Reviewing electronic plans

[Future Planning Diva]

Has anyone maganged a transition from paper-based plan review to electronic plan review?

This will have a big impact on the way we work, and I'm looking at the possibility of setting up a few shared work stations with REALLY big monitors to facilitate plan review. This will be expensive and take up space, is it worth it? The employees who do this review have extremely heavy workloads, and thier review tends to be the critical path for processing applications, so we want to make things as smooth for them as we can.

I know architects tend to work on dual monitor setups these days, and I'm not sold on any particular approach. I'd love to hear how you personally review and comment on large-scale drawings electronocally.

Cheers,
FPD

[kms]

We accept paper and electronic plans. The transition to electronic reviewing hasn't been smooth. The common complaint is that the monitors are too small. One reviewer prints drawings from the file because he prefers working with paper. He likes to make notes and write comments on the drawings as he goes.

The engineers who submit plans prefer submitting electronic versions of their plans. We haven't caught up with them yet.

[Raf]

One of the biggest obstacles is how to review a plan digitally and what to require. PDF versus CAD, etc. How does your department(s) keep track of what commented on what plan. Is their a paper copy in the end? Is it a linear fashion where one department reviews than the next?

Hardware: I recommend monitor sizes at least 24"inch LCDs or larger. Dual set up doesn't do a hell of a lot of beans unless you are checking against a digital code.

Software: This is a huge one. Your staff needs to be all on the same software review platforms. I highly recommend blubeam revu. It is a pretty powerful PDF mark-up sweet that allows for track changes, and other functionality that Adobe Standard does not have.

[Masswich]

We just switched to electronic plan submission and review. Getting some big monitors (hint, get large HDTV's, they are less than half the cost and almost as good). We use ePlan from Avolve. Seems to work pretty good.

The only thing we take in paper now is the actual application. Still working out the kinks but we gotta stop drowning in paper here.

Some grumbles from the public. We are thinking of setting up a work station out front so people can scan their paper plans in when they get here if they need to.

[Future Planning Diva]

Thanks for the responses.

I read that big TVs can have lower resolution that good monitors. . . but maybe the HD feature addresses that issue.

As for public response, we hope to have a good communication plan in place to guide applicants through the transition to electronic filing. Plus we'll have to allow paper filing as an alternative. My hope is that most applicants will see the benefits to online filing!

Cheers,
FPD