The First Facility Management Blog

An enhanced online demonstration of SMARTcodes, the new, cutting-edge system to automate code compliance checking developed by the International Code Council, is now available for a test drive. Facility managers, building owners, other construction professionals, plan reviewers, and code enforcement officials—both in the building department and fire service—are encouraged to check out this new service.

Users will be able to check a building design automatically for code compliance and provide feedback to the Council via an online survey. Test drivers can choose from a number of Building Information Models (BIMs), place the building in different geographical locations, and pick a model checking software to run the code check.

With those simple selections, SMARTcodes will automatically check the building for compliance with envelope and lighting provisions of the 2006 International Energy Conservation Code, highlight areas of non-compliance, and provide a three-dimensional view and written description of the code violations. Users can run the demonstration multiple times to pick a new building, see the same building in another region of the country, or use different model checking software.

Visitors also can try out a manual code search feature, access specific code criteria, and drill down to relevant referenced standards, code commentary, and code interpretations, as well as related product listing directories that link directly to manufacturers’ product information.

The enhanced on-line demonstration, which will run for some time and be regularly updated, opens the door for construction industry professionals to try out auto code checking and manual code searching and provide suggestions to make SMARTcodes even better.

In the future, the Code Council team will expand the SMARTcodes demo with more BIM options, additional codes, and federal, state, and local code amendments. Further down the road, the SMARTcodes demo will exhibit an e-permitting feature that lets visitors prepare a simulated permit application and submit a BIM for permit and code check.

Eventually, the SMARTcodes enhanced demo will include the International Building, Fire, Mechanical, Plumbing, and Fuel Gas Codes. The final step before releasing SMARTcodes for commercial use will be a beta test where users can code check their own BIMS.

The International Code Council, a membership association dedicated to building safety and fire prevention, develops the codes used to construct residential and commercial buildings, including homes and schools. Most U.S. cities, counties, and states that adopt codes choose the International Codes developed by the International Code Council.

The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) and Bentley Systems, Incorporated have announced that Bentley collaborated with GSA on the development of “The Building Information Modeling (BIM) Guide Series 02 – Spatial Validation Program.” The guide helps designers developing Final Concept designs for GSA’s Public Buildings Services (PBS) meet GSA’s spatial program BIM minimum requirements. The requirements include the submission of a BIM Industry Foundation Class (IFC) model as defined by the buildingSMART organization of the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS).

For more on BIM as it relates to facility managers, read “Building Information Modeling” in the November 2006 edition of TFM’s The Facility Technologist.

During the development of the new GSA BIM guide, Bentley and Heery International’s architecture and engineering team implemented a project for GSA. “We were excited to be able to help Bentley Architecture meet GSA’s BIM spatial program requirements,” said Gordon Smith, Heery International vice president, director of architecture. “Thanks to this process, we can easily incorporate BIM as part of our workflow. We’ve found significant efficiencies in engineering, section coordination, and discipline coordination.”

Brad Workman, Bentley vice president, Global Building and Plant Solutions, said, “The success of Bentley’s solutions on this project substantiated that, as an interoperable BIM exchange strategy, IFC is directly applicable to GSA’s requirements today. The project provided an important set of guidelines that will help AEC firms in their efforts to secure new business from the federal government, and will support GSA’s use of BIM to more efficiently and accurately assess design performance.”

Workman continued, “At the same time, the project clearly demonstrated Bentley Architecture’s strong support of interoperable workflows by delivering a compliant IFC model, fully meeting GSA’s spatial program BIM requirements.”

GSA, which owns more than 350 million square feet of space, believes that validating architecture and engineering designs at Concept Design is a big step towards better space management. It began validating spatial programs using BIM in fiscal year 2007.

In the past, GSA validated spatial programs using manually created 2D polygons in plan drawings during early design stages. But this proved to be time consuming and led to discrepancies when GSA’s spatial data management team measured and reported on the actual building spaces for rent calculations.

By using BIM, GSA can automate the spatial validation process to ensure that all designs in the Final Concept phase adhere to the spatial requirements established by the housing plan and PBS business assignment guide. GSA will also use this analysis to benchmark performance and generate measurement reports based upon equivalent space types and building type.

During the development of the new GSA BIM guide, Bentley:

* Successfully completed the spatial validation program detailed in the guide by ensuring that Bentley Architecture design models managed the required data and produced a compliant IFC model.
* Used Bentley Architecture to complete a project for GSA, in conjunction with Heery International, that consisted of modeling the 1800 F Street GSA Central Office – a nine-story building with 1.1 million square feet of office space. The IFC2×2-compliant model defined more than 3000 spaces.
* Created an Adobe PDF of the 3D space model to facilitate distribution and communication of the model’s facets to other project stakeholders. This interactive 3D PDF featured user-controlled dynamic sectioning.
* Illustrated the benefits of interoperability between Bentley Architecture and Google Earth™ by exporting a geospatially located 3D model in the native Google Earth KML/KMZ format of the 1800 F Street facility properly sited in downtown Washington, D.C.
* Proved that GSA’s requirements for spatial program BIM submissions can be easily met with Bentley Architecture.

GSA continues to take a vendor-neutral position on the use of BIM for spatial program submissions for PBS and does not require or advocate the use of any specific BIM application. Its only requirement for spatial validation is the delivery of a compliant IFC model such as that delivered by Bentley Architecture.

To find out more about Bentley’s BIM solutions and its support of GSA’s BIM requirements, visit www.bentley.com/bim. For information about GSA’s National 3D-4D-BIM Program, go to www.gsa.gov/bim.

About Bentley Bentley Systems, Incorporated provides software for the lifecycle of the world’s infrastructure. The company’s comprehensive portfolio for the building, plant, civil, and geospatial verticals spans architecture, engineering, construction (AEC) and operations. With revenues now surpassing $400 million annually, and more than 2400 colleagues globally, Bentley is the leading provider of AEC software to the Engineering News-Record Top Design Firms and major owner-operators, and was named the world’s No. 2 provider of GIS/geospatial software solutions in a recent Daratech research study.

About Heery International Heery International is a full-service architecture, interior design, engineering, facility management, program management, and construction management firm with more than 1000 professionals located throughout the United States and overseas, a history of stable leadership, and annual revenues of approximately $400 million.