Dr. Baabak Ashuri’s project, “Recommended Guide for Next Generation of Transportation Design-Build Procurement and Contracting in Georgia,” was recognized as a 2013 Sweet Sixteen High Value Research Project Award Winner at the July annual meeting of the Research Advisory Committee (RAC) of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) Standing Committee on Research (SCOR).

Each year, the RAC collects High Value Research highlights from member states across the nation. These highlights showcase projects that are providing transportation excellence through research. Each of the four RAC regions selects its top four projects to form the Sweet Sixteen Awards. Continually challenged to deliver more efficient transportation systems, State DOTs are committed to utilizing research and innovation to meet these challenges. All aspects of transportation, from planning and design to construction and maintenance, benefit from the power of research. The “Sweet 16” projects are just a sampling of the many pioneering works from across the nation.

Dr. Ashuri’s project was a partnership between the Georgia Department of Transportation and Georgia Tech to develop a Design-Build (DB) guidebook to improve efficiency of DB contracting in highway construction.  A DB selection tool was developed to evaluate the appropriateness of DB for transportation projects. This tool helps GDOT determine suitability of DB for projects, assess project risks, evaluate and select the most appropriate authorized procurement methods, and implement DB transparently and consistently.  A post-research workshop was held to facilitate adoption of DB contracting in Georgia. Effective July 1, 2012, Georgia legislators raised the cap for DB by 50 percent (in dollars), based on the total amount of construction projects awarded in the previous fiscal year. This was made possible, in part, by solid DB project suitability assessments that this research enhanced for future use.

Dr. Baabak Ashuri is director of the Georgia Tech Economics of the Sustainable Built Environment (ESBE) Lab in the School of Building Construction. He specializes in economic decision analysis, strategic risk management, investment analysis under uncertainty (e.g., the Real Option Methodology), capital budgeting, and project finance. He is an assistant professor in the School of Building Construction at the Georgia Institute of Technology where he teaches decision analysis and risk management, building economics and value engineering, and real option analysis for life cycle costing of flexible infrastructure assets.