Somat Engineering, Inc. (Somat) provides award-winning infrastructure solutions to government and private clients in several market areas, including transportation, aviation, water/wastewater, private development, energy, health, and education.
Project teams are assigned based upon developed expertise in the conditions, requirements, rules, and regulations of the respective market. Our licensed professional engineers, environmental scientists, geologists, and certified technicians also develop long-term relationships with our clients and partners by working closely with them throughout the life of a project. This allows Somat to deliver market-specific design and construction solutions that blend innovation, proven techniques, and superior quality assurance for more accurate cost estimations, timely construction schedules, and optimal project outcomes.
Learn more about the markets we serve below.
Somat is a pre-qualified consultant for departments of transportation (DOT) in several categories. This prequalification status enables our firm to perform various bridge and highway designs and provide traffic engineering services for transportation agencies. Our professionals are very familiar with DOT design standards, including requirements for the National Bridge Inventory System, National Highway System, and other federal programs. Furthermore, we employ Context Sensitive Design to create transportation facilities that blend safety and mobility with aesthetics and community values. Our licensed and certified engineers, inspectors, and technicians have a thorough knowledge of FAA, FHWA, EPA, State DOT, ASTM, AASHTO, and local government standards.
We have performed many transportation projects in our home state of Michigan that incorporate innovative processes and techniques now being adopted by other states. Two examples of these are: (1) “eConstruction” for the secure electronic/mobile collection and processing of field inspection data, documents, reports, and approvals, and (2) the implementation of Percent Within Limits (PWL) for Portland Cement Concrete Pavement to determine contractor payments and incentives/disincentives. Somat has also worked successfully with creative and demanding project delivery methods, including Design/Build and public-private partnerships (P3).
Our clients include the Michigan Department of Transportation, which services Michigan’s 120,000 miles of highways, roads and streets, and the Ohio Department of Transportation, which has the 10th largest roadway system in the United States. We have also expanded our transportation expertise to service other major metropolitan areas, including the District of Columbia and Baltimore, Maryland.
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Somat has provided a breadth of engineering consulting services to the aviation market for over two decades. Our portfolio of work encompasses airside, terminal, and landside assets at major airports, including Detroit Wayne County Metropolitan Airport (DTW), Cleveland Hopkins International Airport (CLE), and Gerald R. Ford International Airport (GRR).
This expertise includes the design and construction of airfield pavements, terminals, buildings, infrastructure, and public use facilities. We have performed geotechnical, civil, environmental, structural, construction, and forensic engineering as both sub and prime consultant to the owner. A majority of this work was performed during the planning and design stage, followed by construction oversight, including inspection and materials quality assurance testing.
Given the mission critical nature of airport operations, increasing security demands, and budget constraints, Somat’s professionals formulate and execute engineering solutions with these considerations in mind.
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Somat provides comprehensive engineering services to public and private clients for water supply and storage, storm water, erosion and flood control, wastewater collection and treatment, and waste-to-energy solutions. These include studies, evaluations, designs, specifications, feasibility reports, presentations, bidding and contract documents, permitting, construction inspection and observation, program management, and project management. Facilities include water mains, sewers, pumping stations, treatment plants, and tunnels.
Water and wastewater utilities throughout the United States have faced growing challenges addressing compliance requirements with regard to combined sewer and separate sewer overflows (CSO/SSO). Many urban centers are faced with multi-million dollar CSO/SSO consent decrees, combined with aging systems, declining tax revenues, and an inability to adequately increase consumer rate revenues. Somat has developed significant expertise in assisting clients with these challenging situations, including the forensic evaluation, repair, and rehabilitation of aging water/sewer systems and meeting such regulatory mandates in an efficient and cost-effective manner.
Our clients include major utilities, such as the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (now the Great Lakes Water Authority), which provides potable water to nearly four million people in Detroit and 126 neighboring communities in southeast Michigan, and the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District, which services over one million residents in the Greater Cleveland metropolitan area.
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Somat provides clients with planning, due diligence studies, design, and construction oversight for industrial, residential, and commercial private real estate development projects. In addition to geotechnical, structural, and environmental expertise, our comprehensive site civil engineering services help our clients achieve efficient and successful project outcomes. Our professionals are experienced in meeting the cost and schedule demands that are unique to private development projects.
Our staff’s experience and background includes project management, engineering, and construction management of private developments, which has allowed Somat to consistently produce preliminary plans and final construction documents that are technically accurate and detailed, while providing realistic constructability and cost efficiency, helping our clients save money and time. Somat’s staff has also served as the client’s representative to address the questions and concerns of citizens, elected officials, and civic associations. We also provide a variety of surveying services to private developers.
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The energy sector in the United States is undergoing significant transformations led by increasing consumer demand, combined with considerations of environmental efficiency and sustainability. This leads to interesting opportunities and challenges for an infrastructure engineering firm to address. Somat has both the technical and domain knowledge to assist energy clients with tackling these issues and preparing for the future. In addition, our staff possesses the right background to meet these needs. For instance, our veteran engineers include alums of multinational energy companies such as Bechtel. We have worked with leading electric utilities to address construction and repair needs at active power plants without material disruption to their services.
Somat has also invested in a state-of-the-art technology that allows for real-time delineation of subsurface petroleum contamination. Known as Ultra-Violet Optical Screening Tool (UVOST®), this investigative tool allows rapid screening of petroleum-based contaminants through the use of laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) technology. Somat is one of a limited number of certified owners and operators of UVOST® in the United States and has deployed the technology on behalf of energy companies requiring a more rapid and cost-efficient way to identify such contaminants, and then formulate and focus their remediation plans.
Our senior engineers also have experience with unique waste-to-energy processing technologies and projects that can potentially bring synergies between the municipalities and public utilities we serve and private energy concerns.
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The healthcare sector is the fastest growing segment of the American economy, expected to reach 20% of U.S. GDP in the next decade. With increasing demands on both spending controls and service quality, it is imperative that healthcare infrastructure also be designed and constructed with these challenges in mind.
Somat has provided innovative engineering services to healthcare clients, including leading university and private hospital systems. This has included renovation and rehabilitation of existing facilities, as well as the construction of new ones. We have also assisted community-based health organizations with building cost-efficient facilities that still deliver world-class service.
For example, Community Health and Social Services Center (CHASS) in Detroit required a new facility to provide services to 28,000 patients in the community — 17,000 more than the old facility. The $17 million building was to include two primary care clinics with 24 exam rooms, diagnostic area, dental office, lab, and children’s play area. CHASS is a federally qualified health center formed to develop, promote, and provide comprehensive, accessible, and affordable quality primary health care and support services to all residents of the community, with emphasis on the underserved African American and Latino populations in Detroit. A number of organizations donated funds for the construction of the new center. Somat was chosen to be the prime consultant for the field and laboratory material testing and inspection services, delivering world class services to an important community facility on a limited budget.
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The education sector also faces an uphill battle in an era of constrained public budgets and growing student populations to serve. Combine this with tight deadlines for school openings and safety concerns, working with educational facilities presents its own unique set of engineering challenges to overcome. Somat has provided geotechnical, structural, construction, and civil engineering expertise to public school districts and leading university systems.
Given the importance of educational facilities to the communities they serve, not to mention the future competitiveness of the American economy, innovative and cost-effective approaches are key to successful education infrastructure projects. Somat has successfully delivered such solutions to organizations facing these demands, including Detroit Public Schools (DPS).
For example, two Detroit public schools, Isaac Crary and Gabriel Richard, were to be rehabilitated to serve as Adult Education Centers. In addition to building renovations, each school site was to be redesigned to present a “community college” environment. Somat performed the site civil design for the demolition and replacement of site infrastructure. We prepared a complete set of biddable plans for civil engineering and landscape site work. This included new parking lots, lighting, fences, signage, pedestrian circulation, site furnishings, and landscaping. These elements were arranged in such a way as to promote more of a campus environment at each site. DPS required that the project be completed and opened in early 2012. Somat worked with DPS on the accelerated schedule, and completed the design and received permit approval, allowing DPS to bid the project in time. The renovations ultimately improved the students’ perception of the facilities, and increased the value of the sites to the surrounding community.
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New Center One 3031 West Grand Boulevard Suite 228 Detroit, MI 48202
(313) 963-2721
(313) 769-2761