owner bio

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Matt Sorrell has engineering in his blood.

He was born and raised in Upstate New York, the son of a Civil Engineer and an Algebra Teacher.  Where most kids played in sand boxes, he spent his afternoons moving toy trucks around in the aggregate piles his father was using to mix concrete for the foundation of an addition to the house.

After graduating from high school, he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps at age 18.  After serving a tour in the Infantry, college didn't seem like that bad of a thing and Matt returned home.  He spent a summer working as a laborer for a local contractor before enrolling at Clarkson University.  There, he earned a degree in Civil Engineering, with Great Distinction.

His first job out of college was with the Utica office of MWH (now Stantec).  He split his time there in the office reviewing structural steel shop drawings and in the field inspecting local bridge projects.  

When the Utica branch was closed due to a series of corporate mergers, Matt had the opportunity to take a job at the company's flagship office in Chicago.  There, he became involved in the design of several large dams.  Coincidentally, one of these projects was in the Hudson Valley for the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).  As that project moved to construction, there was a need to have an engineer close to the site.  Matt convinced his boss that it would be cheaper to work out of a New York office than to fly back and forth every week and he moved back East.  He settled in at the Queens office where he was better able to manage the construction of this project and, more importantly, where he met his wife (also an engineer in that office!) 

Having now worked on a series of large projects as a consultant for the DEP, Matt developed a close working relationship with many members of their staff.  At this time, he was approached by the Deputy Commissioner and offered a job as the Lead Structural Engineer on a massive $1b tunneling project.  Like any engineer, even though he had never really worked on a tunnel, he jumped at the chance to work on this once in a lifetime project.  For the next decade, Matt was involved with major tunneling projects in the New York City area, working out of the DEP's Queens office.  

As this marquee project moved to construction, the DEP thought it would be wise to have a design engineer on-site.   As such, Matt moved Upstate to once again be closer to the job site.  He spent six years working out of the job trailer right on the site.  From his field office, he was able to effectively manage both the construction onsite and design projects in the home office.  It was here that he learned the value in working directly with contractors to develop practical designs.  It paid off as the first contract in the tunneling program was completed ahead of schedule with a minimum of change orders, almost unheard of for a project of this magnitude.

After reaching a milestone on the tunneling project, an opportunity presented itself and Matt went back to the private sector.  In the same way he transitioned from dams to tunnels, he transitioned from tunnels to bridges and headed a small structural engineering group consisting of five engineers for a local midsize firm.  After two years there, he saw the opportunity to recognize a lifelong dream and start his own company. 

Matt currently lives in the beautiful Hudson Valley with his wife.  He spends his free time doing "design-build" projects around his 100-year old house (a labor of love), tending to his orchard and vegetable garden, and caring for the ever growing flock of chickens being raised in his backyard.