The Edmonton Construction Association (ECA) is helping its members and the construction industry embrace an emerging technology. The association has established a Building Information Modeling (BIM) training centre in Alberta’s capital.
The Edmonton Construction Association (ECA) is helping its members and the construction industry embrace an emerging technology.
The association has established a Building Information Modeling (BIM) training centre in Alberta's capital.
“The spirit and intent of this initiative is to help other associations that were behind with BIM,” said Darlene La Trace, executive vice-president of the ECA.
“It is a big undertaking because this is not normal training that we are offering. BIM courses are usually built for the design community. What we brought was something specific to construction that meets the needs of contractors and not the design community.”
The ECA has developed a BIM course for the construction industry in partnership with Autodesk and course instructors.
The curriculum explains BIM and its benefits, how it works in construction and what it means for workers, as well as basic navigation in BIM software.
“We are encouraging our members to take the day off and commit to a full day of instruction,” said La Trace. “For smaller firms, we have helped with the registrations costs.”
About $150,000 was invested by the ECA last year to set up the “i-room”, which houses 10 computers and a server, in order to offer the BIM courses to its members.
The ECA received a grant from the Government of Alberta, which subsidizes training costs and allows it to offer a full day training course for $112.50.
“We made this investment to help our members bridge the gap because not everyone has the money,” said Paul Verhesen, president of the ECA.
“There is a gap opening up between the haves and the have-nots, with big firms separating themselves from the smaller firms. At the ECA, we are trying to level the playing field for all our membership.”
In the last year, the ECA has held 57 full-day hands-on training sessions, with 358 participants.
To train these people, the ECA has hired a full time staff member, who handles registration, schedules the instructors and ensures the courses are technically ready to go.
La Trace said retaining course instructors can be a challenge, as they can be hired away by the design community or their own members.
The success of the course has shown that there is a need for an offering of higher level BIM courses.
“Recently, we had good news from some colleges and universities that they would work this into their curriculum,” said La Trace.
“More courses with BIM content have to be offered and become part of the overall training for construction.”
ECA members are asking for BIM courses with a specific focus on structural steel, mechanical and civil construction.
“We need to provide our members with a competitive advantage because there are firms coming into the Alberta market that already do this,” she said.
BIM is based on the concept of creating a 3D virtual model before any construction begins.
It has a growing array of tools that promise to revolutionize the way the built environment is constructed.
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