Portland State University (PSU) Development News

[mcbaby]

well, at least it will match the urban center.

[MarkDaMan]

^huh, the Hacker one wasn't the choosen one.

I don't think YGH design will match the Urban Center, but it will fit the block and opens up the plaza with the window looking in.

Still, the 1700 building in Hackers looks flossy...Much better than the earlier rendering I've seen.

[pdxf]

Originally Posted by Urbanpdx

I don't understand how these firms "spend up to $200,000 of paid staff time going after these jobs". First that is 10,000 hours at $20 per hour.

Most billing rates for individuals at firms begin at $75/hour. For a project like this, there are probably at least five or six people working on it, with only a couple at the bottom end of the billing scale. Higher ups on the scale probably bill at twice that.

[Urbanpdx]

But the firms don't pay thier people the "billing rate" they pay them a lot less. That is like a developer that spends a few thousand doing a due-dilligence investigation on a site and finding a problem saying they were out $10 million (the profit had they done the project) instead of the $3000 they actually spent because it didn't work out. If you had an offer accepted on a house and you paid $300 for an inspection that showed a lot of dry-rot so you bailed out would you say you:
a) "spent $300 on the failed deal"
b) "spent $100,000 on the failed deal because you hoped to make that in appreciation during your ownership"
?

These architecture firms are NOT "spending up to $200,000" on these proposals!

[zilfondel]

Umm... Design-Build is becoming much more common practice throughout the USA, replacing Design-Bid-Build. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, as it allows architects to retain control over the final product much more so than in the older system. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong...

[Urbanpdx]

Design build is interesting. It seems to me that the contractor would have the control though, am I wrong? That might make for a hard to market building unless your program was pretty tight before going to contract. I think this is pretty routine for commercial and industrial buildings.

[pdxf]

Originally Posted by Urbanpdx

But the firms don't pay thier people the "billing rate" they pay them a lot less.

Sure they don't pay the employees that much, but a billing rate also adds in the costs of doing business. You seem to only be factoring the initial, up-front cost of labor. Regardless of that, there is opportunity cost involved. A firm could be billing those hours to another project that is paying at the billing rate. In essence, if we spend our time working on a project that doesn't pay anything, it is lost money since we could be collecting that money from a project that does.

[awg]

I'll bite:

But the firms don't pay thier people the "billing rate" they pay them a lot less. That is like a developer that spends a few thousand doing a due-dilligence investigation on a site and finding a problem saying they were out $10 million (the profit had they done the project) instead of the $3000 they actually spent because it didn't work out. If you had an offer accepted on a house and you paid $300 for an inspection that showed a lot of dry-rot so you bailed out would you say you:
a) "spent $300 on the failed deal"
b) "spent $100,000 on the failed deal because you hoped to make that in appreciation during your ownership"
?

These architecture firms are NOT "spending up to $200,000" on these proposals!

The rationale is as follows:
An architecture company would spend 2000 hours (say 8 people 40 hours a week for 6 weeks at an average billing rate of $100--which is a typical blending rate that a company would use). This comes out to $192,000. If the company is busy--as many architecture firms are right now--that is money they would have billed to another 'less glamorous' project they would have taken. In many ways, this is a real cost to companies because they would probably have set up a budget that assumes a certain amount of billable time to pay their costs throughout a given year. Since they didn't take that project, their bank account in the following month is-for all intents and purposes-$192k lighter. This is precisely why not many architecture companies would chase a project like this in the current economic climate (NOTE only 3 entered this race). And it typically results in companies that chase these kinds of projects paying the younger staff lower wages and smaller year end bonuses (if any).

Umm... Design-Build is becoming much more common practice throughout the USA, replacing Design-Bid-Build. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, as it allows architects to retain control over the final product much more so than in the older system. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong...

It depends how one looks at this: In the traditional Design-Bid-Build approach, architects historically have gotten more time to do the designing part of the Design-Bid-Build. The Bidding part is specific to the Design the architect comes up with. When something goes out to bid it is assumed it is done (on the architects end) for all intents and purposes. In the Design-Build process, the architect takes the "design" to a certain point of time that the contractor and development team can estimate it. At that point the contract is awarded--however--the "design" is not complete. The estimate assumes a great deal of things because there wasn't the time to pinpoint every detail. The architect now has to design something within the parameters of the estimate.

For example, on a rec center like this the contractor might have assumed the entry lobby was going to cost $150 a sq ft at 2000 sq ft = $300,000. The architect (as well as the contractor and developer) now has the responsible to dream up a lobby design for $300k. A certain % goes to the floor--lets say $xx a sq ft for terrazzo x 2000 sq ft and how about $xx a lineal foot for lighting in the ceiling etc. etc.

Its a give and take; either way can work. But there is a huge amount of trust between the architect, contractor, and developer in the design-build process.

[Urbanpdx]

Thanks all. That is good info. The design build program still looks scary. That trust thing looks pretty huge. What if the architect says "lets just re-hash a dumb box and put in as few hours as possible" and the contractor says "ya, I can build it really cheap and pocket the extra cash"?

I guess the salient point on the competition is that the firm must be so busy that the competition work results in work being turned away. 8 people for 6 weeks seems like a lot for some renderings, elevations and floorplans though. Otherwise when Starbucks makes a mocha instead of a late they are "spending" $4 for the coffee they throw out instead of the 50 cents it cost them.

[zilfondel]

Originally Posted by Urbanpdx

Thanks all. That is good info. The design build program still looks scary. That trust thing looks pretty huge. What if the architect says "lets just re-hash a dumb box and put in as few hours as possible" and the contractor says "ya, I can build it really cheap and pocket the extra cash"?

I guess the salient point on the competition is that the firm must be so busy that the competition work results in work being turned away. 8 people for 6 weeks seems like a lot for some renderings, elevations and floorplans though. Otherwise when Starbucks makes a mocha instead of a late they are "spending" $4 for the coffee they throw out instead of the 50 cents it cost them.

The flip side to that is the architect will have a really shitty portfolio (design-wise) and thus hopefully won't get hired to design cutting-edge projects. See Ankrom Moisan...

[GreenCity]

So I was just wondering, is the design element that most everyone dislikes from the winning design the facades facing out onto the streets? From my eye the windowed section across from the Urban Center actually seems to be a nice accent to the plaza. Large windows which will create a nice lighting effect towards nighttime, a feeling of openness along the entire length of the frontage, and a sense of lightness and modernity that should mesh well with the developing aesthetic of PSU. It's not a large tag project along the lines of what some larger universities have pursued, but really is that something PSU needs anyways? I rather appreciate that we spend more money and time on a building to teach planning and politics than on a Rec center for students to lift wieghts and play basketball in. And for a smaller scale project it seems fairly suitable and nice. The seemingly long exspansive walls of brick looming over fifth and sixth should change though, does anyone know if Savinar's BBB recommendations took PSU into account? Or if any of the three proposals looked at this building's setting as part of the Mall?

[MarkDaMan]

Welcome Green City...Once the renderings were posted, the criticizm seems to have died down. Randy Gragg wrote a scathing editorial in the Oregonian and I think we were all expecting a metal shack held up by string.

I have to agree for the cost of the project, it looks like the YGH proposal is going to be a complimentary addition to that part of the campus without cloning a stunning success as Hacker proposed. I have yet to see other renderings from YGH, but initially it looks to be solid and the night view from the plaza will be enhanced by seeing all the activity inside the building.

[65MAX]

The image posted here is the "good side" of the building, the N side facing the plaza. From what I hear, the 3 street (E, S and W) sides are nothing more that giant brick walls with a few horizontal bands of windows. Very oppressive. Especially as you said, considering lightrail is on two of those streets.

[chepe]

Hey all,

New to PDX (having recently moved from Spokane and before that Seattle). I found this thread interesting because I live very near PSU and walk through campus every day on my way to work. I agree with others that the side facing the Urban Center courtyard will likely enhance that already attractive space. It would be interesting, however, to see the other sides of the building. My feeling is that PSU, despite having several streets at least partially running through campus is pretty closed in on itself from the surrounding neighborhood.
This may have been a choice on the part of PSU as the closed off feeling works to produce a kind of enclave feeling once you actually walk into the campus. I was surprised, however, about the general lack of interaction with the neighborhood surrounding the University. I think that is why the Urban Center is such a success. Other than the streetcar just looking pretty damn cool rolling through the courtyard, it actually creates interaction between the surrounding neighborhood and the campus. It would be unfortunate in my opinion if the new rec center ends up furthering the divide between the University and the surrounding streets.

[awg]

I guess the salient point on the competition is that the firm must be so busy that the competition work results in work being turned away. 8 people for 6 weeks seems like a lot for some renderings, elevations and floorplans though. Otherwise when Starbucks makes a mocha instead of a late they are "spending" $4 for the coffee they throw out instead of the 50 cents it cost them.

2 additional observations:

Generating renderings, elevations and floorplans sounds easy. Doing it well and on a budget is not. Think about a school project. A semester is how long 14 weeks? 10 - 12 weeks is spent designing a floor plan, sections, and elevations. The last 2 weeks is spent generating the presentation drawings, sections, renderings, and models.

The $4 cup of coffee costs a lot more than $.50 to make. The majority of costs that go into the $4 cup are not paying employees salaries. For an architecture company think about:

- the rent payment due every month to the building owner
- the energy bill due the utility for heating, cooling, lighting
- paying the receptionist to answer the phone
- paying the accountant to count the money on the jobs that make money
- paying your insurance coverage
- paying your employees health benefits
- paying into you employees retirement plan (hopefully)
- paying your marketing director

The costs of chasing projects like these can be absorbed, but they are real costs. A general rule of thumb I have heard, is to assume for every dollar in salary think 2.5 times that for other costs. So if you pay an employee $25 an hour, all the other costs add up to something like $62.50 to break even. And this assumes every hour is used at 100% efficiency.

[Urbanpdx]

Good info thanks. It sounds like it is an expensive business but why should a losing firm get paid to make a proposal? If you want to put a new roof on your house and get 3 bids from contractors do you expect to pay each of them $200 because they had to send an employee over to your house and work up a bid?

I know I am being kind of argumentitive here but that line that Gragg had saying/implying that the firms "spent" $200k and that the school should be paying those costs just got to me.

[anp]

Originally Posted by Urbanpdx

Good info thanks. It sounds like it is an expensive business but why should a losing firm get paid to make a proposal? If you want to put a new roof on your house and get 3 bids from contractors do you expect to pay each of them $200 because they had to send an employee over to your house and work up a bid?

I know I am being kind of argumentitive here but that line that Gragg had saying/implying that the firms "spent" $200k and that the school should be paying those costs just got to me.

The level of effort and detail in the architectural proposal is much greater. This type of architectural proposal does not consist of simply working up a bid stating that you could design and build a building of "X" square feet accommodating a given program for a cost of "Y," which would be similar to a contractor's proposal for a roof. Would you expect the roofing contractor to propose a major, detailed redesign of the roof and then to erect a large-scale mock-up free of charge?

[mchine73]

I've been looking at grad schools for urban design, right now I'm graduating in December with a Econ Finance double major. Just wondering if this would be practical and what y'all think of PSU's urban design school. Best program? Job prospects?

Right now just trying to find so info and am still a solid 16 months outs.
Thanks

[Urbanpdx]

If the roof job were big enough, say millions of dollars, I might not think it is out of line.

[anp]

Originally Posted by Urbanpdx

If the roof job were big enough, say millions of dollars, I might not think it is out of line.

And perhaps it wouldn't be. I'm just saying that it isn't necessarily unreasonable to expect some amount of compensation for up-front work that goes beyond "normal" expectations, and that is what Randy Gragg seems to be saying in his column. It would be especially disappointing to spend that much time and money on a proposal and then find that about 2/3 of the decision (90 out of 150 points) is not based in any way on the design proposal.