Third Party Utility data ... your approach

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I am pulling together a project in Thames to look at the way we represent third party network data (Gas, Electric, telecom etc.) on our systems (GIS and Mobile GIS). Traditionally we have received vast numbers of raster images from various parties of various quality and 'published' these to GIS users. This is quite an onerous task, and fraught with data quality and currency issues.

I know there are commercial services (Dial Before you Dig/National One call etc.), but are these cost effective and can they deliver within the demands of reactive work.

Also, some utilities have their own website with redacted network data (& functionality).

How do we overcome the fact that connectivity can be an issue in 'Urban Canyons' in London for field users trying to download such data.

So, I was wondering how others within the group approach this? Do you face the same issue? If so how has it been solved in your company.

In appreciation of your response.

Lawrence

 

2 Replies

Yes we face the same issues. ...

Yes we face the same issues. We used to provide a web feed of gas, electric and telecoms from links provided by each source utility on our corporate web map. It wasn't integrated with our GIS but was a start and useful. However 3rd party utilities change their approach or upgrade their systems leaving us with plugins that weren't compatible or not providing web feeds any longer. When much of our in-house operation was outsourced to contractors we stopped providing directly. So now like South Staffs, their admin teams lookup the plans themselves and attach them to job sheets. Its not a great system.

Published by Andrew Pennington, South West Water - Asset Data Development Team Manager

Within South Staffs, we don't ...

Within South Staffs, we don't hold other utility data within our own GIS. However, our direct services teams have the ability to access gas and electric plans from their field system. For gas plans, they use a viewing application provided by the Gas company with the data being updated on a quarterly basis. For electricity plans, they access the electric company's web service direct, sending a request for a plan that gets e-mailed back to their field devices. Desktop PCs at the reporting centres are also set up and available for use by them or their management team. We have had some issues around connectivity, but most of these have been overcome by 'encouraging' the teams to request all the plans they need at the start of their day (i.e. before leave for their 1st job). at the end of the day (for the following day's work), particularly if they have jobs in known connection blackspots. Our Direct teams have visibility of 2 days' worth of work. For any emergency jobs that come through during the day, then generally they should be able to get access at some point whilst travelling to the site - urban canyons are less of an issue for us. In terms of our contractors, they don't use field systems so their admin teams generate the gas and electric plans (using same facilities as our Direct services teams) and attach them to the worksheets. Hope this helps.

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