Advances in capturing and sharing location information about underground infrastructure in Europe

I was invited to participate in a meeting of the European Underground Infrastructure Community this morning.  I heard about very important advances in capturing, capturing and sharing location information (maps) about underground infrastructure that are relevant to any jurisdiction attempting to reduce underground damage and improve construction efficiency.

France

In 2012 a presidential decree mandated that the location of underground infrastructure had to be accurate to 40 cm or better (Quality Level A) for all critical infrastructure in urban areas by 2019.  In France critical infrastructure refers to infrastructure that is dangerous for excavators.  It excludes telecom and most water distribution networks. At this point the target date has slipped a bit, but it is estimated that about 80% of the location of urban underground infrastructure is known to QL A.

It is important to note that this applies not only to new infrastructure but existing infrastructure as well.  One of the contributors to the improvement in the quality of existing infrastructure data is a shared responsibility model.  As a contractor I am expected to request information through the DICT system about the location of underground infrastructure in the areas of a proposed excavation.  If the information supplied by the network owners operating in that area is poorer than QL A, I can invoice the network operator for the work I have to do to achieve QL A.  This system motivates network owners to work toward improving the quality of their data to reduce the cost of paying invoices. Furthermore, the cost for a contractor to do this work is probably significantly higher than if the network operator undertakes the work themselves.

Netherlands and Flanders

Studies from the 1940s through today have shown that incorrect or incomplete knowledge about the location of underground utilities is the leading reason for project delay claims.  A study of ten  Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDoT) projects that involved a subsurface utility engineering (SUE) survey prior to engineering design found significant business benefits with an ROI of $22.21 saved for every dollar invested in SUE. Most one call centers are designed to provide underground utility information just prior (in North America about three days in advance, in the Netherlands up to 20 days in advance) to shovels going in the ground.  What this means is that planning and engineering design are conducted blind about the location underground utilities. The result is increased risk of utility damage, unnecessary but expensive utility relocations and construction delays.  In the Netherlands the KLIC system now can respond to three types of information requests, safe digging requests (80% of all requests), emergencies (5%), and planning requests (15%).  In Flanders similarly about 16-17 % of information request to the KLIP system are study requests.  This means that areas of high risk from underground infrastructure or where areas where utilities relocates would be expensive can be avoided during the design process.  Nobody would begin engineering design for a civil engineering project without a (above-ground) survey by a registered professional land surveyor.  Having accurate, reliable information about underground utilities is just as important.  In addition to the Netherlands and Flanders other jurisdictions are recognizing this as well.  In Colorado a SUE survey prior to civil engineering work in the public right of way is now mandatory.

In both Flanders and the Netherlands data is shared using an open standard harmonized data model (IMKL) that allows all data for a proposed excavation to be downloaded as a ZIP file and visualized on a single layered map using a free and open basic, commercial, and in-house developed viewers, supporting both offline and online viewing,

Germany

Red - inquiries handled conventionally. Green - inquiries handled by BIL system

In Germany there has been rapid growth in the number of request for information about the location of underground pipelines.  BIL is the Germany-wide information system for pipeline inquiries. Since February 2016 BIL has provided a cost-free digging request portal to a the national information system for pipeline inquiries. The foundation for BIL was laid in 2015 by 17 German pipeline companies from the chemical, high-pressure gas and mineral oil sectors. To date the BIL system has been able to automate 80% of these requests, with the result that  turnaround times are faster and require less staff.

It is interesting that 30.36 % of requests to the BIL system were for planning purposes (pre-construction) and the remainder for excavations.  This varies considerably for different sectors from about 20 % for civil for different sectors. While civil engineering and pipeline construction predominantly inquired about excavation, significantly more planning inquiries were made in the area of ​​energy generation and special measures (railway infrastructure, hydraulic structures, tunnels, industrial areas)

Spain

Two regions in Spain, Catalonia and Navarre, have developed non-governmental industry consortia for sharing information about the location of underground infrastructure,  These consortia are industry-supported, primarily by large utility and telecom operators such as Telefonica, ENEL, and Iberdrola.  Excavators pay a fee to retrieve this information which is provided as vector data, in AutoCAD, Microstation or shape file formats.

Thanks to Holger Kessler for the opportunity to participate.

Comments

[Jan-Willem Nijman]

Geoff, I like to make a couple of remarks to put things in some perspective. The country were i think most of the planning is done, is in fact the UK and that is because the main service in the UK is free for the user and the focus on Health and safety. Netherlands is lacking this and this is shown on the high damage rate (6%), the highest in mature countries. About Germany: BiL is processing about 100.00 enquries and has 90 members. That may sound a lot but in perspective of 5 million excavations and 10.000 utilities and other assetowners this is only a very tiny portion of the countries infrastructure. Besides Bil there are 2 others services and numerous local inititatives. Spain's services receive only about 100.000 enquiries, again very small for such a country, which means many companies are excavating without a search. Main reason is the cost for the enquiry with can be quite expensive. I would be happy to discuss about this since I have been in those countries quite a lot.
Regards, Jan-Willem Nijman