The National Academies Press

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From page 19... ... 19 C H A P T E R 3 3.1 Introduction There has been a substantial amount of research into estimating construction costs for highway projects, and there are a handful of studies about estimating design cost and preliminary engineering, but there has been no research about estimating preconstruction services costs. The focus here is on the 16 projects and the nine agency case studies collected by the research team and the relevant analyses and observations of those case studies. Read the entire page →
From page 20... ... 20 3. How are PCS cost-estimating consultant contracts successfully procured? Read the entire page →
From page 21... ... 21 Representatives from these nine agencies were interviewed in a structured interview process to determine the agencies overall PCS cost-estimating procedures. The interview template is shown in Appendix C Read the entire page →
From page 22... ... 22 Iowa DOT collects project cost data for PCS through engineers' timesheets. These data are collected and stored mainly for accounting purposes. Read the entire page →
From page 23... ... 23 Figure 3.3. Snapshot of NYSDOT project data. Read the entire page →
From page 24... ... 24 project managers to predict an estimate for future projects with similar qualities. NYSDOT uses an in-house system called DPR that contains a selection of tools to estimate PCS hours. Read the entire page →
From page 25... ... 25 UDOT does not believe it sets out to make mistakes; therefore, it does not consider loss of design effort necessary in estimating PCS costs. To improve PCS estimating, UDOT believes it needs to retain, hire, or train new experienced staff. Read the entire page →
From page 26... ... 26 standard percentages to estimate the PCS cost for future projects. The old system used 15% of the construction cost as preliminary engineering; MSHA now uses a curve system on preliminary engineering. Read the entire page →
From page 27... ... 27 RIDOT does not use data collected from past projects to estimate the PCS cost for future projects. Design costs are estimated by using 15% of total construction cost. Read the entire page →
From page 28... ... 28 election cycle, so government and legislative representatives change regularly; therefore, projects continue to lose and gain importance depending on the political influence. RIDOT believes that having more accurate PCS cost estimates would have no impact on the planning process. Read the entire page →
From page 29... ... 29 3. Number of sub-consultants, 4. Read the entire page →
From page 30... ... 30 Figure 3.5. UDOT's project development process. Read the entire page →
From page 31... ... 31 • Bottom-up (micro) estimates, which usually correlate to a work breakdown structure (WBS) Read the entire page →
From page 32... ... 32 be moving into top-down estimates to make more informed decisions at the programmatic level. 3.6.4 How Are PCS Cost-Estimating Consultant Contracts Successfully Procured? Read the entire page →
From page 33... ... 33 the need for PCS training within DOTs on the importance of estimating PCSs as well as on effective practices to help improve PCS estimates. 3.8 Case Study Summary 3.8.1 Possible Effective Practices A number of PCS cost-estimating methods have been identified throughout the case study analysis. Read the entire page →

From page 19...

... 19 C H A P T E R 3 3.1 Introduction There has been a substantial amount of research into estimating construction costs for highway projects, and there are a handful of studies about estimating design cost and preliminary engineering, but there has been no research about estimating preconstruction services costs. The focus here is on the 16 projects and the nine agency case studies collected by the research team and the relevant analyses and observations of those case studies.