ADC Engineering

ADC Engineering is a South Carolina civil and structural engineering firm founded in January 1990 with two employees and a structural practice. It’s since added civil engineering, aviation engineering and site design, and it now has more than 65 people in offices in the Charleston area (Hanahan), Columbia and Greenville. Its clients include universities, airports, municipalities and private developers around the state. On Coastal Carolina University’s $75 million Health and Human Performance Building in Conway, ADC handles civil engineering and site design for the grounds. The 85,000-square-foot, three-story building is under construction with Hood Construction as construction manager and Garvin Design Group as architect of record.

Civil engineering, aviation engineering, structural engineering and landscape architecture all sit under one roof here, a less common pairing than it first looks. A site can therefore be graded, drained, paved and planted by the same firm that designs what stands on it.

The aviation side is the one that separates ADC from a general civil practice. Airfield work in the portfolio includes the checked baggage inspection system at Myrtle Beach, taxiway repairs at Charleston, Runway 15/33 at Joint Base Charleston, pavement repair at Pope Army Airfield and C-17 landing zone repair at North Air Force Auxiliary Airfield. Federal projects run alongside it: the Von Braun III Complex, an explosive ordnance disposal course instruction facility, Wallace Creek, the Mass Migration Complex and Homeport Ashore Norfolk. Anti-terrorism force protection design is listed within the civil scope, which is what qualifies a firm for that kind of work.

Civil services themselves are specific rather than catch-all: storm water management and modeling, erosion and sediment control, pavement design and analysis, sanitary sewer collection systems, potable water distribution, construction administration and observation, design-build and LEED design, plus campus planning. One campus project described on the site is a 126-acre master plan covering a middle school, a high school, a library and an advanced studies center.

Public and institutional work fills out the rest. Healthcare includes MUSC’s R. Keith Summey Medical Pavilion and Shawn Jenkins Children’s Hospital. Education spans Philip Simmons High School, Lucy Beckham High School and Trident Technical College. Industrial clients include the Volvo North American manufacturing center and a Daimler Freightliner logistics building. In Charleston, the firm served as engineer of record on the Colonial Lake renovation for the city.

Three offices cover the state: Hanahan for the Charleston area, Irmo for Columbia and one in Greenville. The firm states its principals stay involved in every project.