Category: Opinion

eCognition Review in LIDAR News

14th July 2014

Thumb eCognition ReviewThe latest issue of LIDAR news features a 3-page review of Trimble’s eCognition software by Jarlath O’Neil-Dunne.

Jarlath is a researcher with the University of Vermont’s Spatial Analysis Laboratory. He has over 15 years’ experience with GIS and remote sensing and is globally recognised as a leading expert on the design and application of Object-Based Image Analysis Systems for automated land cover mapping.

eCognition emerged onto the geospatial scene in the early 2000’s and gained notoriety for being the first commercial Object-Based Image Analysis platform. Jarlath discusses the strengths of the software and what sets it apart from all other geospatial software packages.

Read the full review on page 70 in the latest version of LIDAR News.

The 5 minute interview with Andreas Sinning

13th May 2014

AndreassinningLast month, KOREC’s PR Manager, Lucy Hamilton had the chance to interview the Director of Marketing at Trimble Railway; Andreas Sinning. He talks about the development of the GEDO TMD system and how it’s advanced from the first version produced in 1996.

Andreas goes on to explain how the rest of Europe is receiving the latest in Trimble rail development; the GEDO Vorsys and GEDO Scan system.

For the full interview, check out the latest version of Altus Volo.

KOREC Opinion …on Mobile Spatial Imaging

16th April 2014

webKORECmx8prKOREC’s Mathew Lock makes the case for point clouds and in particular, gathering this data with a mobile spatial imaging system.

Early in my survey career the various field teams used to brag about how long it took them to fill the standard memory of the Geodimeter 600, a mere 1000 points at the time. On large opencast collieries or quarries it was pretty tough going, but in Autolock mode, in a built up area, it wasn’t long before we needed to upgrade the memory.

As speed and technology have advanced so has productivity and it is easy to forget how much high quality measured data our profession can now collect in a very small amount of time. From thousands of points in a day with Robotic Total Stations and GNSS to millions of points a minute with high speed laser scanners. Although we are still impressed by laser scanning data, we are beginning to take point clouds more and more for granted. As software and computer manufactures upgrade their products, point clouds become more and more accepted as conventional survey data, manipulated by 3D CAD technicians into whatever deliverables the client wants.

The logical next step is speeding up the collection of point cloud and imagery, which is why KOREC has invested in Trimble’s premium mobile spatial imaging system, the MX8.

Carry on reading in the Spring 2014 edition of Mensura.

KOREC Opinion …from Munich

16th April 2014

AndyB2The annual European Trimble Distributor meeting took place in the Bavarian capital of Munich this year. As ever, Trimble provided much thought on strategies for their distribution partners and one focus area this year was ‘sustainable’ growth – something that every business strives for.

A full understanding of how your customer’s customer operates, along with the requirements and ‘pain’ points for the end user of the data, can be key to expanding away from one relatively small part of the Design, Plan, Build and Maintain phases of a project.

Read Mensura Spring 2014 for more information.

Customer Survey 2013

4th October 2013

The Annual customer survey has now been launched. It’s your chance to help us help you. Tell us your opinion on how we can improve our service and which parts of our business you believe are performing and satisfying your needs.

For every completed survey we will donate 50p to Crash Charity and for Ireland customers we will donate 50¢ to Simon Communities, both worthwhile charities working towards helping homeless people get off the streets.

As well as this you’ll also be in with a chance of winning an Apple iPad. All completed surveys will be put into a prize draw to win!

UK Customer Survey

Ireland Customer Survey

 

What effect has 3D laser scanning had on the surveying industry?

23rd July 2012

We’re delighted to have another guest post from one of our customers. Graham Mills from The Technics Group takes a look at the effect of 3D laser scanning on the surveying industry.

Graham is the Managing Director of The Technics Group. Graham started Sitechnics Ltd, a general surveying company in 1989 and co founded Subtechnics Ltd, a utility mapping company in 1999. Now trading under the Technics Group he employs a team of 35 people and have offices in Guildford, Surrey and Maidstone, Kent.

Graham is a Fellow of the Chartered Institution of Civil Engineering Surveyors and is President of The Survey Association, the trade body for commercial survey companies in the UK.  The team are established users of laser scanning technology, most recently adopting the FARO Focus 3D Laser Scanner to expand their laser scanning expertise.

Graham’s blog:

As technology advances further in any industry, workforces improve and efficiency comes along for the ride. In terms of surveying and geographical landscaping, this is no exception.

What has really taken off, however, is three-dimensional capturing and imaging.

A natural transition, 3D is fast becoming the best way of visualising data. In the past, numerical values and measurements were displayed in charts and blueprints in a two-dimensional way, despite describing a 3D building or landscape. By turning to 3D laser equipment, and with the new ability to then illustrate in this manner too via 3D computer aided design, we can create a more accurate and visually valuable document.

Not only are there clear benefits to three-dimensional projects, but 3D Business Information Modelling (BIM) is to be made compulsory for all public projects by 2016, setting a certain standard for other areas to aim for. This should raise the bar for the industry and make surveying a more productive area, minimising 2D illustrations. Although they have their use, 2D modelling can result in vital elements becoming lost in translation.

FARO Focus3D Laser Scanner

 

 

 

 

 

3D laser scanners not only provide beneficial applied measurements, but they can do so in an effective manner. Technology is now faster and more advanced than ever, meaning that collecting data is less time consuming. The FARO Focus 3D Laser scanner for example, can take readings accurate to the nearest millimetre whilst only taking a few minutes to capture over a large area.

With less time wasted on gathering numbers, there can be a larger time allowance for analysis and visualisation of this data.

In fact, thanks to detailed images of complex environments, there has certainly been a level of improvement over the past few years in terms of conception and imaging.

Particularly in the case of public buildings where approvals and multiple checks much be made before any building work can be signed off, 3D is a real game changer. Thanks to the 3D data from laser scanning, alongside 3D augmentation within BIM, you can really gather a sense of the architecture of a potential building as well as its location, position within an area, and its spatial dimensions. With improved visualisations, probable problems can be detected and dealt with at an earlier stage accounting for a more productive process.

In a similar fashion, documentation thanks to 3D laser scanning is of great assistance to forensics and accident investigations where time is really of the essence. In these instances, where accuracy is vital, the precision of the lasers is beneficial for insurance purposes as well as reference in police investigations.

Three dimensional lasers work by co-ordinating thousands of laser points around a designated area. These points communicate with one another to form a ‘point cloud’ which is then later given surface texture and colours to appear more realistic and three-dimensional. This data can of course be used to make two-dimensional images or models also, allowing for different options where relevant.

It’s fair to say that the effect of 3D laser scanning is a good one. Not only is it increasingly the quality and the speed at which we can carry out project analysis, but it will do the same for other companies too meaning the overall output from surveying is better. Whether it is topography, geotechnical surveys or planning permission, we can ensure the highest standard possible thanks to improved technology.

A lesson learnt – why we need to combine social networks with networking socially

1st June 2012

social networking made easyAround this time last year we did a bit of research with our customers to try and find out what they really thought of us as well as listening to any suggestions they had for ways we could improve or do things differently. Most of the research was carried out using an online survey whilst a small number of our customers were interviewed face-to-face by our independent research company. This split between online and face-to-face questioning closely reflects our split between online and offline marketing over the last few years. We took a conscious decision not to attend certain industry events or exhibitions, focussing instead on our online channels such as the website, blog, Twitter and Facebook pages. This has been great in so much that it has allowed us to measure and monitor the impact of our activity using our various analytics systems but it is not without its limitations.

Our products and solutions can be incredibly complex and technical; face-to-face demonstrations and explanations are vital.  So, with customer feedback pointing towards the need for us to be ‘out there’ with road shows and events we took the decision to launch our first Technology Days with Trimble Express last month in Dublin and London.

To say that we were overwhelmed by the level of interest in the events would be putting it mildly; with both events being over-subscribed it was clear our customers were keen to see everything that we and our partners had to offer. Social media played its part in the event success, the KOREC Facebook pages promoting both events and helping to increase registrations.  In fact one of the biggest spikes in registration numbers came within minutes of announcing on Twitter that our key note speaker for London would be David Philp, Head of BIM Implementation for the Cabinet Office (incidentally @ThePhilpster was invited to speak at our event through Twitter).

Feedback from those who attended the events has been really positive; a common message is that customers hadn’t fully appreciated the range of technologies and solutions that we and our partners provide. It also allows our friends at Trimble, Faro, Sensefly and Aibotix the opportunity to get first-hand feedback from the customer.

With this in mind I’m pleased to confirm that we will be holding some more surveying and mapping events in the UK later this year. We’re bringing the Technology Day with Trimble Express to Northumberland,Yorkshire, Cheshire, Derbyshire and Somerset. The events will be smaller than our Dublin and London events, taking a more hands-on approach.  We also plan to hold a laser scanning day in Warwickshire and some smaller training days at our offices in Huntingdon.

So listening to our customers has given us a valuable lesson. We can’t assume that by continued communication via emails, blogs and tweets we ensure that our message hits the mark. No amount of social networking with tweets, retweets or Facebook ‘likes’ can replace the buzz that face-to-face networking provides when combined with a venue full of valued clients who we can chat to whilst sharing a coffee and a bite to eat before getting hands-on with the latest survey and mapping technology.

KOREC welcomes guest blogger Steve Bury

4th January 2012

We are delighted to welcome our first KOREC guest blogger, Steve Bury, owner of Bury Associates Ltd.  Steve has kindly taken the time to tell us how the FARO Focus3D laser scanner and the rise of BIM has changed the way he works.

Specialists in BIM and laser scanning services, topographical surveys and measured building surveys,  Bury Associates has been providing its clients with Revit Building Information Models of existing buildings and structures since 2007.  Last year the company’s Revit work on Manchester Central Library contributed to it being named as the ‘most BIM friendly project’ of 2011.

Steve’s blog:

At Bury Associates we’ve been producing 3D Building Information Models of existing buildings since we purchased our first Revit licence back in 2006.  Long before BIM became the buzzword it is now, it seemed logical to us that we should be able to give our clients an accurate 3D representation of the buildings we were surveying. After all, a building is a 3D object; yet we were using total stations to gather 3D information to define the size and shape of each building we surveyed only to convert all that valuable information into flat 2D drawings that seldom fully represented the building properly. We knew there had to be a better way of doing things so we spent a lot of time and effort in developing techniques that allowed us to use a tool that was primarily aimed at designing new-builds to model existing buildings from our survey data.

Manchester Central Library

Early in 2010 we were awarded the contract to survey and model in Revit the iconic Manchester Central Library for a major refurbishment programme. The building is circular in shape, with some interesting curved vaulted ceilings that intersect with each other – quite a task to model in 3D!  This contract has been seen as a showcase for BIM and has recently been declared the ‘most BIM friendly’ project of 2011 by Building Magazine and we‘re really proud that our model has been used to underpin the whole process.

Not long after we completed the library model we were asked to provide Revit models of parts of the world famous Blackpool Tower – a fun and fascinating job. The model we created of the Tower top really shows that we can survey and model even the most complicated of structures and produce really impressive results.

Blackpool Tower

All of our early projects relied on gathering the necessary 2D and 3D information needed to create the model using reflectorless total stations, such as the Trimble S6. We found this an efficient way of obtaining the measurements our Revit modellers needed to generate the building information models they were working on, but on larger, complicated projects, we found we were spending long periods on site, which was costly.

We had considered using laser scanners for some time but their high purchase price combined with Revit not being able to import and use point cloud data meant it made little sense to change the way we were working. Towards the end of 2010 we started to take another look at scanning when we heard about the launch of the Faro Focus3D. For the first time there was an affordable laser scanner available that was not just small and lightweight but quick and easy to operate too. Other scanners we’d seen always seemed to us quite cumbersome and not quite quick enough to scan. Another concern of ours had been that many of the buildings we survey are ‘live’ with lots of people milling around. Blocking off an area in a school or a hospital for half an hour at a time for us to scan simply isn’t practical. We were incredibly impressed with the Focus3D and as soon as we learned that Revit 2012 would support point clouds we placed an order for one.

As well as our 3D Revit work we also have many clients operating with 2D drawings, so we are also often producing normal plans, elevations and sections for many of the buildings we survey. For the last 8 years we have used very efficient software developed in-house to measure buildings, so it was very important to us that scanning should be at least as efficient, or ideally more efficient, than our previous techniques. It did take us a few months of trial and error before we got things right, but there is now no-one in the office who would want to go back to our old way of working – the time savings for producing elevations and sections in particular are quite significant.

We are now scanning pretty much every site we work on – we even use the Focus 3D to gather some topographical information when suitable. We recently took delivery of our second Focus3D and we’re sure it won’t be the last one we purchase.

There is now an increasing awareness and interest in Building Information Models and 3D building surveys amongst our clients, particularly from those involved with, or looking to get involved with, public sector contracts. Since Paul Morrell, the government’s chief construction advisor, declared that all public sector building projects should be carried out using BIM by 2016 there has been a realisation that in order to be ready, clients need to switch to using a BIM system now and fully embrace working in the 3D environment. With the current budgetary constraints that are in place, many of those BIM based projects willbe refurbishments and their success will depend largely on surveyors skilled in producing BIMs of existing buildings and structures. We have completed a number of Revit BIM surveys over recent months and all are entirely based on point cloud data collected with the Focus3D. Projects have included schools, a large university building and part of a well-known central London building.

As well as the areas we have traditionally been involved with – Revit modelling, measured building and topographical surveys – we increasingly find that we get enquiries to use our Focus3D laser scanners to measure more unusual objects. We recently hauled the scanner to the top of a Welsh mountain to survey some old quarrying equipment and we are currently discussing potential projects involving scanning museum pieces and assisting advertising and visualisation companies with their work. We are constantly discovering new markets and we are excited about several  opportunities we have recently identified.

In the survey industry we have been lucky enough to get some wonderful, innovative technology over recent years, but the Focus3D has certainly made the biggest difference to the way we work and its reputation as a game changer is well deserved.

BIM – is there a role for the surveyor?

30th September 2011

My colleague Oliver Brooks’ recent blog takes a look at the hot topic of the moment in the construction and engineering world – BIM. KOREC are recent converts to the world of Twitter and there is a great deal of conversation in the ‘Twittersphere’ around BIM and it seems that everyone wants to have their say. It’s no surprise then that there are BIM events springing up left, right and centre and the KOREC calendar is looking pretty hectic over the next few months as a result.

We’ll be attending a number of events for a number of reasons. Like a lot of companies, we’re interested in seeing what we can contribute to the BIM agenda and understanding exactly where the technologies that we provide can help. Unsurprisingly this isn’t for completely alturistic reasons, but we are also looking at ways that we can help our land survey customers develop their businesses into this field at a time when new business opportunities are thin on the ground.

Manchester Central Library Revit BIMWe begin at The Infrastructure Show in a couple of weeks where we will be joined by a number of our partners who will be giving presentations in the NCE Hi-Tech Zone. The topics are varied to say the least, with KOREC, customers and partners discussing projects that they have worked on using the variety of technology solutions that we provide. One of the highlights will be Steve Bury of Bury Associates who will discuss how he used laser scanning, Autodesk Revit and the Trimble S6 to produce a BIM for the refurbishment of Manchester Central Library for his client Ryder Architecture. KOREC’s Matt Lock will be providing a cut-down version of his recent CICES presentation which looked at how surveyors can play a role in BIM, plus we have an introduction to the Intelligent Trench solution which brings the world of RFID to BIM and utilities asset management.  Finally, we’re joined at the show by FARO, hot-footing it from InterGEO with the latest version of the FARO Focus3D laser scanner which offers a series of new features to make 3D Documentation projects even more efficient.

In case we’re not already busy enough during the week of The Infrastructure Show we’ll also be attending the hot-ticket in the ICE conference season, ICE BIM 2011. The ICE sold out for the conference in just three weeks and there is now a waiting list for the 2012 event, so if you need a barometer of the interest that BIM is generating in the UK construction industry this is it. A cursory glance at the conference programme and you can get an idea as to why the event sold out so quickly. We are certainly looking forward to listening to the discussions and debate whilst considering how we can help our land survey customers find their role in this rapidly shifting technology landscape.

FARO Focus3D Laser ScannerStaying with BIM, the team at KOREC are really excited about exhibiting at BIM Show Live on the 1st November, particularly as we will be joining our partners from TEKLA at the show. If you miss him at The Infrastructure Show,  Steve Bury makes another appearance at BIM Show Live and will be giving a short case study presentation. With KOREC’s our own stand at the exhibition we’ll have the opportunity to provide visitors with a good understanding of how they can utilise the latest laser scanning and surveying technology to help their BIM projects. Thanks to the FARO Focus3D, laser scanning technology is fast becoming more affordable and user friendly, so surveyors who have previously been priced out of the market can now add laser scanning to the services that they provide to clients. Elsewhere in Europe clients and architects themselves have started to adopt the technology as they realise the benefits and range of applications that the technology provides.

Last, and by no means least, as payback for Oliver headlining his latest blog with the term ‘marketing fluff’ he will now be discussing the surveyor’s role in getting BIM to the field at the COMIT Construction MobileIT Conference 2011 – Delivering the value of BIM to Smart Mobile Devices. KOREC are pleased to be sponsoring this event and Oliver’s presentation will discuss the role of 3D Laser Scanners in the BIM process for redesign, visualisations and clash detection as will as how office based process and information can be linked to the surveyor and engineer on site.  As with the ICE BIM conference the programme has its fair share of big hitters including Phil Jackson, Chair Of ICE IS Panel, Institution for Civil Engineers; Tim Broyd, Group Technology & Innovation Director and Group Sustainability Director, Halcrow; Dietmar Backes, Geomatic System Manager & Teaching Fellow, University College London and Iain Miskimmin, Technology Chairman – COMIT PROJECT Ltd / Industry Consultant, COMIT / Bentley Systems. The COMIT conference takes place on the 11th November at University College London and bookings are now being taken online.

So as you can see, it is going to be a busy few months for us at KOREC and I am sure that by the end of all this we will be able to have a pretty good stab at defining exactly what role our surveying customers can play in BIM. If you want to get a head start, then you could always take a look at our recent FARO Focus3D Webinar which gives an excellent introduction to the technology, even if I do say so myself…

KOREC BIM Events

Deformation Monitoring using Fixed & Mobile Intelligent Sensors – it’s kids play!

6th September 2011

This time of year many people have just returned refreshed and rejuvenated from their summer holidays.  I too have just returned from a trip to the beaches of North Wales where I spent many a happy hour building a dam across a small steam flowing onto the beach with the kids.  This dam built with rocks, pebbles and sand managed to hold the relentless stream back for a few minutes before either being overwhelmed by the water or deliberately sabotaged by my youngest!  Without eyes in the back of my head it was impossible to watch the kids and all the possible weak spots and inevitably, albeit a few hours later, they got bored as their paddling pool kept emptying and went off in search of ice cream.

Now back in work as I think back to those happy memories I’m reassured that modern surveying technologies are assisting the monitoring of dams throughout the world.  Demand for monitoring is on the rise with new monitoring projects emerging every day.  Ageing infrastructure, construction projects, and natural events such as floods and earthquakes require improved awareness of motion, providing opportunities for surveyors to expand their services and add new clients.  The growth in this field can be put down to a number of factors such as safety, improved decision making and the need to comply with regulations and contractual obligations.  Real time monitoring systems can detect motion and raise alarms so people and equipment can be moved to prevent accidents before they occur.  With the increase in the speed and quality of data acquisition and analysis that modern surveying technology brings, better decisions can be made by taking all factors into account.

Many less critical monitoring and deformation projects are done with measurements taken at intervals of days, weeks or months.  Instruments tend to be setup in fixed locations and repeat measurements to remote targets – permanently installed on the structure or area being monitored -are then taken.  Once the survey work has been done, the instrument is packed up and moved onto the next project.  The survey data is then post-processed back in the office and analysed to identify movement since the last observations or to see if trends are occurring over time.

If the project requires constant monitoring, then real time automated methods are used.   Here instruments are permanently installed and are often protected from the weather in specially designed shelters out of reach from human touch.  Permanently installed targets are then measured several times an hour, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days of the year.  The survey data is instantly transmitted back to deformation analysis software which detects movement and raises immediate alerts if movement tolerances are exceeded.

Often on larger projects, both optical total station data and GNSS data can be combined for improved results.  Total station technology is excellent at rapidly collecting precise measurements to a large number of targets but can be limited if the line of sight between the instrument and target is broken.  GNSS technology only needs a clear view of the sky of course and can be used to monitor individual points across a larger area and also to provide extra validity of the control points that the total station uses as reference points.

In more complex monitoring projects, such as continuously monitoring buildings whilst tunnels are bored underneath a city, a combination of multiple total stations and GNSS receivers can be used.  Such projects as the new Durchmesserline underground railway in Zurich and the Crossrail project in London are examples of this large scale monitoring solution using hundreds of total stations and GNSS receivers.  As the amount of data being collected and transmitted in these projects is vast, it is imperative that the processing software receiving the data can quickly process and analyse it.

Software solutions such as Trimble 4D Control (4D as in X,Y,Z and time) can rapidly analyse and share this data using open access SQL databases and can also be used to remotely set the total station measuring schedules.  This has the benefit of being able to install the total stations in locations where access isn’t crucial thus also protecting them from theft or damage and improving line of sight to targets.

And if things do go wrong and structures start to move, within seconds the software sends email or text alerts to the specified people ensuring immediate action can be taken.

So the next time I take the family to the beach, perhaps I need to invest in some of this survey technology to give me eyes in the back of my head.  Or maybe I just let the dam burst and get straight to the mint choc chip cone with flake!

BIM – is it just marketing fluff?

30th August 2011

Everyone seems to be talking about BIM so it seemed the perfect topic for my first blog.  BIM, or so I naively thought, was a fairly new concept, with various technological solutions being promoted that would fulfill all our BIM needs.  When I started to research the topic in more detail and discuss it with colleagues in the industry, the overwhelming response I received was that BIM, often under some other term, has been in use for 25 years, or even more.  It was Charles (Chuck) Eastman at Georgia Institute of Technology in the US that first introduced the concept of BIM back in the late 70s. It is not a new concept at all so why all the recent marketing activity and noise about BIM?

Well first of all what does the abbreviation BIM stand for?  According to Wikipedia, BIM or Building Information Modelling is the process of generating and managing building data during its life cycle.  And that’s important; it’s actually a process, not a suite of slick software applications or design drawings. Typically BIM is a 3D representation of a building, made up of individual building components that contain specific information about themselves.  BIM components are intelligent objects and a component in the model may know its location, dimensions, material, manufacturer, fire rating, efficiency rating and carbon footprint.  Introducing time, such as component delivery dates to site, adds a 4D element to BIM and allows 4D sequencing.  This provides a more intuitive interface to test the accuracy of build sequences and helps evaluate interdependencies of components and clash detection.  Add component costs and BIM becomes 5D.

BIM changes the way we work and companies that adopt the process benefit from its streamlined approach and collaboration.  Today contractors face many challenges as project designs are increasingly complex and have more demanding schedules.  Contractors must find ways to increase productivity and reduce or eliminate rework.  Mistakes are costly and can affect multiple trades, delay the start of other tasks and require design changes.  These complex designs come from architects and it’s surprising to find that more often than not the architect’s documents cannot be used for construction.  It’s perhaps a misconception that the architect prepares the documents and gives them to the contractor, and the contractor takes them and builds the building from the information contained therein.  This is seldom the case.  Indeed construction documents are at best adequate but significant additional information is frequently required.  Should Architects be held more responsible for quality documents or is it in fact the client?  Should the client contractually define collaboration approaches for projects to ensure data and information is widely available to all involved?

It seems to be that the multitude of differing ideas about BIM and its usage have hindered the construction industry in developing a strategic approach to how best implement the process,  deliver cost savings and enhance deliverables.  A number of organizations, committees and centres of excellence are attempting to address this such as; buildingSMART, Construction Project Information Committee (CPIC), Construction Opportunities for Mobile IT (COMIT) and the recently launched BIM Academy, it is through this collaborative approach that BIM is gathering momentum.

Collaboration in integrated project delivery requires an environment of trust and respect between clients, architects, designers, structural engineers, building services engineers, manufacturers and contractors.  BIM has the potential to break down the walls of project delivery by merging the roles between designers, contractors and other professions.  This collaborative approach of extensive information sharing increases the ability to alter design due to accurate pre-construction modelling rather than the substantially more costly changes during the construction phase.

So BIM is ideal for design and build projects but with an increasing importance placed on reusing existing buildings and redeveloping brownfield sites BIM can equally be used for this adaptive reuse of buildings. Most existing buildings do not have detailed design or as-built drawings and 3D models but as the need to reuse buildings grows then so does the opportunity for BIM.  Technologies such as laser scanning can produce accurate 3D models very quickly and this as-built data can be introduced into the BIM process for redesign, visualizations and virtual reality walkthroughs.  Other surveying technologies such as the Trimble LM80 Layout Manager running on a pocket sized Windows mobile device, enable contractors (Mechanical, Electrical, Plumbers, Engineers, etc.) to take BIM data into the field and work with live design data ensuring that the latest design is always on site.  As-built data can be wirelessly transferred back to the office providing real time project management tools.  It is this digital technology and move away from paper site plans that will help drive BIM into mainstream use.

As the use of BIM grows then the benefits to the whole industry will become clear.  Those early adopters already embracing the collaborative approach are paving the way for BIM to become the critical tool of the design and construction process as well as a valuable asset for facilities management.   Recent UK government initiatives announced by Paul Morrell, the Government’s Chief Construction Advisor, recommend “fully collaborative BIM  …as a minimum by 2016″. The Strategy Paper from the BIM Industry Working Group indicates that BIM is here to stay, so if we can continue with the marketing ‘fluff’ about BIM then awareness will grow and we should all soon reap the rewards.

*The Strategy Paper for the Government Construction Client Group from the BIM Industry Working Group is available to download.