Model Coordination: How Design Teams Have Moved Beyond the Light Table at PDX Airport

MIKE ADAMS: Welcome, everyone to the Model Coordination: How Design Teams Have Moved Beyond The Light Table at PDX Airport Session. My name is Mike Adams, and I am a BIM Coordinator at ZGF Architects. I began using Autodesk products in the field of architecture back in 1990.

Yeah, that means I've been around a while. Presently, I work as a coordinator, but I've previously held the positions ranging from blueprint running extraordinaire to project architect. Now, I'm dedicated to training and supporting others in the use of Revit and the architectural process.

CHITT KAPADIA: Hello, everyone. My name is Chitt Kapadia. I, too, am a BIM Coordinator at ZGF. Although I'm younger than Mike's total experience in the industry, I have been around the various parts of the construction phases ranging from the trade partners to consultants, and finally, aligning with the architects.

I take pleasure in day-to-day problem solving and implementing unique workflows on complex projects. Well, enough about the presenters, let's talk about the content.

MIKE ADAMS: How about a little on the project we're going to be talking about? The Portland International Airport, or PDX, is situated in Portland, Oregon on the southern banks of the Columbia River. It was first built in the 1930's and has undergone several changes over the years.

PDX has won the title of America's best airport for six consecutive years-- with the latest addition being the terminal core redevelopment, or TCORE, which adds to its distinct Pacific Northwest charm. This is a massive project that covers around one million square feet and requires a $2 billion investment for its design and construction.

To give you an idea of its footprint size, the modified scope covers an area equivalent to roughly 10 soccer fields, while the terminal core extension covers approximately 2.5 soccer fields. Most of the redevelopment and additions are focused on improving in-planeing, mezzanine, and a new roof-- while also making significant upgrades to the deplaneing levels to enhance and expand the bag handling system, and the airport support systems.

This is a nice aerial view rendering showing the extent of the project. The model ecosystem consists of over 70 models, from design consultants, trade partners, and contractors. As you can imagine, coordinating these models in Revit was a challenging task. We had to come up with a solution.

Back in the day, we used to overlay drawings on a light table for coordination. CAD came along and made it easier, but this is just a digital version of the light table process. Now, just a few decades later, the design is developing in a 3D environment, but coordination is still necessary.

Most teams would say, hey, we can do that in Revit, however, how do you engage the stakeholders in the early design process that influences the design, but not in Revit? The answer may very well be Autodesk Model Coordination.

So in the background of this slide is a picture that was of the built skylight lattice from the TCORE job site. Now, on to learning objective one. Discover how you can enable project managers, project architects, lead engineers, owners, contractors, and trade partners to view design models in a 3D space.

The goal of any design effort is to take your design to completion. In the past, we would coordinate using the 2D drawings, and to achieve the end goal. But what if there was an easy-to-use, on-the-go 3D tool that allowed you to see the design in an updatable environment? This would allow you to coordinate faster and with more accuracy.

The design teams these days are taking on more software than ever before. Oftentimes, the decision-makers will struggle when forced to navigate within the Revit environment. Introducing yet another platform can cause software fatigue. Well, this happened with TCORE.

Many of us have experienced projects where the leadership team is not involved in the Revit modeling, resulting in delays in the process and inability to verify design deficiencies until it's too late. The traditional method of creating renderings, drawings, and even physical models to display the outcome of their guidance could no longer be necessary.

Model Coordination allows those with expertise to view any part of the building at their convenience. We were initially presented with the idea of Model Coordination for the TCORE team. The design team was already dealing with multiple software platforms, and was hesitant to take on another one.

As a result, I aimed to create an environment that was simple and easy to adopt, given the team's software fatigue. After evaluating the project setup, we decided to use the same language for sectors and areas of work in Model Coordination to ensure consistency in conversations about drawings.

We also discussed the possibility of tracking conflicts through issues, which would provide better insight and trackability for the team. However, this was deemed too ambitious and out of our comfort zone. Using all the information gathered, we created a plan to incorporate Model Coordination while keeping the design team engaged, and avoiding overwhelming them in the process.

With a little training and some show-and-tell on how to use Model Coordination, the team was off and running, and have been using it for over three years. Model Coordination is simple navigation, low learning curve, helped to ease the users into the platform.

As you can see, the simple navigation, minimal toolbar layout, and visual nature make Model Coordination a great tool for users of any level to see the design as it develops. This view has 16 different models loaded into it, and still navigate smoothly.

You can choose to easily add and remove models, depending on the content you want to see. These are also easily updated as the design develops. When setting up Model Coordination, you want to take into consideration how your team is going to use the environment. Take time to make views that are large enough to capture important content, but not so big they're hard to manage.

For TCORE, again, I used the same language as what was in the design documents. I created views based on the same scope boxes used for the sector layout, and also provided a North and South view. This image shows the North view and the corresponding sectors that make up the North scope. And you can see how a single sector view is comprised of multiple discipline views.

By using Model Coordination, you can see congested areas in better clarity than in Revit. This is a view of a seismic joint in the electrical conduit from our trade partners. Another benefit of model coordination is the ability to bring in 3D CAD from trade partners and view them with ease.

This view is a collection of design models from structural and MEP mixed with trade partner 3D CAD from fire sprinkler consultant and steel fabricators, Tekla CAD Export. It allows you the ability to back-check and make sure that the trade models are located properly to align with the prefabricated penetrations.

Now, for some storytelling from the team members who use Model Coordination on a regular basis. During meetings, the client consistently asks the team to pull up Model Coordination to better understand the impact of the coordination and the value engineering efforts.

During the Art Committee efforts, Model Coordination enabled the client to clearly evaluate the size and line of sight of all art installations. While designing and coordinating our security cameras, the team utilized Model Coordination to involve the design team during coordination process.

Thanks to Model Coordination, we were able to gain insight into the design and quickly address any issues that arose, which helped streamline the communication.

Here's an unexpected user of Model Coordination-- the Signage Consultant. They typically work in Adobe Illustrator and not in Revit, or rarely, anyway. Most of their signage presentations to the client started with a screenshot from Model Coordination and then edited in Photoshop.

MayerReed used Model Coordination at almost every meeting with the client to understand their request, and sometimes to show them that it wouldn't work the way they wanted it to.

Now, on to bag handling systems. They're a consultant that took full advantage of Model Coordination, and it was used in early design before the trade partners came on-board, and it helped to understand the complicated routes needed for the system.

They felt it created a high output, high resolution clash detection that required low resources from your machine, and it was easier and faster to use than traditional methods. They also found the user interface very straightforward in assigning clashes to team members across all disciplines, was useful for tracking and closing clashes.

Now, part of any airport is the concessions area, and PDX is no different. Our project had these spaces shelled, but we had to coordinate with the tenant architects to make sure that the services would connect properly.

Model Coordination played a huge part in the identification and coordination of various unique conditions through collaborative efforts, allowing us to successfully align detailed level elements, such as conduit and sprinkler routing-- appearance and other intricate details that are often challenging to coordinate in large scale projects.

This slide is here to show you that you can use Model Coordination as a quick spatial review without the need of producing high quality renderings. This rendering is of the same space of the coordination space that we just looked at. Which came first, rendering or Model Coordination? I'll let you decide.

So to recap, you want to keep your eye out for tools that will help your team, listen to your team's workflow, and build a tool around them. Train them-- yeah, you need to train them to get the best buy-in results from any new tool, then you can sit back and revel in your accomplishments.

Now, on to learning objective two. Learn how to setup a complicated project in Model Coordination, the do's and don'ts. First, let's talk about what Model Coordination is. Well, Model Coordination, in a nutshell, is simply comparing one view to another and having the ability to see conflicts.

When both views are loaded into a single Model Coordination view, it will paint the elements that interfere with each other. The primary model will be painted red, and the clash with model will be painted green. When you're using the clashing in Model Coordination, the issue can only be assigned to the red element, indicating they are the most likely to be adjusted.

The basic process of Model Coordination involves curating a set of views and adding them to the published settings of each model used. When it comes to models for the Model Coordination environment, there are two approaches-- the working model and the federated model. I'll explain both methods, so you can choose the one that suits your needs best.

Now, the working model. First, create 3D views for each discipline model. Include all the views in the Publish Settings, publish the model, and share through design collaboration. Then you copy the newly shared model into your designated coordination space folder.

For the federated model, you create a federated model and save it to your designated Model Coordination folder, link in all of your discipline models from the shared folder, create a view for each discipline, add these views to your publish setting, sync to central and publish your model.

Now, let's talk about the pros and cons of each method. The working model pros spread the work out among the team, and it is a good path if you have complete buy-in from all design partners. Now, the cons are it relies on everyone curating their views prior to the weekly sharing of the design packages.

The views live in a working model, and are subject to the entire team's modeling behavior. So sloppy modeling behaviors can affect the saved Model Coordination views, and cause republishing of your models after curating the views back to where they need to be.

The published model is also subject to the state of the model from the last user who synced to central prior to publishing. This workflow can be frustrating at times.

Now, for the federated model. The pros give control to the person managing the coordination space. And all the views are coming from one model, so it's easy to maintain the naming convention and scope of work across all Model Coordination views.

The cons are, every time the Model Coordination space needs updating one person is responsible for the updating. This workflow is my preferred method. And you can find step-by-step instructions in the class handout for setting up the Model Coordination for whichever path you choose.

CHITT KAPADIA: Thank you, Mike, for sharing the stories and the setup of the Model Coordination. Before we move on to the learning objective three, I would like to point to the background of this picture-- is that it's the TCORE roof that is being installed currently, and soon to be open to public in a year or two.

OK, so moving on to the next subject, that is the metadata. We all love modeling in Revit, but we all know that how cumbersome it can get. The amount of information that is thrown at you from the bottom, left, top is just immense. And thinking that a project manager, or the person who is making a quick decision on day-to-day basis, and may not be in the model for drafting, it might be really hard for them to understand the overload of the information that is happening in this image.

But what if there is a way that is easy on the eye? That is the Model Coordination. So looking at this image, you are at the entrance of the TCORE selecting just a ground with a simple click, and a Property panel pops up with all the necessary information from the face to the design option, and its dimension for quick quantity takeoff.

And that's what we need for the real-time decision making. But how real-time is it? So this video is taken while I'm browsing through the TCORE Sector 22. And selecting the roof, I can see all the properties and necessary information that is required.

And moving on to the next level, that is the baggage handling area, you can see that model is being loaded in real-time within seconds, with 16 of those loaded in this particular view. And selecting an element and giving you the necessary information right before the pull date is very important.

What if you just want to do a last minute check of the quantity that is required for the pull. Now, moving on to the baggage checking area. We see so many elements in the view being loaded and being available for us, to give so much information that we can use.

Now, moving on to the next slide, and taking a break at this baggage checking areas floor. When we select that, it gives us all the basic information that is coming from Revit. Element ID, that gives you an access to find that element within Revit, if you choose to edit that.

The visibility settings, what phase it belongs to, where it is located within the model, and the most basic-- the quantity takeoff. What is the parameter, length, volume, and area of that particular floor.

Now that we know that all the information from Revit is seamlessly transferred to the Model Coordination, let's see how we can utilize that for issue tracking. This happened to me about a couple of years ago when I got dropped onto this project that was about to hit IFC.

We are going through this process of issue tracking, clash detection, and already 600 clashes are identified, and over 6,000 to be reviewed. This is the first glance at the model class matrix, and it seems a little bit overwhelming.

But if you go to the rest of the views in the Model Coordination, the information starts to breakdown in a way where you can understand it with ease. So let's take a look at how do you go through two models and review the potential clashes, and see if something that is picking out in your eye, and if we can raise it as an issue.

So in this view, there are total seven models loaded, and two of them are being clashed to each other. And you can seamlessly navigate through one clash or the other. If you want to turn off the background and just focus on the clash, you can also do that-- so that nothing is hindering your view.

Model Coordination is designed for ease of access. OK, let's take a break and look at a clash that is a potential clash and you would like to identify it. But when you are clashing it, you can also give a tolerance of the clash. So if you would want to focus on the major critical clashes with the tolerance higher, and look at the things that needs to be resolved as soon as possible.

On the left pan, you can also see all the potential clashes. And once you identify the one, select the checkbox and click on the Identify Clash. And once you do that, you are given a chance to add more information to the Clash Log.

Since it is a new clash, we are setting it to the Open, but once it is under review, you can put it as Progress. And the Responsibility Party log, you can also add more information about what the clash is about, who this clash is assigned to, and who are the watchers.

And then you can also assign the timeline to the clash-- when would be the deadline and when it was initiated. And most importantly, it also gives you a clear instruction what model it is coming from.

If you scroll down on that Clash Log, it is also giving you an option of where this clash is coming from, what is the root cause of it. And this is for a reporting purpose. At the end of the project, you can take a look at, was it just the design coordination, or was it modeling error? Or is it something else that can be eliminated for the future projects?

You are also given an option of attaching the image that is on the screen with your clash. Along with that, you can also attach a model where it could belong to, or where it should be replaced or reviewed. And last but not the least, the conversation factor.

There are a few people who are watchers in this clash. They can come here, put their comment, and try to get to a resolution as soon as possible within the same environment. The next is the report. So you have created so many clashes and you are about to hit your weekly or bi-weekly clash detection meeting.

At that point, you would like to have a report that is sent out to the consultants prior to the meeting, so that they can take a look and give you the proper feedback. So when you are creating the report, you have options that can be created by the status, due date, assignee, or the location.

So you can focus on a smaller scope, if you would like to just go by the location, or just an individual who is going to attend the clash detection-- then you can just export it by an assignee. This can be automated and you can export these reports on a periodic manner.

So to recap learning objective three and four, we have seamless navigation in the Model Coordination for multiple models at the same time. It is quite easy to assign a clash and identify any issues. And most importantly, all of this information is cloud-based, and you can just navigate through it with a simple mouse click. Well, thank you for coming to this presentation of Model Coordination.