2017 Could Be a Break-Out Year for Design-Builders

The design-build project delivery method has been on the rise for the past several years, now surpassing design-bid-build delivery system use by 10 percent. (Fifty percent of all projects use design-build, 40 percent use design-bid-build and 10 percent use construction management at-risk.) And with 22 states passing design-build legislation last year—providing authorization to implement the design-build model for public buildings—2016 marked the highest legislative success rate for design-build since 2009, according to the Design-Build institute of America.

In DBIA’s chart above, you can see that half of the nation now has full design-build authorization, and all states allow DBIA members to use design-build for public projects in some form. But in our region, particularly in Iowa and Wisconsin, we still have work to do. As DBIA continues to educate legislators about the design-build process and legislators ramp up discussions of how to address our aging infrastructure, the cost savings and accelerated schedule offered by design-build is likely to sell itself.

To read more about DIBA’s legislative efforts and progress, visit DBIA.org.