A Day in the Life of An Engineer in Construction

Danielle, Civil Engineer, Construction Industry

I work as a civil engineer for a construction company in New York City.  My duties at work can vary dramatically day to day depending on my company’s needs.  Some days my time is consumed with paperwork items, such as submittals (making sure that anything we’re using on the job is approved or that the layout for certain equipment is correct), work plans (documents which help to explain the methodology behind how we will be completing each work task), or tracking logs (tracking correspondence between my company and any other entity).

Other days, my time is spent out on the job site with the workers building the project.  On these days, I get to assist in handling unforeseen issues such as dealing with and repairing deteriorating concrete that was initially assumed viable for use or revising and improving specific work task methodologies to reduce inefficiencies on the job.  I also am in charge of tracking construction progress, such as tracking how much linear feet of piping was installed or how much concrete was demolished for replacement, and I create design drawings using computer software programs. 

As a civil engineer in construction, what I love about my job is that every day brings something different and exciting and the projects that I work on help to improve the quality of life for so many people in their day to day lives.

                                               Here I am on site with one of my colleagues

One of the projects that I work on in my job is repairing and improving the train tunnels in NYC.  Preserving our NYC infrastructure is so important!