Utilities Drafter

Every major project requires some kind of design. Whether that image is burned into your mind, packaged with your new IKEA bed, or carefully graphed out on paper, the design is the launching point from which to work. A Utilities Drafter is in charge of creating the schematics, blueprints, or three-dimensional models for workers who install gas or electric distribution systems.

This might seem like a daunting task, but, if you’re a Utilities Drafter, your schooling prepared you for it, and you don’t do the job alone. To make sure every elbow bend, circuit, pump, filter, and valve is in the proper location, you use a combination of tools—the first being the expert who designed the system in the first place. As a Utilities Drafter, you meet with Scientists, Engineers, Architects, and Surveyors to better understand their vision and the technical details. You also consider budgets and timelines.

With a plan in mind, you rely on computer-aided design (CAD) programs to help you create and make changes to the design. You focus on the minute details of the project, including pressure requirements, the size of gas lines, the materials to be used, and the composition of the ground you’re working with. This means that along with your artistic skills, you brush up on math and engineering principles. But your attention to detail, creativity, and discipline pay off when you present an accurate and easy-to-understand visual representation of the utilities project plan to the construction team.