Over the past few months, the pandemic has prompted supply chain disruptions that could affect the planning of capital projects in condominiums.
Some sectors are “suffering more than others” and some companies within those sectors are experiencing greater setbacks, Mina Tesseris, senior forensic engineer at Arbitech Inc., said during a recent CCI Huronia webinar about the current state of condo communities.
Issues in the lumber and pre-cast concrete industries are clogging the flow of equipment and materials onto job sites. He noted the challenge of finding two-by-eight pressure-treated wood, as well as backlogs in the pre-cast concrete industry causing summer projects to be set back due to COVID-19.
“A lot of the facilities producing pre-cast concrete were shut down, or on reduced hours or labour,” he said. “That’s starting to catch up with us now.”
He’s finding some manufacturers within the roofing industry, shingle supply for instance, are very slow to deliver, while others have not been affected at all.
“We’re also seeing delays at the border with products coming from the U.S. and that is affecting projects in terms of delivery times.”
With this in mind, there are a few items condo corporations and contractors should consider when planning and delivering a project.
“From a planning perspective, you’ll definitely want to check on availability of materials before you go to tender; talk to the manufacturers, talk to the vendors, see what the delivery times are for the materials and whether or not they are available. You don’t want to be specifying materials that aren’t going to be available when needed and delay the project.”
During construction, contractors should ensure that they’re proactively ordering materials.
“In the past, we were working on a just-in-time type of system, where materials were delivered to the job site or ordered and expected to be delivered to the job site when needed,” he said. “Now, there are potential for delays. Planning ahead and receiving materials in advance will help minimize some of those risks.”
