The ENDLESS pile of plans!!!! - InspectionNews

Matthew Skowron · #1 (**permalink**) 09-07-2007, 03:26 PM

Hello, First time posting be easy now...

I work for a city in Texas and we have a problem such as many citys do arciving our finished building plans. We have a storage building 1/2 full of plans some from as long as 30-40 years back i think my oldest plan is 1930ish. We have a plat scanner and are reserching a method to catalog and store the plans. we are looking at storing them on a server so the inspections department and Planning (engineering dept) can all access the plats and other parts of the construction phase.

Info usefull to know is we are going to a permit software called In-code and are hopeing to murge our plans into the program and have them accessable from the permitting software but are still reserching what types of programs if any are out there to assist in archiving plans on a computer server for access by other departments. (not the public for safety of the home owners) Any one out there that has gone through this growing pain and willing to share I would appreciate the help

thanks Matt city of kerrville

Jerry Peck · #2 (**permalink**) 09-07-2007, 04:52 PM

Matt,

Welcome to the home inspection forum.

Here is some help from the IBC:
106.1.1 Information on construction documents.

Construction documents shall be dimensioned and drawn upon suitable material. Electronic media documents are permitted to be submitted when approved by the building official. Construction documents shall be of sufficient clarity to indicate the location, nature and extent of the work proposed and show in detail that it will conform to the provisions of this code and relevant laws, ordinances, rules and regulations, as determined by the building official.

In South Florida, where I was for 20 years, most records were kept on micro fiche film after a certain date/age.

It would depend on what your state, county, and city require for retention of "public records", which is what plans, inspection reports, and permits are.

I would start with your City Attorney and see what the requirements are which you must meet minimum, and then ask them 'what about ... ' if within what they provided you.

I would be leery of *only* using electronic storage media such as hard drives (they do fail), DVDs (formats change over years and decades) or even magnetic tape.

I would think micro fiche files which were also scanned into the electronic media would be best - that gives electronic data access while still providing small physical storage space requirements (relative to the physical storage space required for plans, etc.).