Design Development
Concrete Bureau delivers a complete, coordinated design development package ready for city approval. We pull every discipline together, check it against code, and hand over a permit set that submits cleanly the first time. That means fewer rounds of comments, fewer resubmissions, and a faster path to breaking ground.
What is design development?
Design development is the stage where a concept becomes a buildable, code-compliant set of documents. It means coordinating architectural, structural and MEP information, resolving conflicts, and packaging everything to the format and standards your jurisdiction requires.
We act as the team that assembles and quality-checks the permit set — so your submission is consistent, complete and unlikely to bounce back with comments.
Who it is for
- Architects and developers preparing a permit submission
- Teams that need an independent coordinator across consultants
- Owners who want a clean, city-ready package without surprises
- Consultants who need someone to assemble and QC a multi-discipline set before submission
What you get
- Review of city and department requirements: mandatory drawings, formats and standards
- Coordination with architectural, structural and MEP teams
- Permit Set drawings prepared and packaged to standard
- Code compliance checks: fire safety, accessibility and energy efficiency
- Model coordination and clash detection across disciplines
- Supporting documents: area schedules, load calculations and energy data
- Final packaging: correct sheet order, file structure and high-quality city-ready PDFs
Documents we typically prepare
A permit set draws on more than architectural drawings. Depending on your jurisdiction, we help assemble:
- Architectural, structural and MEP drawing sets
- Area and room finish schedules
- Structural load calculations and details
- Energy compliance and accessibility documentation
- Fire and life-safety plans
Common reasons permit sets get rejected
- A dimension or room boundary that doesn't match between architectural and structural sheets
- Missing or inconsistent fire-rating and egress annotations
- Area and room-finish schedules that don't reconcile with the drawn plans
- Structural load calculations that don't match what's shown in the drawings
- Accessibility documentation missing for a jurisdiction that requires it up front
Why a coordinated permit set matters
A permit set assembled from disconnected discipline drawings is where review comments start — a missing dimension, a corridor that doesn't match between architectural and structural sheets, a load calculation that doesn't line up with what's shown. Coordinating everything in one model before packaging catches these before a reviewer does.
The schedule benefits too: a submission that comes back clean the first time avoids a resubmission cycle, which on most projects costs far more time than the coordination work itself. And it leaves a clear paper trail — one coordinated model and one set of decisions — instead of comments scattered across emails and redlined PDFs from different consultants.
Our process
Requirements review
We confirm the mandatory drawings, formats and standards for your jurisdiction.
Coordination
Collect current project data and align AR, STR and MEP into one coordinated model.
Compliance & checks
Code compliance and clash detection, with supporting documents prepared.
Permit packaging
Final, correctly ordered, high-quality PDFs ready for city submission.
FAQ
- Do you guarantee approval?
- No one can guarantee a jurisdiction’s decision, but a coordinated, compliance-checked and correctly formatted set sharply reduces the risk of rejection and rework.
- Can you work to our local code?
- Yes. We review the specific city and department requirements and prepare the set to those standards.
- Which disciplines do you coordinate?
- Architectural, structural and MEP, including clash detection between them before submission.
- Can you start from an existing, partially coordinated model?
- Yes. We audit what already exists, close the gaps between disciplines, and take it forward to a compliance-checked, submission-ready set.
- How long does design development typically take?
- It depends on project size and how coordinated the discipline models already are — smaller packages can be ready in a few weeks, larger multi-discipline sets take longer.