John Pierce ’81 Describes Role of 3-D Modeling and New Yankee Stadium
John Pierce ’81 was the only 2011 Reunion College speaker who wore a New York Yankees hat. The cap was a prop during his Skillman Library presentation on how his employer, Turner Construction Company, used 3-D modeling to manage the building of the new Yankee Stadium, the $2.3 billion successor to the old Yankee Stadium, one of the world’s most famous sports facilities.
Pierce didn’t actually work on the New York Yankees’ latest home, which opened in 2009 next door to the team’s original Bronx home in use from 1923 to 2008. But the Turner vice president knows all about Building Information Modeling (BIM), a system of virtual prototypes that has revolutionized preparations for the construction of radical structures. Turner, for example, used BIM to monitor the erection of a 50-story bank tower in Mexico City, a project supervised by Pierce in his role as the company’s Latin America manager.