We have a lot of powerful software for building design these days, Autodesk's Revit suite being the big one. But as in software development, better tools just ends up meaning that clients demand things faster and cheaper, rather than better.
There are some classes of problems that it definitely helps solve, like keeping the structural engineer and HVAC engineer from design conflicts where a beam and a duct go through each other. But everything needs to be done yesterday, so I'm not surprised that problems that can't be automatically identified are able to slip through.
> “The people responsible for technical oversight were saying, ‘We cannot do this within this amount of time,’ and Schwarz would answer, ‘I don’t care,’ ” he says.
Pretty much sums it up.
EDIT: There's no excuse for the exposed high voltage wiring alongside the low voltage alarm systems though, that sounds like a contractor screwed up. I don't know the German electrical code, but generally in the US anything over 60V is classified as "class 1" wiring and it goes in a conduit. Typically this is a grounded metal tube so that you can't accidentally pound a nail through it, and if anything shorts to the conduit there's a safe path to ground until overcurrent protection trips.
And if for some reason you have lower voltage "class 2" wiring running in the same conduit, those wires (and whatever else they split off to) are now considered class 1, even if they're only low current 24V signal wires or similar. They can no longer leave conduit and go anywhere else, on the off chance that it shorts to the line voltage wires it's sharing conduit with.
But as in software development, better tools just ends up meaning that clients demand things faster and cheaper, rather than better.
Exact same thing in the arts field - not all clients of course, and I can't think of a recent equivalent to a fiasco of this scale, but the general trend is that clients feel when the cost of technology goes down so should other costs.
AFAIK as long as you're only carrying a couple of 230V lines (3x1.5qmm NYM-J and friends) you're fine to use plastic tubes or tack them onto the walls, but as soon as you're mixing in non-power wiring you're required to lay them in separate tubes.
Commercial construction or residential? Small residential buildings in the US get by with unshielded Romex wiring, but I'm pretty sure NEC doesn't allow it for commercial projects here.
I'm on the lighting side of things, so I'm tangentially familiar with electrical requirements but I don't deal with them regularly.
There are some classes of problems that it definitely helps solve, like keeping the structural engineer and HVAC engineer from design conflicts where a beam and a duct go through each other. But everything needs to be done yesterday, so I'm not surprised that problems that can't be automatically identified are able to slip through.
> “The people responsible for technical oversight were saying, ‘We cannot do this within this amount of time,’ and Schwarz would answer, ‘I don’t care,’ ” he says.
Pretty much sums it up.
EDIT: There's no excuse for the exposed high voltage wiring alongside the low voltage alarm systems though, that sounds like a contractor screwed up. I don't know the German electrical code, but generally in the US anything over 60V is classified as "class 1" wiring and it goes in a conduit. Typically this is a grounded metal tube so that you can't accidentally pound a nail through it, and if anything shorts to the conduit there's a safe path to ground until overcurrent protection trips.
And if for some reason you have lower voltage "class 2" wiring running in the same conduit, those wires (and whatever else they split off to) are now considered class 1, even if they're only low current 24V signal wires or similar. They can no longer leave conduit and go anywhere else, on the off chance that it shorts to the line voltage wires it's sharing conduit with.