http://www.building.co.uk/technical/process-and-it/bim-the-inside-story/5021676.

article BIM - the inside story 29 July 2011 | By Thomas Lane PRINT EMAIL MORE SHARING SERVICESSHARESHARE ON TWITTERSHARE ON FACEBOOKSHARE ON LINKEDIN COMMENT SAVE

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BIM builds up: Five recent innovations in BIM 10 June 2011 The use of force: Building information modelling 22 October 2010 New images: Tottenham FC stadium design goes for planning 26 Oct 09 Pilot project 2008 Issue 4 The IT strategy at T5 2003 issue 29 In recent weeks weve heard all about BIM - its advantages, the sharing principle, the downfalls,the training needed and the cost, but what does it all actually mean? Thomas Lane follows one BIMed-up project from beginning to end Compulsory use of Building Information Modelling on all public sector projects could help save the industry from itself. Using design information collaboratively has been shown to produce cost savings of up to 10%. These savings could make the difference between surviving and going bust in todays tough environment - yet BIM is still a minority activity. Chief construction adviser Paul Morrell aims to change all that with his proposal to make BIM compulsory on public sector projects - an idea that is being backed by the government, as a recent working group report showed minimum savings of 5%. The savings come from sharing design information, which saves each team member from drawing up designs from scratch. Holding data in common means design information is consistent and coordinated, eliminating expensive clashes once projects get to site. It sounds great in principle - so why isnt BIM the norm rather than the exception? The first barrier is that it involves switching from working in 2D to 3D, which means software upgrades, expensive training and a change in mindset. The second is that while sharing information is fine in principle, the questions arises of who owns the information and who you blame when something goes wrong. That is a difficult issue to resolve in a notoriously fragmented industry. So how does using BIM work in real life? Building decided to follow a projects team from start to finish to see how each member gets on. We join the team at the design stage to see why they are using BIM and how the information is being shared. We will revisit the team once the project is on site, to see how BIM is benefiting the construction process, and finally will see how the design information will be used to help maintain the building once finished.