Meet Andy Herrmann, 2012 ASCE President

 
Produced by Beery Media, LLC, for ASCE

Inaugural Address of 2012 ASCE President Andrew W. Herrmann, P.E., SECB, F.ASCE

The following is a transcript of the inaugural address by 2012 ASCE President Andrew W. Herrmann, P.E., SECB, F.ASCE, delivered Friday, Oct. 21, 2011, during the ASCE Annual Business Meeting at the 141st Annual Civil Engineering Conference. 

What do civil engineers do best? 

Civil engineers solve problems. And we’re good at it! 

Looking back, the earliest memory I have of solving a problem was as a child growing up in the Bronx in New York City. My backyard consisted of a little grass and a lot of gravel mixed with clay.  I remember playing with my soldiers with their trucks and jeeps and making roads for them to drive on in the gravel. But the vehicles were having a hard time because the gravel in my Bronx backyard wasn't smooth. I wanted to make it easier for the trucks so I smoothed them and then used some of the clay from the yard to pave my roads. I guess I was trying to solve infrastructure problems even then. 

When I was a boy, my dad managed bowling alleys and I enjoyed going with him on the weekends to the alleys. I enjoyed bowling up front but what I really enjoyed was going to the back, to the pit area with the large machines. I would climb up the 6, 8 feet to the top of the pinsetters to the catwalks and lie down on the catwalks (don’t tell OSHA that a 12-year-old boy was on a catwalk) and watch the automatic pinsetters. It was amazing to watch how the problem of returning the pins to their positions and the ball to the bowler were solved. 

As my Dad advanced to other bowling centers I discovered there was more than one way to solve problems – AMF pinsetters were different in their approach than Brunswick pinsetters – but they both solved the problem of sweeping pins, resetting them in the proper locations, and returning the ball to the bowler. I was fascinated by the machines, the movable parts, the drive systems, and the logical coordination and progression of all the parts. 

Fast forward years later, I became a civil engineer and spent my career working for Hardesty & Hanover, a consulting firm known for bridges, especially movable bridges.   There are different kinds of movable bridges – Bascules, Vertical Lifts, swing bridges – but they all solve the basic problem of getting vehicles across the river and tall navigation under the bridge. Working with bridges was the opportunity to solve larger problems with different solutions.  

I joined ASCE back in the ’70s and as Blaine Leonard, our past president would say, I became an ASCE junkie. I have always been interested in the work that this Society does. Living and working in New York, I was involved in the Metropolitan Section and eventually became [its] president. I was a charter member of ASCE's Structural Engineering Institute and served as the Chair of the Committee on Bridges and Co-chair of the 2005 Structures Congress. As I became involved in and experienced higher levels of ASCE, I wanted a chance to lead this organization. I wanted to give back a measure of all the experience and knowledge I have gained by being involved. 

As your 2012 president, I am committed to advancing ASCE forward to better prepare our profession for today and tomorrow.  And our three strategic initiatives are focused on solutions to problems. 

In The Vision for Civil Engineering in 2025, we noted that the world has changed rapidly and our current civil engineering education has not kept pace. ASCE’s strategic initiative to raise the bar on engineering education before licensure is vitally important.  

Here’s why – Engineering tools and the flow of information have changed significantly since I was in school, and yet the number of credit hours required to graduate has actually decreased.   

And that does not make sense. 

We need additional education in our disciplines and specialties but also additional emphasis on experiential learning – beyond just the classroom and book education.  Writing a permit or a proposal, presenting it to the public or an owner, using the latest technology to design and send data to people all over the world ... Our civil engineers of the future must have these advanced education and communication skills before they are licensed. 

It’s the only way they can be professionally competitive in the global marketplace now and in the future. Technology is allowing our profession as well as our world to move much faster than ever imagined. Technology will continue to increase in speed and importance.  We need to raise the bar on education now to match the realities of today and tomorrow, not the reality of the past.  

The second of our top initiatives is focused on sustainability.  We live in a world with finite resources.  And that’s a problem with the increased demands of an ever expanding world population.  

The supply of our resources will simply not be able to meet the demand in the future.  Sustainability and resilience are solutions to that problem. 

Sustainability is a word that’s been around for decades ... and often not understood.  Sustainability must be about much more than just “being green.” That is why ASCE’s sustainability initiative concentrates on using the triple bottom line of social, economic and environmental approaches – as we plan, design, build, maintain, and rehabilitate our projects. Low bids are not the solution to our infrastructure problems. We must focus not just on a project’s initial cost, but also on its environmental and social impact as well as its life cycle costs. 

As part of our strategic initiative on sustainability, ASCE has joined with ACEC and APWA in the formation of the Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure. This non-profit organization created and is testing a product called Envision – a sustainable infrastructure rating system. It will allow users to measure and certify infrastructure projects as sustainable. Along with this rating system – which is approaching public release – there will be a variety of educational offerings. We already have developed an online course called The Fundamentals of Sustainable Engineering. 

What will you learn from this course? 

You will learn to effectively use the principles and practices of sustainability in your daily work. 

But in addition to educating ourselves, we must work hard to educate others such as industry, policy makers, legislators, and the public on the benefits of the triple bottom line approach.  

Our third strategic initiative is infrastructure.  This one is my favorite and the one in which I have been actively engaged these past few years.   

It’s no secret that the infrastructure our grandparents and great grandparents invested in has been a gift to us.  It’s brought our nation prosperity and our place in the world as an economic powerhouse.   

It’s also no secret that we have not honored that gift – our infrastructure, for the most part, has outlived its original design life.  Failing levees and collapsing bridges should be avoidable tragedies. We know that structures weaken as they age.  

Yet these tragedies haven’t been avoided so far… because as a nation, we haven’t kept up with the needed maintenance, repair, and replacement. 

And that has got to change. 

I consider it a privilege to have served on the Advisory Council for both the 2003 and 2005 Report Card for America’s Infrastructure, and to chair that council for the 2009 Report Card.   

Like many ASCE Presidents before me, I have testified before Congress and made numerous media appearances on behalf of ASCE explaining the need for increased national investment in our infrastructure.  

Our message is finally being heard by some lawmakers in Washington. The Report Card is being quoted in Congressional hearings and in town hall meetings. It was even referred to in the President’s State of the Union address. While some legislation has been introduced to address pieces of the problem, we still do not have the level of long-term commitment that is truly needed.  

Long lines of traffic, constant delays due to patch-work repairs, and aging water mains that are corroded and leaking water are just a few of the problems that will intensify in the coming years if we don’t as a Nation start investing in our infrastructure. 

ASCE civil engineers, we have a national problem – the biggest problem I have ever faced as an engineer – and I am asking you to join me in finding a big solution. We have 140,000 members, and I know we are all good at finding solutions.   

I’ll do my part this year to continue spreading the message of our aging infrastructure on a national level to the public, to the legislators and basically to everyone who will listen.  But I am asking you to join me in trying to find a national solution to this national problem. You already have the knowledge and expertise to solve infrastructure problems – I want you to share that knowledge and expertise and help me spread that message on a local level. I need you to talk to your neighbors and your family members, and then step out of your comfort zone a little farther, and take the message to local leaders in your communities and in your state legislatures. 

Now maybe talking to public officials feels a little intimidating – but only because we look to them as experts and don’t realize that they feel the same about us.  Every day, we are affected by the laws made in our legislatures and guess what?  Those laws were influenced by the people who took the time to talk to the legislators beforehand.  Lawmakers need to be educated and they want to have the experts’ opinion – our opinion! 

And we are the ones who have the knowledge of infrastructure they need. We must share that knowledge.  This is the only way to make a difference in all our lives. 

ASCE has been trying to raise awareness for years. And more than ever before, we need to raise our voices in every corner of our country.  Please join me in making 2012 the year that our voices join together.  

A year that our nation finally understands the importance of infrastructure in their lives.   

A year that Americans finally realize the declining condition of our infrastructure.   

And a year that their voices finally join our call for a national commitment---a commitment that must finally be honored—a commitment to investing in the infrastructure that will be there for our grandchildren and their grandchildren.  

So, like the backyard dirt roads that I paved as a child, I want all of you to help me pave the way to a better tomorrow. 

Thank you.