By Steve Rizer
What tangible effect, if any, will Construction Specifications Institute’s (CSI) recent endorsement of the digital practice documents that American Institute of Architects (AIA) published last year have on the design and construction industry? Will use of the documents and building information modeling (BIM) technology in general soon skyrocket?
When asked to predict what the endorsement’s potential impact could be, AIA Contract Documents Managing Director and Counsel Kenneth Cobleigh and Michael Bomba, associate counsel for AIA Contract Documents, jointly told ConstructionPro Week (CPW), “These documents have already gained wide acceptance within the construction industry, as evidenced by the Level of Development (LOD) Specification definitions being adopted in BIMForum’s LOD Specification and requests from other groups for licenses to use the text. We are hopeful that CSI’s endorsement will further drive usage of the documents by increasing awareness and strengthening their position as the industry standard for digital practice documents.”
In a separate interview with CPW, Greg Ceton, CSI’s director of technical services, commented on what the documents mean to the industry and how they may impact BIM use. “As has often been stated, the challenges facing practitioners in BIM are more social and legal than technological, and we believe that these documents are a good first step in helping to satisfy those issues.”
The digital practice documents that CSI endorsed include the following: AIA Document C106-2013, Digital Data Licensing Agreement; AIA Document E203-2013, Building Information Modeling and Digital Data Exhibit; AIA Document G201-2013, Project Digital Data Protocol Form; and AIA Document G202-2013, Project Building Information Modeling Protocol Form.
The ConstructionPro Network member version of this article includes additional details about the documents and a transcript of the other comments that Cobleigh and Bomba made during the interview.
