Agricultural experts likely
have rules on how long one should persist with a new species once introduced
into a field. Also, for recognising the signs to give up if the plants are not
taking to the new environment.
If there are similar
rules for establishing viable crops of BIM around the global AEC industry, they’re
better be longer than 30 years.
Based on personal
experience, that is at least as long since it has been trying to take roots, unsuccessfully.
Even a decade or so ago,
I could see that BIM was nothing like an emerging success story.
For several years since,
I worked on analysing, measuring, reanalysing and remeasuring anything that
could reliably assess just how well/badly BIM was doing.
While not employing tactics
supported by the mainstream, I genuinely wanted to make it work or at least
understand why it does not.
The closest I came to formulate
the reasons of this very complex failure, is that BIM is a ‘language’ – a complicated,
at some point sophisticated, beautiful language.
A language that its host
industry does not speak.
Fluency is probably
below 1% of all the people that work in the AEC industry and deal with its information
day in and out.
People can and will
argue with this assumption.
I am confident that
proper scientific studies would reflect similar numbers.
And if I was very wrong
in my guess, like tenfold wrong and the number was 10%, that is still terribly
low for something that has been trying to take roots for 30 years and is the
backbone of a major industry.
One can try being
positive, acknowledge that languages historically took millennia to develop,
but in this context of a highly digitalised word, the out of synch development of
a language of a major industry operating in a global context is a concern.
My gloomy view on BIM’s
survival prospects is not universally shared.
May I call them
BIM-doom-deniers?
Ask anyone that is
personally benefitting from BIM and they’ll tell you everything is going just
fine.
Ask others that have
managed to stay away from it and depending on their status and position will
have similarly rosy-coloured stories to say.
(‘on our last project,
we could have not done what we had without BIM, sure it cost a bit’).
BIM is still heralded as
something that is ‘the thing to really flourish - soon’ and something everyone knows
is important and doing everything to develop it within their own teams/projects/organisations.
And yes, doing their
best, and knowing it is important and the future is in BIM and…
you get the picture…
This situation seems to suit
everyone in the industry.
It doesn’t and shouldn’t
by any logic. But I’d accept it as ‘let it be’ (my time has passed, move on) were
it not for the upcoming generations.
The new generation of 20
somethings (and younger) in training or about to enter the AEC, are taught that
documenting building is about creating drawings.
Don’t get me wrong, I
know they are also encouraged ‘to BIM’ at universities or at least allowed to use
various modelling software, but I am yet to come across a programme that will
squarely say, ‘forget the drawings (paper based or otherwise – i.e. their
digital versions) and figure out a new way to think up/document and share
building information’.
Or even if such programs
exist and students are let loose to model, render and animate to their heart
content, once they enter the industry, they get quickly shown the ‘real’ ropes.
A good modeller will
have plenty of opportunities to model, but rule number one is, that the ‘drawings’
are priority, what consultancies get paid for.
(what consents are given
on, what building contracts are based on, buildings built from etc etc).
It would be great to be
able to state that these two aims are not contradicting, that the drawing is
gradually losing its power to the models, after all ‘drawings come from models’,
but the sad reality is different.
In fact, what comes out
of the process of these ‘in practice BIM’ experiments are very poor drawings
and mildly better-but contractually useless models.
And if you think that making
BIM models ‘contractual’ will be the answer, think again.
CAD drawings never
become universally accepted contractual documents and the risk/liability issues
of that ‘language’ are significantly less difficult than what making models ‘real’
would be.
Working for a general
contractor I’d consider a challenge put to us from the design consultancies to
build exactly what they’d modelled (no drawings or specs) after all isn’t that
what they charge principals extra for?
Don’t worry. Not going
to happen (unfortunately).
Maybe I should not be
worried about the future of new generations, they’ll figure out how to claim
their piece of the industry. If the last 30 years are anything to go by, this
is not a given.
As scary as it sounds,
if we can assume to have a viable AEC industry in 30 years from now, it could still
be a similar ‘drawing based mush’ as it is now.
So, BIM is dead, has
been, will carry on.
What positive spin can
be put on?
If you have missed the
boat for BIM, if it has been dead all along, you can carry on working without
it.
(make the occasional positive
comment to your modeller ‘slaves’ and no one will bother you).
Alternatively, you can rethink
the process of Building Information Management and consider it as ‘a story’ disassociated
from its medium (the drawing).
A story of ‘an idea’
that goes through many hoops to become a building.
Recognise, that being so
badly and deeply conditioned, that the only way to handle building related
information is through drawings (AND specs – lots of written specs!) is a weight
that can be lifted from the industry.
But if drawing becomes
redundant, all of us that associate ourselves with creating/reading/checking/sharing
drawings will be also be redundant?
That is an uncomfortable
thought for all but the most competent of modellers and is what is paralysing
the industry and preventing it of reinventing.
Take the ‘drawing’ out of
the process of creating buildings. Eliminate it.
And/or give space for
the new generations to do away with the drawings and tell their building stories
their way.
The typical response to
this motion will be:
‘Ha, they can render and
animate these young’uns but do they know how structures work?
How plumbing goes in a
bathroom, how to detail a window sill? Nah, no idea’.
You might be right, but
you aren’t helping this situation either.
The ‘zombie BIM’ is also
encouraging and enabling the status quo.
By pretending progress (we
all do BIM!) yet sticking to what is familiar to the oldies we are NOT passing
on the industry knowledge to the younger generations bur selfishly holding on
to it.
Look at building material
giants, what do they do to help this change?
Provide CAD files of
their installation details? Revit libraries of their windows? Specification
writing apps?
What about mammoth-sized
global engineering consultancies? Making hay while the sun is shining they
cheaply insource BIM modelling and on-sell mildly useful drawings and specs?
Surely there is an
industry wide responsibility to tackle the issue of ‘they can model but don’t
know how to put buildings together’ in a better way than parading zombie-BIM
examples around endless BIM conferences?
I know. Overwhelming.
Another aspect of our lives
that we can’t do much about as individuals.
It is such a clichéd
saying, that every step in the right direction counts.
Keeping this BIM alive
is NOT the right direction.
If you are so keen on
drawings, go back to drawings and stay with them but make them work (again).
Yes, they can be created
via models, but focus on the drawings and increase the level of literacy
(read/write) across the industry. Models are not good if only 1% of the
industry can create/modify them (even 10% is too low).
Being such a long post, few will bother to read through it.
Some might not get beyond the title and claim, I am being
especially insulting to the good BIMmers of this world that are trying their very
best.
Nah, I’m not. I give credit where credit is due.
But if you want to really prove me wrong, go
paperfree.
