Highway work vs. land development

[BelspringKen]

After several years in land development, the last 4 or 5 as project engineer, I am considering switching into transpo.

I have some experience with project management. Have done most of the functions, just not all of them on one job. Have not really done much in marketing, other than worked on proposals.

I sat for the PE (again) and found the traffic/transpo the most interesting topic of all the things I had to brush up on. I am also tired of dealing with development projects with tiny budgets that always seem to be behind schedule.
Am I just trading one set of problems for another?

Can any of you transpo types comment on what you like and dislike about what you do?

 

[proletariat]

I've dabbled in the highway aspect and the traffic aspect. A highway job seems as if you would spend a lifetime grinding out cross sections, profiles, and plan views for a massive DOT road project. Not very appealing to me.

The traffic aspect seems much more appealing and makes more business sense if you would ever hope to go out on your own. You would generate traffic impact studies, develop signal plans, and do long range traffic planning. It is a better sole-proprietor business model because your revenue is dependant on the number of reports and studies and signal plans you generate, not the hours you bill sitting behind a cad station.

The best option, I think would be to do mainly the traffic work, and then also get occupancy permits from the local DOT for clients which may require a little highway design and signage.

My company, as many land development consulting companies, subs out the traffic and occupancy permit work to transportation engineering firms, so we would probably be your clients. I also think that traffic pays better than site civil pays better than highway design if you want to remain a wage earner.

 

[BelspringKen]

The position would be a change to another dept. in my firm.

I am told I would be involved in traffic as well as highway.
The long hours in front of CAD are a big concern for me, but if I stay put I will still have more than my share of it.

 

[proletariat]

You could just ask about the cad hours. If it is small-time highway work involved with access to state highways, or intersection realignments, it wouldn't be bad at all. If you are designing an interstate beltway around a city, it could be years of cad.

 

[BelspringKen]

I am leaning towards going to the traffic/transpo dept.

Its hard to do grading all day, then review for the PE at night - knowing that there won't be any CAD questions on the PE. Another issue I have is that we are often a sub of a sub - getting all our info secondhand at best.

 

[namdac]

BelspringKen,
I currently work in the public sector of a D.O.T. and I find it to be more of a challange. On so of the projects that I have worked on had many, many various items to deal with. Land owners what the world, you stike your best offer by giving him 10% above land value, 5 separate drives with triple pipes. And he says its not good enough. Hello condemnation. Challanges like this are fun to some, I mean where else can you have someone else (non-engineer) tell you that it will not work. Just remember one thing everybody needs Roads,Bridges,Box Culverts and Railways, let's face it we as a people are hook.
Hope this helps some. May be next time I won't vent.
Regards,
Namdac

 

[BelspringKen]

namdac,
Vent all you want! I am interested in hearing opinions.

I have been in the position of having non-engineers (developers, mostly) making comments on things that they have no background with.

 

[ccor]

My personal favorite is when a non-engineer reviewer (or even licensed ones) takes a free red-line on a plan I am taking professional responsibility for. They refuse to approve the drawings unless I make some change I'm not willing to stamp. So far I've always been able to reach some sort of compromise, but I hate the battle on what seems like every project.

 

[BelspringKen]

I think some reviewers are frustrated designers. They want to design something on Your job when they get it.

 

[jdonville]

BelspringKen,

There are loads of jobs on highway/transportation projects. I have mainly done geotech engineering for the roadway subgrade and structures part of it (bridges, culverts, retaining walls, light masts, etc.) on two major jobs over the past three years.

The first involved seval miles of widening from 2 to 4 lanes and a new 2-lane bridge over the Mississippi, among other hurdles. The most recent is 8 miles of divided highway (2 lanes in each direction) over "virgin" farmland, 6 bridges at exisiting roads and 2 interchanges plus some truly huge embankments (forty-odd feet of new fill) and one large retaining wall. I'm also working on a more limited job (2 bridges and 3 new retaining walls).

The consultants that my firms have worked for typically do most of the heavy drafting as they keep the geometrics, drainage and structural design in-house.

That neglects the small army of folks who do the surveying, right-of-way planning and acquisition and permitting side of things. Add in all the environmental assessments and corridor selection studies and you're talking some serious horsepower and loads of time required to get the job done.

I'm not going to even get started with the construction and all the materials testing that has to be done...

Jeff