Frequently asked questions
What does engineering project management cover on a development?
It covers the co-ordination of the technical disciplines and the consenting pathway: setting the investigation and design programme, managing the interfaces between geotechnical, civil and structural design, assembling the consent applications, responding to council requests for information, co-ordinating engineering plan approval and network operator sign-off, and managing construction review and completion certification through to code compliance or section 224c.
How long does the consent process take in New Zealand?
Statutory clocks give 20 working days for a building consent and 20 working days for a non-notified resource consent, but the clock stops whenever a request for further information is issued, which is common. In practice a straightforward building consent is often six to ten weeks door to door, and a subdivision consent with engineering plan approval can run several months. The main lever on the timeline is the completeness of the application at lodgement.
What causes project delays on engineering projects?
The recurring causes are investigation scoped too narrowly for the eventual design, requests for further information from council, engineering plan approval and network operator sign-off not allowed for in the programme, ground conditions differing from those assumed, and inspections missed during construction so certification cannot be issued at the end. Most of these are programme and scoping problems rather than technical ones.