Page 86 - Green Building Through Integrated Design

THE CONTRACTOR’S ROLE IN INTEGRATED DESIGN 63

Photography by Timothy Hursley.

The Contractor’s Role

in Integrated Design

No discussion of integrated design would be complete without examining the contractor’s
role in the process, especially since many high-performance projects are design/build or
design/assist projects in which the contractor is engaged right from the beginning, at the
very least to provide pricing and constructability reviews as the design is evolving. It’s
hard to overstate the importance of the contractor’s role in an integrated design process.
After all, in most projects, they coordinate the work of dozens of trades and subcontrac-
tors and have the responsibility for spending more than 90 percent of the project budget.
They are also directly responsible for more than ten points in the LEED-NC system.
Indirectly, they are responsible for implementing the design team’s vision and holding the
project’s specifications firm against a barrage of submittal (change) requests.
DPR Construction’s Ted van der Linden provides some perspective on how the gen-
eral contractor might be a significant asset to the integrated design team.*

*Interview with Ted van der Linden, DPR Construction, February 2008.