FORT WORTH, Texas - Department of Defense installations are facing a 2018 master planning deadline under new rules promulgated in 2012 to ensure all master planning documents comply with the new DoD and Federal Real Property Master Planning directives.
The Regional Planning and Environmental Center (RPEC), part of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Fort Worth District, is helping them get there.
RPEC planners, working with the Pacific Ocean Division (POD), became program managers of a collaborative U.S. Army Corps of Engineers-wide master planning effort to support compliance efforts by U.S. Army Garrison-Hawaii (USAG-HI) in FY2014. The team worked with HQ-USACE and other Regional Planning Support Centers to help the garrison meet the requirement. The team also supported a knowledge-based learning effort to plan these new strategies and implement them through design and construction.
All installations must meet revised terms of Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) for Installation Master Planning, according to Rumanda Young, RPEC master planning section chief and energy development manager at the Southwestern Division (SWD). New rules require more efficient use of energy and water and reduction of waste. They enhance quality of life for those who live and grow up on DoD installations.
The new UFC standards, and the USACE-led effort to develop this Area Development Plan (ADP) master planning process, was timely, according to Mark Mitsunaga, master planner at the USAG-HI Directorate of Public Works Planning Division. He said the garrison’s master plan hadn’t been properly updated in 25 years.
This was an opportunity to apply the new URC in a real scenario to test its applicability and adjust as necessary.
The RPEC team finished compliant updating ADPs at Fort Hood in December 2013. USAG-HI wanted similar support, but was challenged with a compressed contractual schedule to update its ADPs in order to move toward UFC compliance.
“The good news story is this: It took us three years to finish 11 ADPs at Fort Hood,” said Young. “Because of a highly motivated customer and an enterprise support solution made up of an integrated team of USACE planners representing not only POD and SWD but the other Regional Planning Support Centers and contractors, it took us 10 months to do 13 districts for USAG-HI.”
Varied conditions across the sprawling installation in Hawaii was a particular challenge, said Young. At Fort Hood, there was a commonality to the terrain. The ADP districts were all contiguous; streets typically marked the boundaries between them. In Hawaii, the installation sites are scattered all over Oahu and on the Big Island (Island of Hawaii).
“Each ADP has very different stakeholders, different climate,” she said. “Some are in the mountains, some on beaches, one is in the middle of a volcano. Some are training bases, some are housing.”
Mitsunaga said there are 22 distinct sub-installations within the garrison. Each location has a specific purpose that contributes to the whole mission of USAG-HI.
“You have to orchestrate a lot of parts and not lose sight of the common goal,” he said.
Regular daily transit between locations over large distances is not uncommon. For instance, soldiers at Fort Shafter regularly travel to Schofield Barracks for training. Traffic congestion is a big issue.
Young said RPEC, backing POD installation support efforts, earned strong support from the garrison because of sustainability master planning it performed at Schofield Barracks. The installation was willing to fund the compressed schedule out of its own pocket to get the 13 ADPs completed in FY 2014. It also asked POD/RPEC to conduct sustainability and transportation master planning across all of USAG-HI in FY 2015.
A workshop for each ADP brought together local stakeholders with the USACE-led planning team. Together they cataloged site conditions, created a vision plan and wrote several planning goals. They then developed alternative master plans. It’s a lot like the National Environmental Policy Act style of participatory planning, said Young.
“We don’t go out and do the master planning for them. They roll up their shirtsleeves. We do it together with the people who live and work and go to school there,” said Young. “Then we come back, and we put together draft plans. It’s all done, fast and furiously, in one week.”
The preferred alternative development plan is then identified, along with constraints and opportunities. This is the power of the USACE efforts of establishing Regional Planning Support Centers. We have the technical expertise and capabilities to support our customers as a team, she said.
Under the old master planning paradigm, installations put together short-range and long-range plans. Under the new paradigm, through a collaborative workshop with the installation stakeholders, the team develops a vision plan and framework. Each ADP is taken apart and fixed in pieces, considering second and third order effects – what needs to be done in the next 2 years, 4 years, 5 years, 10 years ... the birth of the Phased Implementation Plan. The steps are prioritized. It lays out the future of the ADP district step by step through an Area Development Execution Plan (AEDP) that is formulated using existing revenue streams.
Today’s master planning no longer uses traditional single-use only zoning, but mixes compatible uses in one spot to create a better functioning whole, said Young. In the old days, putting barracks above a post exchange would never have been done. But such “form-based coding” can build compact neighborhoods whose boundaries are defined by easy walking distance – not parking lots and roadways to access distant services. It provides a vibrant quality of life, reduces traffic congestion and improves healthful activities in a sustainable way. It also gives more detailed design planning parameters from which buildings are sited to ensure all facilities meet the DoD and Federal Planning principles.
At one point about eight years ago, USAG-HI sorely needed to erect new family housing to serve the soldiers, Mitsunaga said. But the family units were built at Schofield Barracks intermingled with motor pools and barracks. In hindsight, the motor pools should have been located near training areas. As a result, Schofield Barracks suffers traffic problems on a daily basis.
The UFC process allows planners to step back and look at how a military installation should be organized for more efficient mission and non-mission activities, said Mitsunaga. ADPs should be designed so soldiers can live, work and play – within walking distance.
Nearly a dozen RPEC staff went to Hawaii to participate in the workshops. Support came from elsewhere in the district, including Operations and the Engineering and Construction Support Office in Fort Worth, as well as USACE team members from the other Regional Planning Support Centers and HQ-USACE. This effort really demonstrated how USACE can leverage broad enterprise support solutions to meet customer needs.
A particularly rewarding benefit was the partnership between POD and SWD in providing technical planning expertise to installations. It has been outstanding in bringing our planning expertise to POD in assisting them in providing robust support to installations. We are just an extension of their capabilities, said Young.
The UFC compliance program helps USACE position itself as an accomplished player in this niche market. Working with Jerry Zekert, chief of master planning for installations at USACE-HQ, representatives from all of the eight other Regional Planning Support Centers were invited to send personnel as a practicum. This helped them bring home field experience to lead UFC master planning compliance in their areas of responsibility.
USACE master planning technical expertise and breadth of support represents some of the best of practice in DoD. This kind of master planning is attracting USACE work from other government agencies, such as the National Aeronautical and Space Administration, because the process makes economic and environmental sense to them, said Young.
* * *
Example: Schofield Barracks Kolekole Area Development Plan
• Schofield Barracks, established in 1910, totals 8,863 acres with a population of 16,000 service members, civilians and family members. It is divided into two ADP districts.
• The weeklong planning charrette brought together 30 specialists and stakeholders to learn the ADP process in DoD’s Unified Facilities Criteria. Participants included USAG-HI leadership, DPW, USACE, other installation staff and tenant stakeholders.
• After learning the process, they walked the site, documented existing building conditions, building use, street and parking conditions, parking counts, manmade and natural constraints, opportunities, major trees, open spaces and storm-water retention areas.
• A vision statement was developed: “To create mission-focused walkable campuses and training quads with perimeter mission areas connected by safe streets, appropriate parking, and an accessible center that blends duty with daily life.”
• Six planning goals were written to support the vision statement.
• The workshop developed four different alternative courses of action.
• Each team briefed its alternative; a preferred alternative was developed.
• More field work verified the feasibility of the preferred plan based on site limitations. The preferred alternative showed current and proposed street sections, phased implementation plans and capacity calculations.
• The charrette briefed garrison leadership, showing how projects can be phased in over 20 years. It explained how the plan contributes to holistic growth and consolidation at USAG-HI.
| Date Taken: | 12.05.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 12.08.2014 14:16 |
| Story ID: | 149673 |
| Location: | FORT WORTH, TX, US |
| Web Views: | 176 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
This work, Army Corps of Engineers helps USAG-Hawaii meet new planning requirements - Program honed at Fort Hood helps Corps aid others, by James Frisinger, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
LEAVE A COMMENT