KALAMAZOO, MI Walbridge Project Manager Matt Pulick participated in a panel discussion with members of the Western Michigan University Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine project team at this year's Construction Owners Association of America (COAA) Spring Owners Leadership Conference.

COAA's 2015 Spring Owners Leadership Conference is designed to bring leading-edge educational content to construction and design professionals from across the country. The conference is known for providing various levels of information to guests through informative sessions and panel discussions, as well as through an exposition of industry vendors and networking events.

Walbridge recently served as construction manager on a major renovation effort that converted a 300,000-square-foot pharmaceutical research building into a state-of-the-art medical school facility for WMU. The award-winning project brought roughly 30,000 square feet of new additions to the 30-year-old structure, creating a striking new facility in downtown Kalamazoo, Michigan. The renovation involved demolition of 60 percent of the building's interior, which presented challenges to the team as unforeseen elements were discovered.

Pulick joined Peter Strazdas, Associate Vice President of WMU Facilities Management, and Jon Mulder, Diekema Hamann Mechanical Engineer, presenting the use of building information modeling (BIM) at COAA's Spring Owners Leadership Conference. Diekema Hamann teamed with lead architect S/L/A/M Collaborative on design efforts at the new WMU Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine.

Panelists discussed the use of BIM modeling to streamline construction coordination at the WMU Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine project, as well as the "continuous model development" strategy used to eliminate information loss and inefficiencies. The team shared details on its process of using single architectural and mechanical-electrical-plumbing models from project conceptualization through closeout, and how they were prepared for integration into WMU's facilities management software. The session will illustrate how and why the process worked and provide metrics on the project outcome.