Forging stronger relationships with our allied professions is one of our chapters ongoing efforts. Contributing to this effort has been one of my privileges so far serving the chapter. It’s always fun to see old friends and meet new ones. This month I was able to do both in one place for three days straight! I’m talking about the annual Utah Green Industry Conference.
Besides exploring the forests of booths, there was some awesome opportunities to learn from some of the Industries leaders giving at their lecture series (The words Green and Industry just don’t seem to jive). I digress. There were several ASLA Utah members, and landscape architects speaking too.
There was so many courses I decided to attend the ones that featured a landscape architect, but inevitably I couldn’t see attend even all of those because there were overlaps. Perhaps at the top of my list going into the conference was also the first event of the conference on Monday. A Panel discussion titled “Contractor/Landscape Architect/Owner Relations: We’re All on the Same Team”. It doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue, as smoothly. Projects aren’t always executed as smoothly as we want either, so I was excited to learn from this discussion. Greg Graves of JUB, and Mathew Winward of G Brown were the LA Panel for the discussion.
Takeaways included:
-Be sure to have a Prebid meeting with good discussion about the projects design intent as well as areas of concern. Show that you will be an asset to the project as it continues.
-Contractors like a mandatory Prebid. They can size up their competition and know whether the work effort required to prepare a meaningful will be worthwhile. While Owners and LA’s worry that they will be limiting the field. A mandatory Pre-Bid is a show of good faith, and seriousness.
-Frequent and frank communication up and down the proper channels are necessary for a successful execution. Respond quickly, even if just to say you need more time to respond meaningfully.
-As-builts should really be a coordination with contractor and LA. Contractor providing Redlines and LA digitizing or revising them in CAD.
Later that afternoon from 3:00-3:50. There was a double offering of both Rain Bird’s Brady Pitcher and USU’s Kristofor Kvarfordt, so that was hard to decide between. Brady was speaking on “Wiring & Wire Connector Basics” and Kristofor on “Using Storm Water as an Asset” I chose Kristofors course (No offence Brady!). I Probably picked Kris’s course because it was raining that morning and there was a giant stream of water coming from a parapet scupper and falling onto a cobble area just outside the North entrance when I came in that morning. I thought, what a wasted opportunity for a rain garden.
