NEW YORK — The international engineering firm Buro Happold has welcomed a new partner, Erleen Hatfield P.E., LEED AP. Hatfield, who is based in New York, has almost twenty years of experience in the structural design of commercial, residential, and sports projects. She is actively involved in the advancement of building information modeling (BIM) and integrated project delivery (IPD) in the A/E/C industry and sits on numerous national and local BIM committees.

Craig Schwitter, P.E., Buro Happold’s Regional Director of North America, said, “We brought Erleen, who spent 11 years at Thornton Tomasetti, on board as a partner because of her depth of experience in commercial and sports facilities. She is a leader in the BIM movement, and as we move into our second decade of operations in North America, we pride ourselves on being at the forefront of BIM and other emerging design technologies. We’re delighted to welcome her to our New York office.”

Hatfield co-chairs the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA)’s Technology Committee, and was a member of the 2009 AIA’s Integrated Project Delivery Discussion Group. She will be a juror for the AIA’s 2010 BIM awards. She also sits on the American Institute of Steel Construction’s BIM Committee and the Applied Technology Council-81/American Concrete Institute-131 BIM Committee. Her projects with Buro Happold include the Abu Dhabi Media Zone in Abu Dhabi, UAE; Natal Stadium in Natal, Brazil; and the Nations Academy in New York, N.Y. Hatfield also teaches a graduate architecture class at Yale University and lectures regularly at Pratt University.