Geographical Information System in Managing Mega Infrastructure Projects Ankita Adhikary, M.Sc. Geomatics and Space Application, CEPT University Ahmedabad G eographic Information System (GIS) is a computer based tool used extensively to solve various engineering problems related to spatial data. The construction of Mega Infrastructure Project is huge and it involves a large number of activities. Various traditional techniques for scheduling and controlling are still being used in the construction industry which fail to provide the spatial (layouts, 202 The Masterbuilder - June 2013 www.masterbuilder.co.in drawings) and non-spatial (specifications, cost estimates etc.) aspects of information in a construction project. In the recent past GIS has made a huge impact on how many traditional activities are conducted in science and engineering and its functions to handle and analyse vast amount of data has been adopted in the construction industry to fascilitate visualization, management, automation, analysis and decision making.
So it was considered that integration between the Project Management and GIS (Geographic Information System) would be a key part of the solution. This integration would show visualisation of construction progress w.r.t. time. In this integration the drawings were drafted using a computer aided drafting (CAD) program (AutoCAD), the construction schedule was prepared using Project Management Software (MS Project 2003), the updated schedule information (which mainly includes percent complete) which is updated in the Geodatabase (Arc Info). As the updating is being done, a custom application (.net with C# language) had been prepared to automatically update the Geodatabase. Thus the project management software is updated and simultaneously the Geodatabase is also updated and 3-D view of the progress can also been seen. The Integrated GIS Project Management system would help all the parties involved in the construction project (especially for decision making) as they would be able to see all the spatial aspects of project in one system. In spite of growing popularity of GIS, its complete potential to construction industry has not been realized. In this paper, the summary of up-to-date work on spatial applications of GIS technologies in construction industry is presented. GIS technologies have the potential to solve space related problems of construction industry involving complex visualization, integration of information, route planning, E-commerce, cost estimation, etc. Project Management: The term Project Management is defined by Project Management Institute (PMI) The application of knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements. It has five groups of one or more processes each as shown in Figure 1 below: Geographical Information Systems (GIS) In the past twenty-five years, a host of professions have been in the process of developing automated tools for efficient storage, analysis and presentation of geographic data. These efforts have apparently been the result of increasing demands by users for the data and information of a spatial nature. This rapidly evolving technology has come to be known as Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Geographic information system goes beyond description; it also includes analysis, modeling, and prediction. A geographically referenced data has two components: spatial data and attribute data. Spatial Data: Describes the location of spatial features, which may be discrete or continuous. Attribute Data: Describes characteristics of spatial features. For raster data, each cell value should correspond to the attribute of the spatial feature at that location. Components of GIS are: Software, Data, Methods, Hardware, Specialists. GIS SolicitationsIn Mega Infrastructure Projects GIS can be used for: - Progress monitoring system in construction - Networking solutions - 3-D data analysis - Site location and Client Distance - Comparison of data - Construction scheduling and progress control with 3-D visualization - Government Regulations Integrating Project Management and GIS The intent of segment is to demonstrate the benefits of using GIS with construction project management for mega infrastructure projects. In this project integration of GIS and Project Management is developed using Arc GIS, MS Project, AutoCAD, and Visual Studio to assist construction managers in controlling and monitoring construction progress. Successful project control is a challenging responsibility for all construction managers. Visualization of information is an important benefit for any project. The path of the project among the various applications in the system is shown in Figure 2 below: Figure 1: Five Groups of Project Management Process Figure 2: Flow Chart showing the Integration of Project Management and GIS www.masterbuilder.co.in The Masterbuilder - June 2013 203
The progress reports for construction of mega infrastructure projects like large mega city are described in the following sections. Figure 5: MS Project Bar chart Schedule Plan Elevation A list of activities in the building project is presented in Table 1. Activities breakdown is also shown. Each Activity for Slab, Wall, Beam, and Column are divided into components and they are further divided into individual activities. Figure 4: Work Breakdown Structure Figure 6: Digitization of Autocad maps to GIS format Stage III: Initiating Scheduling Process Table 1: Activity Information of the Building Stage I: Creating Autocad Drawings The plan of a typical building is created using AutoCAD, Figure 3 shows a typical floor plan and front elevation of one of the cluster of buildings. Stage II: Creating Work Breakdown Structure Refer Figure. 4 for work breakdown structure of the project. This is to be done to make project control effective and manageable. 204 The Masterbuilder - June 2013 www.masterbuilder.co.in MS Project 2003 was used as the scheduling tool. The project was scheduled based on the activities identified in the WBS described in Stage 2. MS Project was used to schedule the project showing the start and completion dates, locating the critical path(s), showing the sequence and interrelationships between the activities. Figure. 5 shows the MS Project bar chart schedule for the building whose plan and elevation were presented. Stage IV: Digitizing Autocad Drawings To GIS Format After creating drawings in AutoCAD, the dwg files were transferred to Arc Map a module of Arc GIS. The topologic data structure of the basic design layers in AutoCAD was created as layers in GIS based on the layers and activities identified in the AutoCAD drawings. The Migration of Raw data into GIS format is shown in Figure.6.
Stage V: Creating Feature Classes w.r.t. Activities The feature classes (Polygons, lines or points) created for activities were merged together into activities defined earlier in MS Project schedule. Thus, the activities which belong together but are located at different positions were joined together as one feature class. For example all the various components of the Column were merged into one merged feature class called the BLDG Column activity. which is obtained by calculating the average of the percent complete of the activities. Figure. 7 shows the attributes for a layer. Stage VIII: Run-Time Application The run time application is developed using Visual Studio 5.0 in C# language. With the help of this run-time application a user interface was developed. Here the user would come to know about the location of the source file. The user interface displays present date and time. It has drop down lists for the user to select accordingly. Figure.8 shows the User Interface Window. Figure 7: Attribute Table Figure 9: 3D view of superstructure section of the building Stage IX: Import Information About Activities and Update GIS Database The percent complete information is transferred with the help of custom run time application to MS Project every time a progress evaluation is made and the application is run. MS Project was run to generate the updated schedule network. The updated schedule shows the progress for all the activities as of the new date of the update (e.g. at the end of every month or daily updates) and the percent complete information. Figure 8: User Interface Stage X: Showing Progress of Activity In 3-Dimensional Stage VI: Creating Database w.r.t. Feature Class, Activities The attributes needed for each layer were created in a database. The database includes information about Z Factor, Total Volume Incum, Total Reinforcement Quantity Inkg, Start Of Concreting, Percentage Of Concrete, Current Quantity Of Concreting, Start Of Reinforcement etc. Stage VII: Create Updates Of MS Project Schedule The percent complete information on the activities is entered in the database by the user in step V. This information will used in step VII to calculate the percent complete for each activity, 206 The Masterbuilder - June 2013 www.masterbuilder.co.in Figure 10: Activity Day 1 with 3-Dimensional view
activities could be seen in 3D view. The project was updated as progress information became available and the corresponding MS project schedule was sent to Arc Scene. The updating was done with the help of a custom runtime application. The various formats of reports can be generated as per the user s requirement. Figure.10 to Figure. 13 shows the progress from day 1 to day 4 for all the activities involved in the project with the queries. Progress information can be viewed for an individual activity as well as for a number of selected activities at the same time. Summary of Stages: Figure 11: For Column and Wall, Components whose Money incurred till now for Reinforcement and Concreting is less than `100 To summarise stages from 1 to 10, refer Figure 14. The construction schedule that acts as a roadmap for the successful implementation of construction project is developed in Microsoft Excel and transferred to Arc GIS. The spatial information of different activities defined in the construction schedule is generated in AutoCAD. The drawings are transferred into Arc GIS as layers and may be symbolized and queried. GIS allow working with drawings transferred from AutoCAD, however, to edit or modify AutoCAD drawing layer features or its associated attribute table layers need to be converted into shape files. The shape files are simple non-topological format for storing geometric location and attribute information of geographic features. Layers transferred into Arc GIS from AutoCAD may be merged together according to the activities as defined earlier in schedule generated in Microsoft Excel. Figure 12: Activity Day 4 with 3-Dimensional view Figure 13: For Beam and Slab, Total Percentage Completion of Activities less than 50% View The project s 3D view was created in Arc Scene a module of Arc GIS. The activity layers created in Step V were converted into 3D layers in Arc Scene. The new layers are shown in the 3D view created as shown in Figure.9. Stage XI: Preparing Report as Per Required Format The progress of work was shown in graphical format and in different colors. The amount of work done on the various Figure 14: Linking the schedule with spatial aspects of the construction activities www.masterbuilder.co.in The Masterbuilder - June 2013 207
Thus, components of a drawing that belong to same activity but are located at different positions in space are joined together to construct spatial data for each activity. Linking an activity with its schedule involves in adding a field called key to schedule and its attribute table. The field key is common between two tables (i.e. schedule and attribute table of different components) and used to establish the connection between the spatial aspect of activity and the corresponding activity in the schedule. All the entries in the field key are to be entered manually and should be unique in both schedule and attribute tables of an activity. Linking the schedule with spatial aspects of the construction activities are shown in the Figure. 14. Conclusion As GIS is one of the fast emerging fields being utilized in various engineering projects, its complete potential to the construction industry has not been realized yet. GIS improve the construction planning and design efficiency by integration of spatial and attribute information in a single environment. Researches reported in this area are limited, as efforts in the direction to use GIS in construction industry have not embraced the issue associated with its implementation in industry practice. GIS is an effective tool to integrate spatial and non-spatial information of the construction project in a single environment. The methodology discussed here integrates construction schedule with corresponding spatial details so as to make understanding of the project sequence easier. This link allows easier understanding of the project as well as helps to detect possible problems in it. Non-spatial schedules only convey what is built when, whereas schedule in GIS conveys what is being built when and where. Special Attribute Most of the Figures were taken from the available paper of Kolagotla Vijay, Asst Manager, Gammon India Limited Mumbai online. Reference - V.K. Bansal, and M. Pal, Potential of geographic information systems in building cost estimation and visualization. Automation in Construction, Vol. 16, no.3, pp. 311-322, May 2007. - P. Aggarwal, and V.K. Bansal, Spreadsheet-based solution for critical path method. NICMAR Journal of Construction Management, Vol. 22, no. 2, pp. 1-5, 2007. - V. K. Bansal, Potential of GIS to Find Solutions to Space Related Problems in Construction Industry, World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology 8 2007. - Anbazhagan.S, Dept. of Earth Sciences, IIT Bombay, GIS and Its Applications edited in 2003 - CSRE, IIT Bombay, Geographic Information System principles and applications. One day workshop, March 2005. - Cheng, M.Y., and Chen, J.C. (2000). Integrating barcode and GIS for monitoring construction projects. Autom. Constr., 11(1), 23-33 - Cheng, M.Y., and Yang, S.C. (2001). GIS- based cost estimates integrating with material layout planning. J. Constr. Eng. Manage. 127(4), 291-299 - Cheng, M.Y., and O Connor, J.T. (1996). Arc Site: Enhanced GIS for Construction site layout. J. Constr. Eng. Manage., 122(4), 329-336. - Dr.F.Escobar, Assoc. Prof. G. Hunter, Assoc. Prof. I.Bishop, Dr.A.Zeger, Introduction to GIS, http://www.sli.unimelb.edu. au/gisweb - Dr. G.S. Rao, AjitaKini, Saumyagjit Roy, Anwar Hussan, IT and GIS a complementary technology blend - ESRI 2005. ArcGIS Solutions for Civil Engineering GIS the Intelligent Platform for Civil IT. - Geoff Zeiss, Director of Technology, Autodesk, Inc., Convergence: Integrating Geospatial Technology and Architectural and Engineering Design. - Geoff Zeiss, Director of Technology, Autodesk, Inc., Worldwide Challenges facing the Construction Industry. - Stephen E. Poku and Prof. David Arditi, M.ASCE, Construction Scheduling and Progress Control Using GIS, Journal of Computing in civil engineering, Vol.20,No.5,Sept.1 2006 - Shankar Bagale (2006), Planning and Management of Irrigation projects using Remote Sensing and GIS Technology. NRSA,15-22 - Spatial India ESRI India News, Noida, Friday, December 2, 2005, Special supplement on Eight Annual India ESRI User Conference. From Pilots to enterprise Deployments., 1-2 - Vijay K. Bansal, Mahesh Pal, GIS Based Projects Information System for Construction Management, Asian Journal of Civil Engineering (Building and Housing) Vol.7, No.2(2006) Pages 115-124. - Kolagotla Vijay, GEOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION SYSTEM AND ITS APPLICATION TO PROJECT MANAGEMENT IN CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY, Gammon India Ltd., Mumbai. 208 The Masterbuilder - June 2013 www.masterbuilder.co.in