Celebrating Engineers Week and Making a Positive Difference Everywhere You Look

By Thomas Pulse, PE

If you enjoy clean water, safe bridges and roads, sturdy buildings, and managed stormwater – thank a civil engineer.

Engineers come in many flavors – from aerospace and agricultural to biomedical, mechanical, and many more – but here at Ayres Associates we are primarily civil engineers. The Bureau of Labor Statistics defines civil engineers as those who “design, build, supervise, operate, and maintain construction projects and systems in the public and private sector, including roads, buildings, airports, tunnels, dams, bridges, and systems for water supply and sewage treatment.” In other words, we’re the engineers that make things work in your everyday lives.

This is Engineers Week, dedicated to raising public awareness of engineers’ contributions to our world. The engineers on our staff will celebrate by bringing their ingenuity and expertise to their projects, just as they do every other week of the year. They will live out the 2017 EWeek theme of “Engineers Dream Big” by dreaming up new ways to make our clients’ projects better and our world a better place for everyone.

DiscoverE (formerly the National Engineers Week Foundation) has a list of 10 reasons to love engineering. I’d like to add some reasons specific to civil engineering to that list:

Civil engineers make things work

When we were kids, a lot of us drove our parents crazy taking things apart and putting them back together again, just to see how stuff worked. (Sometimes they even worked when we reassembled them.) We are problem- and puzzle-solvers. We figure out how to keep enough water pressure in the pipes for firefighting when extending service to a new subdivision. When designing a new bridge, we protect the river, fish, and surrounding environment.

Civil engineers are trusted advisers

It’s not all math and CADD programs. Contrary to popular opinion, civil engineers communicate a lot. Our clients depend on us to not only make their projects work, but to consider the impact of each project. We advise on budget, schedule, and permitting needs, find grants and loans, build public understanding and acceptance for projects, and coordinate with contractors. We work with our clients every step of the way.

Civil engineers make the world a better place

Many of the things we use every day (and often take for granted) are made possible by the ingenuity and expertise of a civil engineer. From bike trails to interstates, septic systems to wastewater treatment plants, wells to water towers – civil engineers are there, making our lives better with projects that keep us safe and comfortable.

Of course, civil engineers don’t do this all on their own. We depend on architects, surveyors, geospatial experts, technicians, and other professionals to help us get the job done. We work as a team to make a positive difference in our world every day.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor expects the demand for engineers to continue to grow. As infrastructure continues to age, civil engineers will be needed for all sorts of rehabilitation and expansion projects. Here at Ayres we’re always looking for more teammates; check our Careers page for our latest job openings.

Thank you, clients, partners, and teammates, for being part of building a better world. Happy EWeek!

Editor’s Note: Thomas Pulse has retired from Ayres after serving as Ayres’ president.