The Charlotte, NC construction market is still highly competitive and performing robustly. However, there are early signs pointing toward a potential moderate slowdown.

As the first in a series of market studies analyzing the local and national economic factors affecting construction costs, OCMI’s cost management and economic team take a deep dive into the Charlotte, NC Metropolitan Area. What we discovered is a highly competitive market – challenges in hiring common and skilled labor, combined with rising wages and substantial increases of materials, are leading to an above-average, year-over-year escalation of construction costs. While the market will continue to perform robustly in 2019, there are preliminary signs pointing toward a potential moderate slowdown beginning in 2020.

To download a copy of OCMI’s findings and examination of the Charlotte, NC construction market, go to our main case studies page and fill out your information to receive download.

Higher Education Funding & Revenue Streams
After tuition and philanthropy, sports represent the third leading revenue stream for most universities and private secondary schools across the United States. This funding comes not only from ticket sales, but also from the fees and dues generated from intercollegiate, intermural and community league organizations. In consideration of the changing dynamics between schools and the communities in which they reside, engaging local stakeholders through sports has become an increasingly effective way to integrate an institution into the local fabric, while generating additional capital for other uses.

OCMI works with owners, architects, engineers and contractors as a truly collaborative project partner to inform planning decisions. We analyze upfront capital investments and contextualize the data against estimated maintenance costs, anticipated revenue streams, and relative user experiences.

Case Study: Turf vs. Sod
Serving as the Owner’s Representative and working with the design-build team, OCMI studied the feasibility of renovating a school’s existing athletic fields to bring on new uses and get the complex up to ADA compliance. The existing facilities had fallen into disrepair, with complicated soil conditions leading to far-below acceptable field conditions. Initial budgets precluded the installation of an artificial turf football/soccer field, as the upfront costs exceeded the approved budget.

In response to the project realities, OCMI first developed a survey to quantify and understand non-student (staff, teachers, community members) interest in the athletic facilities, identifying the current challenges perceived by all stakeholders. From that survey, it became clear that a key need for non-student stakeholders was the incorporation of an artificial turf field (versus natural grass).

From there, OCMI studied and quantified both the upfront and long-term costs of a natural grass field and an artificial turf field. Our findings revealed that while in this case installation of an artificial turf field would cost roughly 150% more than natural grass, the 20-year maintenance costs of natural grass was nearly 250% that of artificial turf.

Presented with these long-term costs, the OCMI team sought to understand the relative differences in potential revenue streams from non-student users. Again, our findings revealed a substantial advantage to artificial turf. Adjusted for declines during winter months, we found that the artificial turf could be rented an additional nine (9) hours per week versus grass, and at a higher hourly rate ($100/hour versus $70/hour).

Combining these results revealed an optimistic cost-to-revenue break-even point of eight (8) years for artificial turf, whereas a natural grass field would experience continually rising maintenance costs and unlikely generate sufficient revenue to cover those costs.

OCMI’s study ultimately outlined a wider array of community engagement and capital investment options for our education client, allowing the school and the design team to make better informed decisions about the future of the school’s athletics facilities.

The Pull Planning process is a way for contractors and owners to collaborate, improve a project’s schedule, and build teamwork.

On nearly all OCMI construction projects, our schedulers, project managers, and others routinely engage in Pull Planning sessions to improve a project’s schedule, avoid rework, and foresee potential issues or constraints early on. Pull Planning is a collective process that ultimately delivers a better project and cultivates a stronger team environment.

Why use Pull Planning?

• Brainstorming with the entire project team to look ahead (typically 4-6 weeks ahead of schedule) helps everyone understand the project in a more holistic manner
• Identifying potential areas where trades overlap and must coordinate to reduce the risk of productivity claims
• Finding areas where multiple crews would be required to meet scheduling goals
• Analyzing activity durations and sequences to ensure that the team hits project milestones
• Promoting stronger communication among all team players, particularly the subcontractors, fosters teamwork, giving subcontractors ownership and accountability for their scope
• Helping all project players understand each other’s scope ensures that work is reduced and overlapping activities eliminated

The Pull Planning Process

Developing a Pull Planning process varies by project and team, and generally includes participants from the general contractor and subcontractor trades, in addition to other technical subject matter experts, like OCMI’s schedulers. For a $100-million-plus confidential data center project, the Pull Planning process that OCMI adheres to entails these activities:

Preparing for the Pull Planning Session

1. OCMI provides the project team members with the baseline schedule with durations and milestones one (1) month before the construction start date.
2. Before attending the Pull Planning session, every subcontractor understands their scope of work and comes up with a feasible duration for performing respective activities.
3. OCMI coordinates a “kick-off” session.
4. Participants use “sticky notes” with different colors for each subcontractor; each note is filled with the name of the subcontractor, activity scope, and activity duration.
5. Using the notes, the team fills up the wall board with “Week Starting” to “Week Ending” in a matrix, along with an “area” of the project, such as a floor number, cooling tower, etc.
6. Ongoing activities are positioned like a square, and “start” and “end” activities are positioned like a rhombus, so that the team can easily discern between the two types.
7. Subcontractors perform this activity for four (4) consecutive weeks.

Conducting the Pull Planning Session

1. The contractor’s superintendent then leads the Pull Planning session, brainstorming with the project team on each scope of work, scope durations, and predecessor and successor scopes, to make sure that all subcontractors have the material and man power, as needed, as well as discuss any possible risk to the project’s schedule.
2. This process is repeated on a weekly basis, so that the entire team reviews the progress of the present week and prepares for upcoming work using the four-week look ahead schedule, created by OCMI.
3. After reviewing the present week’s progress, that week’s wall board is cleared and moved to the end, which is then filled with the fifth week’s look ahead activities; the entire time line of boards is then progressed accordingly with second becoming the first, and so on.
4. OCMI’s schedulers maintain a record of the project’s tasks by continuously updating our CPM schedule in Primavera P6. We utilize this schedule to reference and double check work scope against the latest Pull Planning session activities.

Lessons Learned & Best Practices

While the first few weeks of a Pull Planning session are comprehensive and time consuming, the process becomes more routine and focused over time, as the team becomes more integrated and familiar with the project’s scope and activity durations.
The Pull Planning sessions afford every project stakeholder the opportunity to receive clarifications, ask questions, and identify potential risks to the project - all aimed at ensuring a safe job site and a project completed on time or, even better, ahead of schedule.