How are plans reviewed? -- #18

 How are plans reviewed? -- #18

How did you find a designer for your tenant space alteration? Had you been considering hiring a code expert to help you saving time and money?

I was a professional plans examiner in the City of Calgary. I reviewed and approved more than 8000 #projects in the past 12 years. I found one fact that more than 50% of the building permit #plans have to be on hold after the preliminary review. Some of them are on hold for more than one year to get approved. The main reason for this kind of delay is that the designers have difficulties to understand the building code requirements.

Unfortunately, as business or building #owners, they don't have any idea of which designer is the best for their job. Their might pick one from the yellow pages randomly or be attracted by one with fancy name or website. It is really hard to avoid a disastrous result.

Another fact I found is that up to 80% of projects, including interior renovations, #additions and new #buildings have the space to save at least 20% of the construction #cost. Thinking about an unnecessary fire separation, the cost can be saved is more than 50% of that wall.  If you can use #wood studs instead of #steel studs for your #partitions, you can save more than 40% of the studs cost.

One example I have reviewed recently is a six storey new building. It was designed as a #noncombustible building. I found if we could make the grade 600mm higher, the whole building can be built as #combustible building. The cost saving is more than a million.

One of the extreme projects I found is a primary #school building. The Building area is more than 3000sqm. The cost of the building is more than 30 million. It should be built as noncombustible building as per the building code, but it is actually built with combustible materials. What a danger to the school kids and what a waste of the money!

I hope this question is helpful when you plan to hire a designer for your next project. No matter which designer you are going to hire, it will be beneficial to have a Building Code expert to back you up.  At least, we might know if you have to avoid that designer for your project. 😁

#plansexaminer #buildingpermit #preliminaryreview #buildingcode #fireseparation #primaryschool #Buildingarea