Civil Engineering Consultant – Stormwater Management, Grading & Drainage
Paige Brue Engineering is a competitive field when it comes to finding a well-paying job, especially when you are first starting out. A couple of decades ago, engineering graduates with a bachelor’s degree could easily obtain positions in their desired fields straight out of school, even without internships/high GPAs/extensive networking. For most people, those days are gone. … Read more
HEC-RAS allows users to define areas that contain water that will not be actively moving downstream. These areas are referred to as ineffective flow areas. Appropriately defining ineffective flow areas is an important part of the modeling process. However, representing ineffective flow areas in HEC-RAS models tends to be somewhat subjective in nature, and every … Read more
Site grading is an important part of land development and civil engineering in general. Even so, site grading is not a required subject in many civil engineering programs. This means that many entry-level civil engineers must scramble to figure out grading in their first professional job after college, which is frustrating. The following blog post … Read more
As I have begun to advance a little more in my career, I have noticed my ability to speak and communicate with clients has a direct impact on my success at work. As things are starting to get back to “normal” after the lockdowns, I have noticed that my social skills diminished a bit during … Read more
Recently, I took the Certified Floodplain Managers (CFM), which is administered by the Association of State Floodplain Managers. Luckily, I passed! However, while studying for the exam, I found that, unlike the PE exam, there was not a lot of information available online about the CFM exam. For this reason, I decided to write the … Read more
On Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRM), a regulatory floodway is designated by blue and orange diagonal hatching. The floodway is useful because it facilitates land use planning that regulates development in flood-prone areas. Although floodway delineations are based on hydraulic analyses, one could argue that floodway mapping is both an art and a science. This … Read more
Mentorship is often touted as a key to achieving professional success in the engineering field. For this reason, I set out to find a mentor early in my career. I joined a mentorship program through the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). While my assigned mentor was a great person and accomplished engineer, I found … Read more
When creating hydraulic models using the Hydrologic Engineering Center’s River Analysis System (HEC-RAS), most users rely on the user interface to assemble information correctly. However, it can be helpful to understand the file types that make up an HEC-RAS project. This is because understanding these file types can help modelers more easily understand how a … Read more
Jarrett’s equation can be used to estimate an accurate Manning’s n value for steep streams. This is important because steep mountain streams should, in many cases, be assigned a higher Manning’s n value than what is shown in Chow’s Manning’s n value tables (which is a table many hydraulic engineers reference regularly). For example, Chow’s … Read more
In today’s modern world, plastics are everywhere. They are so ubiquitous that it can be difficult to imagine a time when plastic was not a part of everyday life. For this reason, it may surprise you to know that mass production of plastic did not begin until the 1950s. Since that time, plastic production has … Read more