> The head arthrititect stood up like a ram rod and said sternly, "We 
> don't ASK the trades, we TELL them!" 
Cuyler,

Sadly we run in to that thinking a great deal w/ architects who have no 
business playing with histo presto... I won't go very far into our 
current FUBAR fiasco... where the architect thinks this is what they are 
doing -- TELLING them! In reality they have actively divested themselves 
of any and all design and or liability for same having shifted it all 
over to the contractor. Now they bitch because they don't like the cost 
proposal when if they took their head out of their dark space they may 
begin to understand what it is that they really told the contractor to 
do... they told the contractor to design the job and be fully and 100% 
responsible for the result. Sheesh! Pay to play, the come back is a cost 
that includes getting a 5th structural engineer through the contractor 
involved (there are already 4 involved) in the project who will sign off 
on the end result and a scope of work that assures that the 5th engineer 
will feel comfortable to sign off.

I am very much interested in new ideas coming from the AIA out of 
California re: Integrated Project Delivery. They are talking about 
cooperative cross-discipline project teams built on mutual trust and 
respect that include owner, designer and contractor/trades from the 
early development of the project to the closure and completion.

I want to encourage my beloved architect and engineer friends whom I 
respect dearly to gather together and begin to burn your lesser 
marauding morons at the stake.

][<en

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