Introduction

For the first time, more than 100,000 pages of building regulations have been made available for consultation with the support of AI (Artificial Intelligence). This can result in enormous time savings in design and testing. Max van Riel, co-founder of STRUCK, showed at the annual conference of the Vereniging BWT Nederland (10 October) that AI can turn a maze into a highway. TEXT FRANK DE GROOT.

It was recently big news in the NOS Journaal: 'Much confusion among municipalities about the new Environmental Act.' Max about this: “And of course this is not only the case with municipalities. If there is one thing that is clear about building legislation, it is that there will always be more of it, not less. And the more rules, the more difficult it becomes to search. Complying with the complicated laws and regulations therefore costs time and money. Yet society expects more and, above all, faster construction. The saving of time and money lies in the preparation of a building project.” According to Max, AI can be involved in the plans at an early stage in places where manpower is often not available: “Since the introduction of language models and Chat GPT, it has been clear that AI is very suitable for processing a lot of text with astonishing results. STRUCK has now been on the road for nine months and already has the largest AI-available library of building legislation and regulations in the Netherlands.”

Quick Checks

The start of STRUCK was during a session at a real estate event where the boundaries of construction plans with AI were explored. Max: “I was impressed by the so-called generative design, but the market also responded with: 'those are not buildings, they are pictures' and 'let us make the buildings now, maybe AI can help us in other aspects, for example in legislation and regulations'.” Several architects had already asked a question to Chat GPT and an answer from the Building Decree always came up, but of course that could not be checked. “Then we showed an AI assistant with the new Bbl processed in it and where the source was immediately visible. Then came the reactions: 'Oh, so I don't have to do a control F on bouwbesluitonline.nl anymore', 'oh, so I can also ask this in English' and 'oh, can this also be done for multiple documents?'” According to Max, quick checks are done in the initial phase of a project, so that better choices are made immediately: “The architect will of course remain the penholder of the creative process, but help and support through AI applications is welcome. Foreign architects are also increasingly involved in a construction project. And they can now ask questions about Dutch laws and regulations in their own language.”

Source Is Visible

A year later, the library now contains national legislation, but also local legislation such as parking standards, bicycle standards, aesthetics notes and more. “Recently, all environmental plans were also made accessible, with the option to download a DXF file. This means that a 3D situation sketch of an area is immediately available, including roads, water, maximum building height and the surroundings. Now, an architect can spend an hour making a situation sketch.”

“Calculating the source is the most important element of our Unravel product,” Max explains. “We now also indicate in shades where exactly on the page the information is located. In addition, customers like to share answers to increase the level of knowledge of construction laws and regulations throughout the company. A function has also been added to indicate what type of project you are working on – new construction or existing construction and office or home – so that the AI ​​agent gives a targeted answer instead of a wall of text with all possible requirements.”

Testing With AI

To demonstrate how it works, Erik Schot, director of InterGarant Group and Roy Tijsmans, Spatial Planning consultant at InterConcept (part of InterGarant Group) have agreed to test the system on stage. Wico Ankersmit, director of the BWT Netherlands Association, is certainly impressed by the performance: “We tested this system by entering ten construction technical exam questions about the Bbl from the ABW 2 course. All the answers were correct! Really incredible!” Wico still remembers a difficult question: “What is the minimum ceiling height in a new office building?” While Roy is entering the question, the audience is already shouting: 2.60 meters. There is great surprise when Unravel answers: 2.10 meters. How is this possible? Wico responds enthusiastically again: “That is correct! Only homes still have a living area in the Bbl, but other buildings no longer do. So then the minimum height of an escape route applies and that is 2.10 meters! I think that 90 percent of designers do not know that.” Roy then examines the head office of InterGarant Group in 't Harde. He wants to know: can I build an extra floor on our office? After this question, the system searches the environmental plan, including the old zoning plans in the so-called 'temporary section'. Municipalities have until 1 January 2032 to convert these old zoning plans to the new environmental plan. The management regulations and the environmental law parts of other regulations are also included in this. The system answers within one minute: 'It is permitted to add an extra floor, provided that the total building height does not exceed 12 metres. Adding a floor does not fall under the permit-free activities, so an environmental permit is required.' The system also shows the source of this information: article 12.2.1, section 3, sub 1 in the old zoning plan Buitengebied Elburg 2012, update 2018, under the zoning rule 'Social'.

There Is Much More That Can Be Done

May I use the building for activities for residents?, Roy wants to know. 'Yes, you may use your office building for activities for residents, provided that these activities fall under 'social facilities' as referred to in appendix 2 column type business. This is permitted according to the zoning rules for "Social" as described in article 12.1 of the document 'Buitengebied Elburg 2012, actualisatie 2018.' And then follows a surprising extra option: a letter can be sent to the applicant with the push of a button. We suddenly see a letter on the screen: Dear applicant, In response to your question as to whether you may use your office building for activities for residents, we can inform you of the following. Yes, you may use your office building for activities for residents, provided that these activities fall under 'social facilities' as referred to in appendix 2 column type business. This is permitted according to the zoning rules for 'Social' as described in article 12.1 of the document 'Buitengebied Elburg 2012, actualisatie 2018.' We hope that this has provided you with sufficient information. Should you have any further questions, we are of course at your disposal. Another click on the button and the entire letter will appear in Turkish. “There are multiple languages ​​possible,” says Max.

Additional Building Without A Permit

Finally, we go to a random house in Ommen. Here we are going to do a spatial test. Erik Schot is now behind the laptop: "How much can I build here?" Erik shows an aerial photo and selects the house and the associated structures on the backyard. The system quickly responds that the applicant is allowed to build another 18.7 m2 on the backyard without a permit. Max responds: "Especially for this annual conference, we have launched the option to find out directly per plot what can be built without a permit. With this, STRUCK is directly responding to the new, more complex rules for building without a permit. This is due to the separation between the technical activity of construction and the environmental plan activity, where building without a permit is now regulated in two places. By the way, you will soon also see the building area and backyard area with hatching." POSITIVE REACTIONS The first reactions to STRUCK Unravel are positive. And there are still many possibilities for how this library can be applied. Max concludes: “For STRUCK, providing insight into legislation and regulations is the prelude to a next step. The library can also be used to test plans against legislation and regulations, as we have just seen. Is a toilet room large enough, is the daylight calculation correct, what is the percentage of GFA/VFA of a building? Later this autumn we will come up with a first product for these so-called design tests, namely around surface standards. Initially, a plugin will be available for Autocad and Revit. But eventually it will also be possible to perform tests on IFC models with so-called unstructured text and agents.”