Enriching Reports With Federated Data

As a longtime user of Bentley Systems applications, Sydney Airport determined that they could use a variety of newer software, including OpenCities Planner, iTwin Capture, and ProjectWise, now combined in Bentley’s iTwin Experience, which forms the basis of their new spatial information system, known as Maps@SYD.

The design team chose Bentley applications because they are based on an open platform and can easily incorporate data in multiple formats, from an array of sources. For example, Maps@SYD can overlay data from financial applications onto GIS data, giving the airport’s commercial leasing team visually intuitive and real-time access to tenant names, lease expiry dates, sales per square meter, and liquor license details, eliminating the need for users to visit the digital print room or request data from the spatial team. Similarly, the spatial team can automatically update and prepare occupancy reports every quarter without needing to consult the leasing team, saving significant time and effort for all involved.

Maps@SYD also helps the team perform regular audits of fire-fighting equipment, video monitoring, flight information display screens, wildlife observations, and confined spaces. Previously, contractors would write information on paper during walkthroughs, before manually uploading data into CAD files, which was error prone and inefficient. Now, having been shown how Maps@SYD operates in a short briefing session, contractors can conduct their audits with tablets and update information directly in the spatial information system. For operations managers going digital, moving away from traditional methods of pen and paper to Maps@SYD, now makes it possible to dynamically analyze the wildlife observation data based on periodic ranges of migration, assisting the decision-making process for strategizing of wildlife management policies.

All users access Maps@SYD via an intuitive web-based portal that divides data into specific sections for different departments and disciplines, such as airport and terminal plans, facilities, development, and safety, sustainability, and environment. Additionally, the system can accommodate reality models created with iTwin Capture, providing detailed information on the existing environment, construction data and progress, plus operational assets. “Maps@SYD is a gateway to historical and real-time data from multiple sources, relating to our physical assets, enabling our people to make informed decisions, facilitate predictive outcomes, improve operational and asset efficiency, mitigate risk, and underpin safety,” said Michael Smith, airport design ofÏcer at Sydney Airport.

Saving Time With Easily Accessible Information

By using Maps@SYD to unify all data within their spatial information system and provide an intuitive portal to airport information, all stakeholders can easily navigate the hundreds of buildings on the campus, enhanced with addresses, floor plans, building services, and photos. Project managers have instant access to all developments, current and planned, with the ability to overlay flood studies, environmentally significant areas, and heritage sites that may impact development. Managers can also overlay operational information, such as aircraft movements, obstructions within and beyond the airfield, plus noise contours, to measure the full impact of development and maintenance activities. Surveyors can input captured images to create reality models of underground services as they are built, providing accurate information without having to revisit the underground site.

The ability to access all information within Maps@SYD saves the spatial team roughly 65 resource hours per week. Tests with users indicated a time savings of over six minutes per search. By the end of 2022, with over 200 users, the team estimates a total time savings of 22 hours per day. Moving from paper-based to digital record-keeping has reduced the time needed for standard audits from 133 hours to 56 hours. While incorporating reality models helps engineers and project managers determine the exact location, depth, and condition of assets, as well as enabling them to check the details of reinstatement works provided by contractors.

With over 150,000 features, hundreds of laser scans, and reality models already in Maps@SYD, the GIS team at Sydney Airport continues to add different data and functionality benefitting the many disciplines involved, and plans to eventually develop it into a true digital twin. “Sydney Airport has commenced its journey towards the development of their digital twin through the implementation of Bentley technology within Maps@SYD, allowing SYD to explore cross-platform data connectivity through their geospatial mapping” said Steve Parker, head of airport design, at Sydney Airport.