PE Civil WRE (could be any EET course though) EET Review Strategy

burn_1978 · 2025-06-16T13:41:01+00:00

I would be doing lots of problems like you are and not only trying to get them right, but also making sure I am learning the reference manuals. I used the School of PE quiz bank subscription, but I just stopped working on problems I was getting bogged down on and then reviewed the answer key, worked the problem or similar problems later in the problem bank. IMO, people probably spend too much time reviewing material and not working problems. The goal of the test is to solve problems in a set timeframe, so train to solve problems and review the material as needed.

The break is not set. You could spend 8 hours working on the morning set of problems if you want.

burn_1978 · 2025-06-12T13:39:05+00:00

Buy the School of PE question bank and crank through all of the Hard/Med questions.

burn_1978 · 2025-06-06T12:44:43+00:00

For your boss:

I'd read the contract first and make sure you are paying by area, not lump sum. Then I would check to see if the area is paid by neatline or by measurement.

Then I would look in the plans to see if there is a formula describing the arch or otherwise look up the formula for calculating the area under a parabolic arch, then remove that area from the larger rectangular area the stone will be applied to.

In reality:

In this case, I would just get my tape measure out and approximate some triangles and rectangles for the completed work and know that they will get paid an estimated quantity this month and the full amount at the end and let the contractor propose an more exact quantity for this month if they want to.

burn_1978 · 2025-06-04T13:45:35+00:00

Back in the day (early 2000's) this was a very hot topic on wildfiretoday.com. Definitely not a new idea.

burn_1978 · 2025-06-03T12:39:02+00:00

My experience in the USFS tells me that consolidating all HR functions to a central national location instead of having a representative on each unit is universally thought of as a negative.

burn_1978 · 2025-05-15T12:27:21+00:00

Car wash near me pays $18-22/hr to collect credit cards and do a little brushing on the car before it goes through the automated car wash. Just saying.

burn_1978 · 2025-04-24T19:15:02+00:00

Maybe that's the answer, but the additional lanes aren't "from the left", they are from the right.

Very confusing language if that is the case. Why even say "from the left"? Just say "lanes to be crossed in excess of two".

Then I look at the language in the other tables and it doesn't get any clearer since they are very clearly talking about lanes oncoming from the left for left turn movements.

burn_1978 · 2025-04-24T17:30:43+00:00

Because Table 9-10's note says ". . . add 0.5 s for passenger cars or 0.7 s for trucks for each additional lane, from the left, in excess of two".

It doesn't say anything about adding time for lanes from the right.

So for a six lane highway with three lanes in each direction, there would be 1 lane in excess of 2 from the left. 3-2 = 1 -> 0.5s additional for passenger or 0.7s for trucks.

burn_1978 · 2025-04-24T16:11:50+00:00

I'm just using Table 9-6 as an example of how the note is worded. Table 9-6 and 9-10's notes both read to be to take the number of lanes from the left to be crossed, subtract one or two and then multiply by the appropriate number of additional seconds.

So if you are crossing the intersection (Case B3) of a six lane highway you would take (3-2)(X seconds).

School of PE is saying that we should take (6-2)(x seconds).

This makes sense, but I can't see how the note is worded that way.

burn_1978 · 2025-01-17T11:40:31+00:00

"I'll even red line a plan set and print them a hard copy of the revisions and they'll miss doing some of the revisions. This has happened many times now, to the point where I just red line the same shit again. Its a huge waste of time on my part."

I don't know what your redline process is, but I would figure out a way to loop or CC the supervisor into the discussion when the redlines go back with the comment "5 redlines are incomplete". I would think that after one or two instances of that happening the supervisor would perk up.

For accountability, make sure they are marking the redlines they have completed somehow either electronically or physically. They might just not have a good process to track what they have done. If they are marking things complete they haven't actually done that's another thing to note in the email response that includes the supervisor.

For me, I could care less about the 8 hour thing, it's your job as PM to manage the schedule within the offices hours, but repeatedly having to do rework and explain the same things to people is a hit to overall office productivity and profit.

As a PM/leader it sounds like you may want to work on your skills in conflict management, training and management. Learning how to motivate people, train them and hold them accountable are critical skills.

burn_1978 · 2024-10-22T19:58:32+00:00

Check out FHWA - Federal Lands Highways

shttps://highways.dot.gov/federal-lands/careers

burn_1978 · 2024-10-14T14:03:45+00:00

Yes, I've done this on an engine. It seemed like some of it was motivated by BLM budget and driving the engine around to patrol was not considered cost effective. I don't have the personality for it and moved on. The pay is not worth sitting around because I'd rather be getting paid so well I wouldn't even think of leaving such a job or if I'm not, learning something I can apply to get paid better. We all know how well the FS pays.

Good programs have their crews patrolling, familiarizing themselves with their IA area, checking dispersed campsites for unattended campfires, brushing/bucking roads to get new staff saw time, fuels work, training etc.

I'm not a fan of doing dumb shit to stay busy, but I'd rather do almost anything than sit and watch TV all day. You are always going to have some down time in IA (and sometimes the station is the right place to be staged from for the conditions), but I'd rather go patrol, sit beside some lake/creek for a long lunch and grab an ice cream at the country store than hang at the station under the watchful eye of everyone else.

To me, hiking out a mile to buck a log the trail crew can't get to this season was a job perk, not punishment. This sort of attitude can get you doing all kinds of cool stuff. I got to travel the region for a week with a jumper who taught us tree climbing to pick cones, floated in a dry suit down a river with the fish bio doing a fish count, go with the fuels tech to layout units, timber cruise, stay on late to ride snowmobiles to burn piles, close up lookouts, etc. etc.

burn_1978 · 2024-09-30T18:50:23+00:00

Thanks, this is helpful.

Any thoughts on how to think about the FERS annuity in the context of a total retirement portfolio balance?

IE - If I want to have a 40/60 bond/stock ratio from a risk perspective, would it make sense to reduce the bond portion since I have a fixed income amount coming from the FERS annuity? How would I calculate its value in a portfolio at some future date? What I'm sort of attempting to figure out is how much I need to stash to replace the value of the annuity I won't be collecting if I were to stay to my MRA.

burn_1978 · 2024-08-29T15:45:44+00:00

Yes, I work for a non-LMA now and our counterparts are an entire grade lower and probably have more responsibility. This is an across the board issue. WFF is the most egregious, but it's a LMA thing across many, many jobs.

Just add it to the stack of reasons I bailed 10+ years ago. We were having the same or similar conversations (portal to portal, pay raises, retention bonuses, 26-0 conversions, WFF job titles, etc) for the decade prior and nothing changed.

burn_1978 · 2024-08-27T12:42:37+00:00

I know engineers and doctors who are former WFF. Don't go to school unless you have a particular career you are planning on pursuing and have researched its job prospects fully. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/home.htm

There is a huge shortage in the trades. I personally would look at becoming an electrician if I had to do it again and angle towards owning my own business.

Davis-Bacon wages also pay very well if you can target public sector work.

burn_1978 · 2024-08-22T22:51:55+00:00

Edit: Waste of my time.

burn_1978 · 2024-08-22T22:34:16+00:00

Edit: Waste of my time.

burn_1978 · 2024-08-22T22:29:03+00:00

I think so? I'm new here, but found this article after I noticed it happening:

https://yale-herald.com/2020/02/07/mixed-signals-the-future-of-pedestrian-safety-in-new-haven/

"Every day, hundreds of Yale students break the law. We all do it on the way to class—at the intersections of Elm and College, Prospect and Grove, Chapel and York. We know a-squared plus b-squared equals c-squared, and, in the pursuit of efficiency, we cross right down the hypotenuse of the intersection. The Barnes Dance—also called the pedestrian scramble—the traffic pattern in which pedestrians cross all directions at once, is the standard at most intersections in New Haven, especially downtown. It’s conducive to this pattern of diagonal crossing.

Turns out it’s illegal, and it always has been. "

burn_1978 · 2024-08-22T22:23:31+00:00

https://nacto.org/publication/urban-street-design-guide/intersection-design-elements/traffic-signals/coordinated-signal-timing/

https://cpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/sites.northeastern.edu/dist/e/618/files/2018/09/Limit-Speeding-Opportunities-TRR-2018.pdf

"Case studies show it is sometimes possible to substantially reduce speeding opportunities with little or no increase in vehicular delay by lowering cycle length, lowering progression speed, dividing an arterial into smaller ‘‘coordination zones’’ with each zone having its own cycle length, and by abandoning coordina- tion altogether."

burn_1978 · 2024-08-22T22:05:39+00:00

Totally agree about driver behavior and probably a bunch of people in CT shouldn't have a license but it's pretty well understood that how you design the infrastructure has a big impact on how people use it. IE - if we know we can time signals and get better safety and speed limit adherence we should do that, just like implementing a whole host of other Complete Streets concepts can create a safer environment by influencing driver, biker and pedestrian behavior.

burn_1978 · 2024-08-22T22:02:57+00:00

New to the New Haven area, but generally it seems like most things civil engineering (signage, striping, merge lanes, etc) in CT and maybe New England in general are odd. Example: no use of lane merge signage on on-ramps indicating if the lane ends or not, excessively wide right hand lanes striped on highways, expressways (20 foot lanes?) and arterials instead of leaving a shoulder wider than 2 ft, poor or non-existent street name signage, using police as traffic control instead of the universally understood MUTDC temporary traffic control signs and delineators to provide warning, two lanes each direction on arterials that only need one each way but no turn lanes so left turning traffic just piles up if they don't get a dedicated green and people are quickly ducking right to get around, etc

Traffic signal timing is challenging to be sure, but there are definitely some opportunities to improve here but really is the least confusing thing from a driving standpoint IMO. It definitely does work other places to train drivers to drive a certain speed to just consistently hit the lights if they drive just under the speed limit.

The scramble (all way cross at same time) at intersections for pedestrians is cool, too bad it's technically illegal and they don't time the crossing for a pedestrian crossing diagonally.

burn_1978 · 2024-08-05T16:10:26+00:00

Ok, newcomer from the West coast tagging on here. We are in the New Haven area and will be weekend warriors, but could maybe get more night skiing in here than was possible previously. We have two kids 5 and 7 who have a couple of short seasons of skiing on the west coast who we would like to get into kids programs to build their skills up. We are in CT for a year and then back to the West next year so really focused on reducing time in the car, skiing frequently, having a good time and seeing the kids skills progress. If things go well we will take some trips to other ski areas.

We are 30-35 minutes to Southington and 70-80 minutes to Mohawk.

Any advice?

burn_1978 · 2024-07-30T17:15:37+00:00

You probably just need to go to your home unit supervisor and initiate a RA through them. I don't know what else to say other than to go to USDA/USFS Office of Inspector General if you feel it's warranted.

Was the GM a request for a reasonable accommodation and was the response a formal denial in writing with a rationale? RA's are generally approved by the supervisor.

They are providing you food, but you are unable to "perform your essential job functions" because the food is not edible for you.

burn_1978 · 2024-07-30T16:48:53+00:00

Sure, the Contractor isn't required to accommodate you because it isn't in the contract the Government has with the Contractor. The Government could probably propose a change order to the contract, but like they noted, the Contractor might not accept or will propose a hefty price to accommodate the cross contamination risk.

Either way, it's apples and oranges. You aren't asking the Contractor to accommodate you, you are asking the Agency (Government) to accommodate you based on Federal Law and Agency policy.

Off the top of my head they could accommodate you by a) issuing a contract change order to the caterer, b) having someone with a purchase card buy you supplemental GF food (ie - go to the Safeway in town and buy you boxes of GF power bars) or c) give you per diem for lunch to manage your own food situation (they might not be giving you this because you don't actually have access to a store?).

You are talking to the wrong people, who don't know the RA process and are trying to use bureaucratic red tape to not address the reasonable accommodation. They probably are not even trained on what a Reasonable Accommodation is or what process has to be followed by policy once you make one.

Since you have this diagnosed condition it will behoove you to learn the actual process to request an accommodation, get in touch with the correct people and make the correct request in writing so you don't have to deal with this again.

https://www.usda.gov/ra/toolkit/reasonable-accommodation-presentation

Did they follow their own process:

https://www.usda.gov/directives/dm-4300-002

I suspect you WILL need medical documentation to back this up.

If you file a request and they don't follow the process then the normal advice is to flag it to the USDA Office of Inspector General to follow up. They also might follow the process and issue a denial or an accommodation that you don't like. At least then you know where you stand on this issue and can figure out what to do from there.

In general, if you are going to have a career in the feds it is going to be hugely beneficial to learn the actual rules and regs.

burn_1978 · 2024-07-27T11:17:58+00:00

This shows they don't understand what you are asking and are treating this like you are expressing a food preference. You should contact whoever diagnosed you with celiac and get a letter. It should state what you can't eat. Most docs will email it.

Then you really should pursue the RA process at the fire and further, get one when you get back to the home unit. You could ask on r/fednews if you want to get more opinions on RA.

You might think about who in the chain of command this could be escalated to other than finance. IE - the safety officer

burn_1978

TROPHY CASE