Use of Geophysics for Transportation Projects (2006)

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18 This chapter discusses results and data gathered in Parts 3 (Budgets and Costs) and 4 (Contracting) of the questionnaire. It focuses predominantly on identifying if money is allocated for geophysics, who allocates it, how much money is allo- cated versus money spent, and different approaches agencies may have for contracting geophysical services. Graphical and tabular responses used for this chapter are included in Parts 3 and 4 of Appendix C. BUDGETING AND COSTS Fiscal budgets are critical to operations of state and federal agencies, particularly DOTs where unexpected events sig- nificantly affect annual budgets. A series of questions re- garding allocation of funds and appropriation of funding were expected to reveal the approach taken by transportation agencies toward spending money on geophysical investiga- tions. However, Figure 13a shows that geophysics is a low priority for funding. In general, geophysics simply does not get annual appropriation of funds at the agency level, pri- marily because the investigations are typically paid for through geotechnical investigation funds (TRB Technical Panel, personal communication, June 2005). Only 23% of the respondent agencies allocate any funds, and 67% of transportation agencies do not appropriate any funds for geo- physics. Four respondents (California, New Mexico, Texas, and Washington State) appropriate a significant annual bud- get, in excess of $100,000. Figure 13b shows the level of money spent annually from “Other” sources, because the fiscal budgets of trans- portation agencies do not include geophysics. The amount of money that is required to complete geophysical investi- gations is less than $50,000 annually at almost 50% of the agencies (Figure 13b). Results indicated that 63% of the re- spondent agencies use less than $100,000 from other fund- ing sources and 10% use funds in excess of $100,000. Sev- eral respondents replied that although there are no independent funds allocated for geophysics, there are very large annual budgets for geotechnical investigations from which geophysics does get funded. Table C4 presents com- ments regarding budgets and funding at the respondent agencies. Figures 13 a and b indicate that agency money spent on geophysical investigations is not allocated and not budgeted separately; therefore, it must eventually come from either the Design and Construction Branch budget or from emergency funds and “Other” sources. It is the Design Branches that carry the largest share of funding, although construction branches also fund the use of geophysics (re- fer to Question 34, Appendix C). When it comes to who makes decisions for budgets and approval of funds for geo- physical investigations, it is primarily at the division or branch manager level, with only approximately 10% of the decisions being made at the agency level. However, ap- proximately 30% of the time decisions regarding budgets (for projects) are made by a project manager or highway en- gineer (Figure 14). This synthesis has demonstrated that among most agen- cies the use of geophysics has increased over the past 5 CHAPTER FIVE AGENCY PRACTICE—BUDGETING, COSTS, AND CONTRACTING 7 2 14 10 67 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Pe rc en t > $100,000 < $100,000 to $50,000 <$50,000 None No Response N=58 (a) 0 10 48 15 27 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Pe rc en t > $500,000 > $100,000 < $100,000 < $50,000 No Response N=58 (b) FIGURE 13 (a) Annual budget allocated to geophysical investigations; (b) annual funding from “other” funding sources for geophysics.

19 years (see Figure 5). In addition, the results also indicated that cost–benefit (see Figure 6) is a major reason to perform such investigations. It appears likely that the approach taken to fund geophysics may change as its use becomes more routine, as it is for example in California and Saskatchewan. Significantly, when asked to predict how much will be spent during the current fiscal year (i.e., Ques- tion 33), the results indicated that more than half of the agencies (55%) have “no way to estimate” (Figure 15), and that 22% will spend less than $50,000. Eleven agencies plan to spend more than $100,000 in fiscal year 2005 on geophysical investigations. Funding for research into geophysical applications is lim- ited. Only 7% of transportation agencies allocate annual funds for geophysical research and this funding supports ei- ther educational or commercial institutions. A few final com- ments regarding spending and use may be drawn from Part 3 of the questionnaire: • Nearly 70% of transportation agencies will only use “proven, state-of-the-practice geophysical methods” (Figure 16). • Cost, skepticism, and lack of management buy-in are the primary reasons that transportation agencies limit the implementation of “leading edge or state-of-the-art geophysical methods” on their geotechnical projects (Figure 17). • Twenty-six percent of the respondent agencies indi- cated that the cost of doing geophysics hinders agency staff from using it on their geotechnical proj- ects (Figure 18). • Figure 19 identifies the typical range of cost per inves- tigation as well as the number of investigations per- formed at that spending level. Geophysical projects costing less than $10,000 dominated the results. CONTRACTING Part 4 of the questionnaire dealt with contracting, in-house ca- pabilities to perform geophysical investigations, contractor selection and award processes, and what would make DOTs more comfortable with geophysics. Results from this section are presented in Tables C5 and C6 and charts in Appendix C—Part 4. Table 3 identifies the position (i.e., title) of the in- 69 21 5 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Pe rc en t Yes No Don't Use Geophysics No Response N=58 5 13 20 14 15 10 8 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 R es po nd en ts Cost Skepticism Lack of Management Buy In Other No Response 'No' Answer to #39 N=80 FIGURE 16 Use of standard, proven, state-of-the-practice geophysical methods. FIGURE 17 Rationale for not using leading-edge or state- of-the-practice geophysical methods. 7 32 22 9 3 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 R es po nd en ts Agency Head Division/Branch Manager Team Leader/Project Manager Staff Highway Engineer No Response N=73 FIGURE 14 Decision maker for budget related to the use of geophysics. 2 9 7 22 55 5 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Pe rc en t > $500,000 > $100,000 < $100,000 < $50,000 No Way to Estimate No Response N=58 FIGURE 15 Prediction of money to be spent in fiscal year 2005 on geophysics.

20 26 57 17 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Pe rc en t Hinder Help No Response N=58 1.2 1 8 32 88.2 280 2 13 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 N um be r o f I nv es tig at io ns > $100,000 $75,000 to $100,000 $50,000 to $75,000 $25,000 to $50,000 $10,000 to $25,000 <$10,000 Other No Response Agency Who How N/R N/R Internal consultation and review by geophysics branch Personnel knowledge N/R Past projects and revised because of problems N/R N/R Incorporated as addendums or special provisions to a standard contract Either through project scope of service or through a district-wide contract (not efficient because prime consultant hires a sub-consultant to do work and charges an overhead/admin. fee) Open-ended contracts (Infinite Delivery/Infinite Quantity) N/R Previous examples/usages N/R Consulting with specialty subcontractor N/R In-house Based on previous contracts AKDOT AZDOT CALTRANS CFLHD CODOT CODOT CTDOT DCDOT Edmonton FLDOT GADOT HIDOT IADOT IDDOT ILDOT INDOT KSDOT KYDOT MADOT In-house Supervising geologists or engineers Geotechnical design engineers Designated project lead Geotechnical engineer It varies—project design staff, geotechnical staff, or others Staff It is usually someone at a project engineer level, from whatever group is interested in getting the information. It could be the geotech, structures, or pavement of design group that could develop the RFP Design consultant Project manager Geotechnical engineer Geotechnical engineer/manager Design Office Project manager Design Branch Geotechnical engineer Project engineer Geotechnical engineer Chief geologist Designers FIGURE 18 Costs related to geophysics hinder or help your highway engineering staff. FIGURE 19 Typical cost range of investigations and the number per year at that cost level. TABLE 3 WHO PREPARES RFPs AND HOW THEY ARE PREPARED (Response to Question 43) dividuals who are responsible for preparing RFPs and also shows how they are developed. The trend is for staff geolo- gists or engineers to prepare the RFPs, with the exception of some supervisors or consultants enlisted to assist. In addition, although RFPs are prepared primarily by experienced staff or consultants, they are most often done on a project-by-project or case-by-case basis. State, federal, and Canadian transportation agencies all ap- pear to contract out a major portion of the geophysics work to

21 MTDOT N/R In-house personnel perform work NDDOT Researchsection N/R New Brunswick Me N/R NHDOT Research geologist Supplemental provisions NJDOT In-house/consultants N/R NMDOT Geotechnical manager On-call contracts OHDOT Our office or district managing engineer Text document ORDOT Project geologist/engineer N/R ORDOT Project geo-personnel Case-by-case basis Port Authority NY/NJ Geotechnical engineer Discussion with geophysical specialist or engineer Quebec Geotechnical engineer N/R Saskatchewan Pavement engineer for GPR Past experience SCDOT Consultant written, reviewed by geotechnical engineer N/R SDDOT Unsure N/R TNDOT Geotechnical section As needed TXDOT University writes project statement Through interagency contracts UTDOT Geotech division engineers and geologists Define the scope of work and estimate, then utilize the existing pool contracts VTDOT Project manager, project engineer Generally in cooperation with vendors WFLHD Project geotech N/R WSDOT Chief engineering geologist Provide to the consultant liaison Notes: N/R = no response; RFP = Request for Proposal; GPR = ground penetrating radar. MDDOT Chief, Engineering Geology Division N/R MEDOT N/R MIDOT Project manager Mostly boiler plate format tailored to specific project Ontario Regional supervisor Standard RFP MODOT Geotechnical section Working with university personnel orwith consultant personnel for firms on contract list Geotechnical engineer Manitoba Geotechnical engineer Use the department's template TABLE 3 (continued) private consultants. Figure 20 shows that there are just seven agencies that use qualified in-house staff to perform geo- physical investigations (not necessarily geophysicists, but staff with experience conducting investigations), and that 23 use both in-house and contractors. Slightly less than 50% use only private contractors. Because there are a fair number of agencies that conduct their own geophysical investigations, Questions 46 and 47 asked if the equipment and software was owned or rented. The results indicated that 50% of the agen- cies do own the necessary equipment and software; however, they noted that it was equipment selected for particular meth- ods and/or applications. When using private contractors, the agencies noted that the most common form of solicitation is “limited solicita- tion,” as shown in Figure 21. Limited solicitation refers to sending RFPs to prequalified, preselected contractors, and contractors with whom the agency has had previous experi- ence and therefore are confident in working with them. 7 26 23 2 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 R es po nd en ts In-House Contractor Both No Response N=58 FIGURE 20 Use of in-house or contract geophysicists.

22 In addition to the type of solicitation (see Figure 21) there is value in understanding what type of contracts transporta- tion agencies award for geophysical services. Figure 22 shows the variety of contracts identified through answers to Question 50, and the distribution of award types. Lump- sum/fixed-price awards represent 34% of the responses, but unit price low-bid and time and materials are about even at approximately 15% each. Questions about using academic institutions to perform geophysical investigations indi- cated that 14% of the agencies do award “run-of-the-mill” geophysical projects to such institutions (Question 51); however, when it comes to “cutting edge” or “state-of-the- art” geophysical projects, approximately 22% use acade- mic institutions and 29% use private/professional contractors for the projects that are more along the lines of research and development. 3%6% 7% 8% 11% 11% 12% 16% 26% Limited Solicitation Sole-Source Solicitation Open Solicitation Open Competition No Response Other Methods Web Solicitation Referrals All N=111 34% 17%14% 13% 10% 9% 3% Lump Sum Fixed Price Time and Materials Unit Price Low Bid No Response Cost Plus ID/IQ OtherN=69 FIGURE 21 Type of RFP solicitation is used by your agency. FIGURE 22 Typical type of contract for geophysical transportation projects. Figure 21 also shows that sole-source solicitation is the sec- ond most common approach to procuring service providers. Open competition and (open) web solicitations represent ap- proximately 18% of the response. Answers to Question 49 revealed that 26% of the agencies use large Indefinite Deliv- ery/Indefinite Quantity (ID/IQ) and “on-call” contract vehi- cles. These ID/IQ contracts allow for rapid access to the vendors who are technically qualified, and once the contract has been awarded by the agency it limits the task order (i.e., RFP) and the purchase order (i.e., procurement) process. The respondents indicated that the typical length of an ID/IQ and on-call contract is from 2 to 3 years, and ranges from $100,000 to $300,000 in contract value (no guarantee of use). However, some contracts as large as $4 million over 5 years using multiple private contractors have been awarded (see results in Table C6, Appendix C—Question 49).