Removal of the crane on the sidewalk

What exactly are you doing with your webcam? No craftsman has to let himself be filmed while working, and whether the insulation on the upper floor is properly installed everywhere or the vapor barrier is well glued, you can't see that with it either. The electricians and plumbers had poorly glued their cables passing through the vapor barrier for me. I then asked the drywall builder to fix it before the drywall work starts and you never see it again. You only notice things like that if you check every day yourself. One day later it would have already been covered up, the drywall builders were just setting up their scaffolding. They also told me about defects that I should report to the general contractor. No webcam and no neighbor, who actually doesn't care what's happening at the construction site, can do that. It's not their business. If you decide to build, you should move close by. What speaks against that? You want to live there forever anyway. The additional costs are easily made up for by savings on fuel and time, at the latest during interior finishing, when you work there day after day for weeks.

What actually is wrong with your webcam? No craftsman has to be filmed while working, and whether the insulation upstairs is properly laid everywhere or the vapor barrier is well sealed, you can't see that with it either.

Nobody here is talking about a webcam, but about a retired civil engineer or the like, who as a "Value Added Webcam" extends the eyes of the OP beyond his distance from the construction site by inspecting the day's work as a builder's avatar (often also after the workers have finished for the day, and absolutely without filming anyone in flagrante fiddling). And on days when everything is already hidden at the end of the day, he simply comes during the work in progress. Then he also sees what was sealed how cleanly.

And if it’s a retired civil engineer or something similar, then in 5 minutes of site inspection they see more than even the most interested but non-expert client sees in 5 hours. And they can put it into words so that, depending on the situation, it can be clarified over coffee with the respective trade, in a formal conversation with the site manager, or even in a detailed analysis / expert report.

My construction site was always known among the trades as, quote, "five-star construction site" because everyone was well taken care of and treated well. They also knew that I was not only extremely often and for a long time on site (also due to self-performed work) but that I also repeatedly asked very precise questions - and of course I could only ask those questions because a civil engineer who has been on construction sites for decades dictated them to me. For the executing personnel of the trades this was not unpleasant at all - they immediately told their boss that here was a nice but obviously highly competent client who wouldn’t let himself be foolhardy. Whether the company botches on other sites or not didn’t matter to me, what mattered was: Not on mine or at least hardly at all. That was only possible for me thanks to expert supervision because I myself was and still am exactly zero professionally competent, I could only relay what the civil engineer had told me.

And to come back to the crane: That was also repeatedly a topic, the entire site setup and safety measures. What can become a problem for me or at least initially land on my desk and then I end up on the municipality’s blacklist. The professional just sees at a glance what is completely okay and what can legally be a problem.

Never again without such expert advice - even if I live right next door and it would already be my second construction project.

And completely beyond "crane locations must be densified": If you google "bf-koeln-einsaetze" as well as "Einsaetze 2013 10.10.2013 crane toppled Cologne Ehrenfeld Piusstr", that was right outside my door and I walked past that crane twice daily. When our crane was dismantled on the construction site, I was really relieved.

For me, electricians and plumbers poorly sealed the passage of their cables through the vapor barrier. I then asked the drywall installer to fix it before the drywall work begins and you never see it again.

I think such a problem would be detected in time by the building inspector. At least the shell construction would be checked before drywall and plastering, as well as the KFW inspection and the blower door test would be carried out.

But the motivation here is to identify problems even earlier through regular visits during the various construction phases and not only at 3 or 4 inspection points, right?

because she dictated to me a civil engineer who has been on construction sites for decades.

Do you think it works if the experienced civil engineer (who is not in Germany) guides me without visiting the construction site himself? Or if the experienced civil engineer guides another civil engineer who has little experience?

I mean that he guides us on what to pay attention to or what to check/inquire about.

If not, should I rely on a building inspector and agree on a detailed inspection plan?

Of course, the Value-Added Webcam Construction Engineer has to be on the construction site, we say that all the time. His eyes are your eyes. He tells you what he sees.

Of course, you can send a building inspector daily. It just costs a pretty penny.

If you send the building inspector during the acceptance, he can inspect what he sees. Everything interesting is then already plastered.

As I said, my construction engineer noticed that the heat pump pipes were forgotten. That was all at a time when nothing was plastered yet, so it could be fixed quite quickly. Of course, it would have been done eventually without this hint too – just then in a correspondingly rough and ugly way. With the forgotten photovoltaic pipe, they would have slit open the exterior facade – you can do that, but it’s not exactly beautiful.