pandemic,” Schneider said. “People could have a look at progress while not being able to travel to the site.”

Between StructionSite and laser scanning, the team was also able to check as-built conditions and identify if there were any issues with elements such as MEP penetrations and more. Another way it helped is to have an idea where the openings for MEP equipment in as-built conditions were vs. plan.

“Anyone who has ever put together certain pieces of furniture knows how visualizations make all the difference,” said Schneider. “VDC served that role on this project, creating alignment among every project partner that language alone couldn’t have.”

The third installment of DPR Construction’s COVID-19 briefing series delves into the insights industry partners and clients provided regarding how an accelerated adoption of technologies may shape the healthcare industry.

COVID-19 has been a disruptor, accelerating and improving the implementation of technology used in healthcare while enabling flexibility of care. What took years to develop and implement is now put into action within weeks.

In the healthcare industry, digital technologies and system integrations have transformed the relationship between medical professional and patient. These integrations will improve the patient experience, access to care, physician access to information, and provides faster and more effective care solutions. Predicting the future has continually been a challenge for imaging, diagnostics, and medical equipment when planning facilities. The consensus from industry leaders is that the adoption of new technologies in healthcare has been accelerated by COVID-19 and will be a game changer as we enter a digital transformation of care.

There is clear consensus among industry leaders that technology will improve health outcomes and increase access to care. Additionally, as patient behaviors shift to greater acceptance of digital health, the wellness model featuring patient participation, ownership, and personal responsibility will change and expand as well.

Telemedicine and eHealth are here to stay. With fewer barriers such as internet access and speed, patient and/or physician resistance, and implementation and reimbursement obstacles, applications of technology have become more accessible and have been more broadly adopted. Additionally, these applications are benefitting the patient experience and increasing patient confidence.

Benefits start with interoperability, which enables safer transitions of care and better patient outcomes overall. Health information systems are more easily working across operational boundaries today. Integration of systems and data (including diagnostic data, asset data and patient data) will provide analytics on “what you have, what you need and when you need it.” Patients are gaining on-demand access to their own patient records and electronic tracking for everything from diagnostic tests to doctors’ advice.

How might this affect facilities and the spaces within?

Integrated technology solutions can boost flexibility and preparedness for the three categories of challenges identified by discussion groups: safety, capacity and isolation.

• Hospital rooms may have more flexibility for remote care with broader implementation of video connections enabling remote rounds, expanded remote monitoring for vitals beyond the nurse station, and increased visualization outside the room. Universal rooms with the flexibility to incorporate ante rooms and digital integration are the future.
• Waiting rooms of the future may be smaller, supported by self-check-in, and self-rooming. Infrared scanning, patient recorded vitals from wearables and UV disinfection may be incorporated, all while maintaining the patient experience that our industry has strived to attain.
• Broader and more effective implementation of robotics may move things around the facility, including supplies, PPE, medication and food.
• A hybrid care model will further decentralize care. In addition to telemedicine, home monitoring and observation will add to the in-person care. There is even the potential for drive-through diagnostics in the future.
• Smart devices - wearables, health apps, etc. - will advance rapidly with 5G to track and monitor all types of health conditions outside of healthcare walls. This will be another direct impact for wellness and potentially less demand for physical space. Further, single use direct-to-consumer devices may increase access and use of care services, speeding the diagnostics process.
• Capacity requirements, including the proper amount and quality of space, privacy, and bandwidth cannot be underestimated. These requirements need to be part of the overall masterplan to pivot with technology advances.

How can we be ready for the digital transformation?

Discussion participants agreed that technology has been a significant element for resuming normal operations and/or enabling reinvention, both personally and professionally, since COVID-19 struck. There is broad agreement that technology will transform not only how we design, renovate and build but also greatly influence what is created as well.

“If we, as an industry, do this right, technology will provide the flexibility to give our customers ‘future-ready capabilities to adapt to new technologies and respond to future emergencies,” said Sean Ashcroft, one of DPR Construction’s national healthcare leaders.

But no one can do this alone and the group of industry leaders strongly agrees.

“Foremost, a health system’s enterprise technology plan must be coordinated and integrated with a building’s design and construction,” shared Carl Fleming, DPR Construction’s national healthcare strategist. “Technologies that are ‘future state’ today will be current state when a new building sees its first patient. As a result, it is imperative for the digital environment and the built environment to work together to enhance patient care and improve clinical outcomes. Our experience reflects better technology coordination when design and construction professionals are part of the technology discussion early in the project and the industry group highly recommends a new role on the construction team – systems integrator.”

Hybrid care models will change the functionality of rooms and the need to bridge telemedicine and in-person care. Outpatient facilities will be smarter, hospitals will be smarter, and MOB’s may allocate space to accommodate the hybrid care model concept. An integrated technology solution will inform space needs for infrastructure, including larger Main Distribution Frame / Intermediate Distribution Frame (MDF/IDF) closets and an expanded infrastructure.

Technology has also been transformative in the design and construction worlds with team interaction, 4D modelling and virtual inspections. Collaboration continues to rise to new levels and jobsites look different. An upcoming briefing will take a deeper dive into how design and construction delivery is adapting and advancing.

Teams around the world took a stand for zero incidents during DPR’s Safety Week. Held in mid-September in conjunction with Construction Industry Safety Week and OSHA’s National Fall Stand Down, the week of activities emphasized the organization’s ongoing commitment to building incident-free environments and a special focus on fall prevention. While the week looked different this year to allow for COVID-19 protocols, the goal of recognizing, celebrating and sharing DPR’s safety mindset and best practices remained the same.

In Singapore, teams conducted several training sessions focused on Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) fundamentals. In Europe, teams focused on fall prevention and held safety briefings on working at height with trade partners. And true to DPR’s core value of enjoyment, elements of fun were sprinkled throughout the week. Barbecue was on tap in the Netherlands, breakfasts in South Florida, and even an ice cream truck in the Southwest, while Singapore ended the week with a celebration and a thank you lunch for craft team members.

“Every week is safety week at DPR,” said DPR's Michelle Gray, an EHS Leader. “Safety must be a constant presence in our lives, both at work and at home.”

The talk has been matched with action. Last August, for instance, DPR saw a 37% decrease in incidents, an achievement attributed to ongoing efforts to plan, a focus on near-miss analysis, and an increase in inspections. The importance of these efforts cannot be overstated—they literally save lives—and DPR continues to maintain the focus on safety by regularly hitting on important areas of emphasis, including fall prevention and working near hazardous energy.

San Diego safety team member Carlos Orzua summed it up simply by saying, “I observed that our commitment to safety is a promise to ourselves, our co-workers and the families who rely and count on us.”

“ZERO incidents is absolutely an achievable goal if we all work together,” added Gray. “We’re extremely grateful for every team member’s commitment to on-site trainings, having tough discussions and speaking up when there’s a potential hazard. Safety starts with you. Safety starts with me. Safety starts with us.”

Socially Distanced, but Together in Spirit!

As this year comes to an end, DPR Construction appreciates the way everyone supported one another in 2020. Normally, at this time of year, everyone gathers to celebrate together at holiday events, but this year is different.

Fortunately, a group of leaders from across DPR's organization had the technology – and holiday spirit – to send their best to employee and partners virtually.

This fourth installment of DPR Construction’s COVID-19 briefing series delves into the insights provided by industry partners and clients related to challenges, solutions, and lessons learned that the healthcare industry generated in response to the pandemic.

COVID-19 exposed a number of limitations within the healthcare industry, pointing to the clear need to build more flexibility into planning, design, and construction of healthcare facilities.

The effects of COVID-19 were seen and addressed throughout the hospital environment:

• externally with the development of crisis testing protocols
• internally with bed capacity during surges, and length of stays
• within the hospital infrastructure, with the need to quickly provide containment and isolation, maintain supplies, repurpose systems and spaces
• operationally, with modified workflows and with the disruption of health systems’ financial models through the cancellation of elective procedures and surgeries.

Intake procedures needed to quickly accommodate the need to keep potentially infected patients isolated from other patients and medical staff.

DPR’s partners noted that commencing care outside of the hospital facility was a quick way to start isolating COVID-19 cases. The result is that many facilities now begin emergency department registration curbside, or with a screening space at the facility entrance to decrease congestion while commencing with isolation protocols.

New uses for mobile apps are being employed as it has been found that smartphone registration is faster and even more accurate than web-based apps. Mobile triage tents could be installed and made flexible by using portable privacy screens. Discussion participants also mentioned separated ingress and egress patterning becoming much more important and how enhanced and clear signage are key to keeping patients and visitors on safely separated paths.

The sudden need for additional and isolated hospital beds required nimbleness as well. Field hospitals went up quickly in many locations. While not utilized to the extent expected, field hospitals could have alternative uses if not necessary for incoming surge patients. Discussion participants noted that in some places they were adapted for the lower end of care. One alternative was to use them or those who could be transitioned out of an acute setting, but who were not ready to go home. The hospital beds were then kept available for those in the acute stages of the disease.

Due to their higher cost to build, hospitals typically have only a handful of negative pressure rooms for isolation cases. One engineer brought up the fact that value engineering targets the systems behind the wall first, yet those systems are vital to scaling during a crisis such as this pandemic. Still, discussion participants offered several examples of quick or temporary solutions to increase negative pressure spaces, with the lesson learned to at least have some temporary solutions ready to go if the flexibility needed is not already built in:

• To purify the air, use mobile photocatalytic air purifiers that use UV light.
• To quickly convert rooms to negative air pressure, implement mobile HEPA filters combined with reverse flow fan filters.
• To provide permanent anterooms as a dividing space for containment and patient isolation. As they flank the isolation rooms, they can provide a safe area for doffing PPE.
• To support the temporary negative pressure rooms and provide a safe space for doffing PPE, portable, reusable anterooms were brought in.

Another lesson learned discussed by participants was how to alleviate the loss of revenue that hospitals and systems are now facing, due to cancelled elective surgeries.

The CARES Act helped mitigate the financial hit through early summer. For systems, one solution was to segregate hospitals within the system and divert the elective surgeries to a non-COVID facility when capacity allows. Another, which does require regulatory cooperation, is to shift some surgery to lower-acuity outpatient facilities, as has been demonstrated successfully within certain fields such as ophthalmology and dermatology. Discussion turned to policy, regulation, and major operational changes that may be considered to drive more transparency and competition.

One key lesson mentioned was that of asset management. As one participant said, “You need to know what you have, to know what you need.” There are many software solutions available for electronic tagging, tracking, and maintaining machinery and equipment. The discussion group added other assets that should be assessed, including infrastructure and space. A space assessment can assist with determining spaces that can be realigned for patient flow or repurposed for isolation. And modular prefabricated walls can be quickly implemented to alter a space as needed. “Modular structures can separate infectious patients and other available spaces can also be customized for a specific region or patient population,” commented Sean Ashcroft, one of the healthcare core market leaders for DPR Construction.

What Silver Linings Lie Within These Lessons?

Reacting to the lessons learned from COVID-19 has given the industry the kickstart it needed to pivot and change.

DPR and its partners agree: this is a chance to reset and reduce overall health costs, improve access to healthcare and reimagine space utilization. As a global issue, COVID-19 has also made the world a smaller place, and there has been increased access to sharing and learning from all corners. New industry partnerships offer greater transparency and collaboration and the value of connections has never been more important.

Hamilton Espinosa, DPR Construction healthcare core market leader, summed it up: “Every situation is unique, but it all comes back to the ability to be flexible, creative and adaptable while we work together to get through this great challenge and look forward with what we have learned.”

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, DPR Construction has created unique ways to continue supporting its nonprofit partners by facilitating virtual events and programs. For example, the development of an educational course focused on the basics of SketchUp, a virtual design software, for Peninsula Bridge.

Peninsula Bridge, a Bay Area organization providing low-income middle school students with academic and personal support, invited DPR to host an hour of SketchUp training each day during their week-long summer program. In alignment with DPR’s community initiative pillar of “creating and delivering construction education and career programs for under-resourced youth,” this SketchUp course showcased the company’s ongoing commitment to the goals of Peninsula Bridge while educating their youth on construction career paths.

Thanks to its intuitive design, SketchUp was the perfect introductory software to expand the students’ understanding of the various ways technology is present in the construction industry. SketchUp allowed students to create 3D models of buildings, mimicking a basic version of virtual design and construction (VDC) software often implemented on DPR projects.

“We really wanted to demonstrate that construction isn’t just about physical labor,” said Madeline Ziser, a Bay Area DPR project manager who co-created the SketchUp training course. “It’s about teamwork and being smart in the way that you build.”

Ziser shared that this new training was inspired by DPR’s South Florida team who originally taught SketchUp to the students of The Milagro Center earlier this year. After seeing how successful that training could be for nonprofits moving their youth programming to a virtual format, Ziser teamed up with Diane Shelton who leads DPR’s Community Initiatives efforts, to create a formal SketchUp training curriculum.

“There is a lot of planning that goes into every DPR project and that planning involves the use of some really cool software,” said Ziser. “By facilitating this virtual course, we got to show students just how much technology goes into construction, while also piquing their interest in construction-related career paths.”

Peninsula Bridge’s Executive Director, Randi Shafton expressed gratitude for the hands-on SketchUp training: “Thank you for an amazing week of construction and design with DPR. What an incredible opportunity for our students with such fabulous feedback and coaching from the DPR team. This SketchUp experience is definitely one of the silver linings of the pandemic.”

While Peninsula Bridge may have been the first nonprofit to engage with this new SketchUp course, it certainly will not be the last. Ziser shared that DPR’s Ryan Meacham has led the development of the third version for the SketchUp curriculum so that DPR employees can facilitate this course virtually with nonprofit partners across the country.

Overall, Ziser is excited for what the future holds with the updated SketchUp course and the positive impact it will bring to DPR’s nonprofit partners’ educational and career-centric goals.

“This training is one of those surprising and positive outcomes of the pandemic. We never would have been pushed out of our box if not for the change to push everything to being virtual,” Ziser said. “I really hope that we can continue to incorporate a SketchUp training permanently going forward and provide something unique and exciting for the kids.”

The fifth and final installment of DPR Construction’s COVID-19 briefing series for 2020, examines collective professional insights of how COVID-19 is affecting project delivery.

COVID-19 pushed the building industry into action. In the early days of the pandemic, designers and contractors jumped in with makeshift solutions to the immediate needs for safety, surge capacity, testing, and isolation.

These teams adapted as things changed, often daily. New and different ways to leverage technology improved communication and collaboration. The silver lining of the pandemic was the validation of a solid infrastructure of trusted relationships, galvanizing the entire industry to come together.

What can we do to be more resilient in the future?

In our discussions with industry leaders, the biggest identified challenge was how to prepare for a resilient future with what is known today. To do this, project delivery must evolve and elevate to a community approach, bringing the best people and ideas together to predict future trends and costs with reliable data. Teams need free and open sharing of ideas for the benefit of the industry and our communities.

• Innovation – shaped by professionals working together creatively – will advance the best solutions. The uniqueness of each facility and system is grounded by owners looking for safety, cost certainty, and higher value project outcomes. Perspectives have changed and the need to do things differently has never been more crucial. This is an opportunity as an industry to collectively be nimble, ingenious, and flexible.
• The Big Room is different, but the results are just as important. While the big room may be less populated, virtual, or take on a hybrid format, the synergy from a combination of in-person and virtual connections has kept current projects on track. Teams have seen high-quality virtual engagement, however, the ultimate impact on design solutions and construction execution is yet to be proven. Human connection and dynamics can, at some level, be captured virtually and through technology, but the informal huddles, mentoring, learning from each other, subtleties of interaction and brainstorming are being missed by many. For true collaboration and building a team community, all voices need to be heard and a big “from wherever you are” room will remain essential.
• Leveraging geographically separated experts has never been implemented with less difficulty - and this has been seen as a benefit to positive outcomes on projects. Geography is becoming less important with virtual connectivity and access to national thought leaders is another silver lining that has emerged. The practice of leveraging global partners for lessons learned and shared best practices reflects the worldwide reach of the pandemic itself.
• Authorities Having Jurisdiction (AHJ) and other regulatory entities are important partners. The immediate response to COVID-19 required regulatory agencies to relax their approach to interfacing with stakeholders and be more flexible. Some of these temporary changes may be part of the solution for future resiliency in the face of pandemics, climate impacts, and biowarfare. There is an opportunity as an industry to work with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), AHJs, and other entities for reforms that allow for greater flexibility. Additionally, the use of digital reviews, inspections, and permitting are proving positive and it is anticipated that these will continue to evolve and change how we do business.
• Integrated Project Delivery (IPD), and any form of early collaborative project delivery, is here to stay and needed more now than ever before to provide predictable results for healthcare customers. The industry group repeated – “we need to get it right” for a resilient recovery and a new normal of “providing more with less.” Trusted relationships are required more than ever, along with industry partnerships forged on transparency, collaboration, and an interdisciplinary approach. One team posited that the next evolution of project delivery methodology will arise as a result of this pandemic and is continuing to discuss the ideal method of forming, managing risk, and adding value in the delivery of healthcare.

What's Next?

DPR and many industry partners have extolled the benefits of prefabrication, modular construction, and virtual tools for communication, design, and documentation to facilitate projects.

“We are still learning as an industry. As we issue this briefing, with the unfortunate COVID-19 upswing, what we learned with the first surge is now being tested and improved upon. We will continue to learn, but to achieve resiliency for our customers, the design, consulting, and construction community must dig in and continue collaborating. Partners that can move fast, think more broadly, and interpret needs are what our customers are looking for,” stated Hamilton Espinosa, one of DPR Construction’s healthcare core market leaders.

Sean Ashcroft, another DPR Construction healthcare core market leader continued: “It will be the responsibility of each of us to ensure that we communicate the risks of short-sightedness, and short-term memory when it comes to decision making. The plans we make today will affect our ability to respond to the next crisis. Even now, we are beginning to feel the impact of staffing, supply chain, and system hardening activities that were deferred in the first wave. As we speak, the industry rallies around the systems we serve and the communities we support in an amazing show of resiliency.”

Espinosa added: “We are at the forefront of change in how projects are delivered - many of which are positive for the industry we serve. As we continue to assess industry changes and market conditions, relationships within the industry will continue to be important to navigate the changes ahead.”