Strategic Engineering
The Strategic Engineering team manages multidisciplinary engineering scopes, working to integrate technical, facility, mechanical, and operational project needs.
From multifaceted technologies to integrated show, ride, and facility systems, our Strategic Engineering team works to deliver challenging and interconnected technical scopes.
- Project Engineering
- Technical Owner’s Representation
- System Integration
- Show Engineering
- Ride Engineering
- Scope Development and Technical
- Requirements
- System Narratives
- Interface Matrices
- Performance Specifications
- Hazard Analysis
- Risk Assessment and Mitigation
- Engineering Packages for Show,
- Ride, and Facility Systems
- Interface Control Documents
- Fabrication Support
- Construction Support
- Technical Specifications
- Drawing Sets
- Permitting Submittals
- Fabrication Documents
- Technical Documentation and
- Coordination
- Design Assurance
- Third-Party Peer Reviews
- Code and Safety Compliance
- Condition Assessments
- Site Surveys
- System and Infrastructure
- Evaluations
- Engineering Support Services
- Testing and Commissioning
- Operations and Maintenance Training
Project Engineering and Technical Representation
We coordinate complex engineering scopes across all disciplines as the technical owner’s representative, ensuring design intent, performance goals, and system integration requirements in the project life cycle.
Serving as our client’s eyes and ears throughout the life cycle, we take pride in ensuring technical execution to the highest standard. Whether working on-site, in the studio, or in the shop, we make sure that all involved parties execute the needs of the project with the highest quality and deliver on time and on budget. Project engineering requires a nuanced understanding of multiple engineering disciplines, including civil engineering, structural engineering, and mechanical-electrical-plumbing (MEP) engineering, among others. Often, these disciplines are executed in segmented lanes away from one another; our job is to get them to talk to one another and deliver seamless, intuitive, and sustainable solutions for your project. This role extends to non-engineering scopes in our role as technical owner’s representative, where we coordinate with design, architecture, fabrication, and countless other teams to faithfully integrate, coordinate, and problem-solve design and installation challenges. This is all accomplished while maintaining creative vision, schedules, and budgets across the project life cycle.
Scope Development and Technical Requirements
Understanding the technical requirements of any attraction requires years of experience. It is crucially important that when dealing with system narratives, interface matrices, performance specifications, hazard analysis, and risk assessment that the experts in charge can intelligently execute on overlapping and intersecting details. AOA has that experience and can translate the dizzying technical requirements into understandable technical scope documents. System narratives and interface matrices help identify performance requirements, maintenance strategies, technical needs, and facility demands, especially when working with multiple systems. Attractions, restaurants, healthcare facilities, museums, and more all require a variety of engineering disciplines to cooperate with one another, and these early documents set the course for how design objectives will translate into functional reality. Any issues identified through this process are mitigated by risk management and hazard analysis processes, clearly identifying solutions so we can work with you to overcome challenges together.
Integrated Show and Ride Engineering
Our show and ride engineers pride themselves on providing innovative and comprehensive solutions to meet some of our industry’s toughest challenges. From interface control documents, all the way through fabrication and construction coordination, our experienced team is dedicated to providing the highest level of service in the development of an attraction. We routinely work with our partners in architecture, show set design, and interior design to coordinate facility drawings, concealing the equipment that makes our systems work and addressing challenges that arise when creating one-of-a-kind experiences. We collaborate with our technical design, fabrication, and media production teams to bring dynamic multimedia moments to life. From awe-inspiring attraction scenes to special effects that enhance thrilling rides, this integrative approach leaves guests wowed and amazed by stories brought to life through the elegant coordination of show, ride, and facility systems.
Condition Assessments and Site Surveys
Backed by practical, real-world insights, our team has traveled the globe to assess existing systems and infrastructure and bring them up to speed. Drawing on years of experience across multiple fields, we take pride in our reputation as complex problem solvers. On some projects, we are working from a blank slate, contributing our part to a new experience that requires an innovative approach to technical and creative questions. On other projects, we are renovating existing systems and infrastructure, updating older documentation, and implementing modern systems. In both cases, we perform assessments of equipment conditions, analyzing both risks and opportunities that may lead to solved problems and breakthrough strategies. Our evaluations of infrastructure, technical systems, and the overall facility site allow us to make informed decisions on the best approach for updating existing equipment and integrating new solutions.
Design Assurance and Independent Reviews
A key aspect of partnering with AOA is mitigating risk. By peer reviewing through our vast network of experienced professionals, we can ensure that we and our clients are making informed and responsible decisions that stand up to the closest scrutiny. We work with a variety of partners when our engineering projects’ needs require, and we invite open collaboration with subject matter experts in many nuanced technical fields to bring foremost proficiency to the benefit of our projects. Code compliance and life-safety requirements are of top priority for our team, and we actively cooperate with all project partners on public welfare needs. Our commitment to quality and long-term performance is driven by a desire for your project to be as successful on day one thousand as it is on day one. If systems aren’t maintainable, sustainable, or operational after opening, then they aren’t much of a system at all. We can only deliver exceptional technical experiences through a strong obligation to safety and a keen eye for quality, both of which are assured through independent peer reviews and third-party design assurance evaluations.
Technical Documentation and Coordination
At every stage of the engineering process, AOA will coordinate, organize, and document every aspect of a project’s components. Aligned with project schedules and stakeholder expectations, we will keep all the plates spinning and ensure you know how the magic trick is done. This approach ensures that your operation and maintenance teams routinely activate and sustain all technical systems with safety and reliability. Comprehensive and successful technical documentation requires a sharp eye for detail, widespread organization, and precise communication across both engineering and non-engineering disciplines alike. The creative visions that we bring to life are made possible through accurate, complete, and thorough documentation, aligning and coordinating specifications for equipment, control systems, and facility support systems. These documentation materials are refined and utilized throughout the project life cycle: during permitting submissions, in fabrication drawings, for installation workflows, and throughout long-term operations and maintenance procedures.
Engineering Support Services
We want our clients armed with all the knowledge they need to move forward with confidence after a project’s completion. Our team will be with you up to and beyond the finish line, from testing the individual components, to proving the entire system out, to providing the training to the staff that will keep it running. Through testing and commissioning, we work to validate the performance and safety objectives set in earlier project phases. Whether working with a newly integrated piece of custom equipment or a standard technology retrofitted into an existing system, we conduct the necessary tests and provide remarkably detailed documentation to prove successful operational reliability and sustained hazard and risk mitigation. This knowledge is passed on to your operations and maintenance teams, both during the project turnover phase and in perpetuity according to your support needs. Guests should be kept safe and amazed by dependable and seamlessly engineered systems, and our support services affirm their experience on opening day and beyond.
