About

Biggs Consulting Engineering, PLLC was founded in 2010 by David Biggs, P.E., S.E. He is also a consultant to Ryan Biggs|Clark Davis, a structural engineering firm he co-founded in 1978. From 2010-2023, he was technical director for Constructive LLC, masonry development company involved in pre-fabricated masonry.

Biggs specializes in structural engineering, forensic engineering, masonry design, and historic restoration. In addition, he is involved with research projects and provides consulting for the development of new masonry products.

Following September 11, 2001, he was a member of the Building Assessment Team assigned to investigate the World Trade Center disaster for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE).

In 2003, Biggs was selected Engineer of the Year for two professional societies in New York State. In 2005, he was elected a Distinguished Member of ASCE; this is the highest honor a member can receive.  In 2008, he was also elected an Honorary Member of The Masonry Society - the society's highest honor. In 2012, Biggs was elected a Fellow of both the Structural Engineering Institute and the American Concrete Institute.  In 2013, he was selected a 2013 Concrete Influencer by Concrete Producer magazine.

He has been an adjunct in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York, where he developed and taught the course “Masonry Structures”.

Biggs has been a consultant to the Supreme Council of Antiquities for the Republic of Egypt. He was part of a six-member international team providing restoration guidelines for use throughout Egypt.

In 2007, he developed the Hybrid Masonry structural building concept and has been involved with the development of computer software, training and research related to the new system. This led to a project funded by the National Science Foundation to research seismic response of hybrid masonry buildings. The University of Illinois and the University of Hawaii performed the research.

From 2010 through 2016, Biggs was a lecturer at the Czech Technical University in Prague for the European Course "Advanced Masters in Structural Analysis of Monuments and Historical Constructions” where he taught the Masonry Repair and Strengthening course.

In 2011, he was a visiting lecturer at the University of Auckland, New Zealand and was co-sponsored by Fulbright New Zealand to present a series of seminars on Structural Engineering Forensics throughout New Zealand.  The lecture series was repeated in 2019 and became a graduate course in 2021.

From 2012-2019, Biggs provided technical assistance to the University of Pennsylvania for the evaluation, stabilization and restoration of the historic city of Gordion, Turkey (http://sites.museum.upenn.edu/gordion/). His work included the masonry Citadel Gate walls of the early Phrygian period (9th century BC) and the tumulus of Midas (8th century BC) with the world's oldest intact timber building.

In 2013 Biggs was a visiting lecturer for the Iraqi Institute for the Conservation of Antiquities and Heritage and the University of Delaware Institute for Global Studies. His work included training Iraqi archeologists and the evaluation of structures within the Citadel of Erbil, the oldest continuously occupied site in the world dating to 6,000 BC according to the UN.

In 2014, David Biggs was a Lecturer for the University of Pennsylvania School of Design, Historic Preservation.

In 2015, The Getty Conservation Institute appointed Biggs a lecturer for its International Stone Conservation course in Rome, Italy. The course was presented in partnership with the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM).  Also, Biggs led a team of 16 to Nepal to assist with earthquake assessments and recovery.

In 2018, The Structural Engineering Institute of the American Society of Civil Engineers awarded Biggs the prestigious Dennis L. Tewksbury Award. 

in 2020, Biggs was appointed an Honorary Associate Professor of the University of Auckland (2021-2023). He teaches forensic structural engineering remotely from the United States.

In 2022, the U.S. Department of State and the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board selected Biggs to receive a Fulbright Specialist Program Award. He will be a lecturer/consultant at the  Universidade do Minho in Portugal for the International Masters program titled Structural Analysis of Historic Monuments and Constructions.  

In 2022, the 2023 World Engineering Convention selected Biggs to its International Scientific Committee.

In 2024, Biggs was invited to consult with the  Croatian Centre of Earthquake Engineering on a seismic retroffing project in Croatia.