Managing geotechnical risk on US design-build transport projects

Abstract

Awarding design-build (DB) contracts before a complete subsurface investigation is completed, makes mitigating the risk of differing site conditions difficult, if not impossible. The purpose of the study was to identify effective practices for managing geotechnical risk in DB projects, and it reports the results of a survey that included responses from 42 of 50 US state departments of transportation and a content analysis of DB requests for proposals from 26 states to gauge the client's perspective, as well as 11 structured interviews with DB contractors to obtain the perspective from the other side of the DB contract. A suite of DB geotechnical risk manage tools is presented based on the results of the analysis. Effective practices were found in three areas: enhancing communications on geotechnical issues before final proposals are submitted; the use of project-specific differing site conditions clauses; and expediting geotechnical design reviews after award. The major finding is that contract verbiage alone is not sufficient to transfer the risk of changed site conditions. The agency must actively communicate all the geotechnical information on hand at the time of the DB procurement and develop a contract strategy that reduces/retires the risk of geotechnical uncertainty as expeditiously as possible after award.

Performance of performance specifications in design-build highway projects

“…It is conceivable but not obvious that the use of performance specifications may be affected if the choice of a design-build contract is influenced by a wish to accelerate projects, an intention that appears to be more common in the US than for Swedish public clients. If as a consequence the time allotted to geotechnical investigations is shorter than under designbid-build, contractors are exposed to additional risk (McLain, Gransberg and Loulakis, 2014;Castro-Nova et al, 2018).…”

Assessment of State Agencies’ Practices in Managing Geotechnical Risk in Design–Build Projects

“…In addition, the amount of geotechnical information expressed in the procurement phase plays an important role in the probability that a given DB project will end in a DSC claim. McLain et al found that providing all the geotechnical information on hand when the project is advertised and forming the DSC clause in a manner that makes it specific to the available geotechnical data instead of using a standard design-bid-build boilerplate DSC was an effective alternative to manage geotechnical risk (14).…”

“…Daoulas addresses key elements that should be considered regarding geotechnical risk during the proposal preparation phase (13). Another study suggests that effective practices, such as enhancing communication between the owner and the design-builder, using differing site condition clauses, and expediting geotechnical design reviews after the contract is awarded, can be employed to mitigate or reduce the geotechnical risk (14). Likewise, other studies have concentrated specifically on the legal aspects of DB geotechnical issues (15).…”

Geotechnical risk decision tools for alternative project delivery method selection

“…In addition, the amount of geotechnical information expressed in the procurement phase plays an important role over the probability to a given DB project ends in a DSC claim. McLain et al (2014) found that providing all the geotechnical information on hand when the project is advertised and forming the DSC clause in a manner that makes it specific to the available geotechnical data instead of using a standard DBB boilerplate DSC was an effective alternative to manage geotechnical risk.…”