The report isn’t long, at all. But it is packed with helpfully structured tables and graphics, and three appendices, plus references into 36 key pages, plus extras. For a report focused on managing information it sure does efficiently shoehorn great quantities of detail in compact forms into its pages.
Excellent, not to get lost in. Which is always the danger with reams of information in the real world. And reports.
Why was the report needed?
In the era of spreading digital networks, more powerful software, fantastic computer processing speed and memory, and colossal storage capability, those features of information technology services are making sufficient inroads to the infrastructure asset and construction sectors that they are helping to catalyse generation of far more data. That, in turn, is spawning ways to exchange, stack and store the mountain of information that seems to never stop mushrooming. The ways and means of working with these data hubs and hierarchies of holding are giving rise to new concepts, such as Building Information Modelling (BIM), Digital Twins (DT), and more.
Concept is arguably a reasonable terms for positioning BIM and DT for neither are fully understood or agreed upon. It depends where you are in the supply chain and, even so, ultimately what a client – or your supply chain neighbours – want. What they will pay for. In the short- or long-term. Is digital and data in service of the build alone or is the vision much, much longer, to encompass lifecycle economics, and operations and maintenance, and smart ways to get and pick over the data, digitally. Thoroughly. Quickly. Continuously.
All depends.
Given all that, all that can be pulled together by engineers and managers in their field of endeavour to see how such possibilities with data and digital, with BIM and DT, might be shaping up is worthwhile. And when the report is structured well, for digestion, at speed, then doubly so.
For this report, by Working Group 22 (Information Modelling in Tunnelling) of the International Tunnelling and Underground Space Association (ITA), the stated aim is “to support the adoption of BIM and digital information management processes within the tunnelling and underground construction industry.”
More formally, it is ITA report No28 – ‘Recommendations for the Application of ISO 19650 Series during the Delivery of underground Projects and Assets: Information Management Process and Responsibility Matrix – Vol 1.’
With all the mention of BIM, it should be noted that it is a sister publication, and has a different focus, to ITA Report 27 which has a more specific focus – ‘BIM in Tunnelling: Guideline for Bored Tunnels, Vol 1. While also from the same Working Group and published shortly before, the following report looks more widely across the web of managing information compared to the (mostly) bored tunnel focus of the sister report, which T&T looked at previously (T&T Oct 2022).
CONTENTS
ITA Report 28 – taking a wide look at managing the matrix of information in tunnel projects – begins by setting out terms and definitions of how BIM fits in the ISO 19650 Series standard – which it says is to be used unless national BIM frameworks are in play.
What is the ISO 19650 Series?
It cover service life planning for building and civil engineering assets. It does so in two standards – Part 1: Concepts and Principles; and, Part 2: Delivery Phase of Assets.
Usefully, ITA Report 28 spells these out plus lists and succinctly details a few other relevant standards, such as for project, quality and risk management, respectively.
In further setting the scene, the report also provides a common language for its discourse and presents the terms in three tables. They include such terms as Actor, Appointed Party, Life Cycle, Trigger Event, Asset Information requirements (AIR), Project Information Model (PIM), capability, and so much more.
Then comes the chapters with the graphics, which clearly show much inter-relationships with flow arrows, node trees and circles and boxes. They are well constructed and clear. And most useful, for when the terms involved are discussed they are many, with multiple titles, in columns of text. Even when briefly given they give quite a sense of there being a lot. Hence, the utility and value of the graphics which serve the report well.
One paragraph, though, perhaps needs emphasised more, for it is so fundamental to BIM. It states that: “The Owner or Employer is the only party which is present at all the asset life stages,” and therefore the report recommends that the entity should lead the charge on everything for information management.
It can be, though, in practice, that not all Owners/ Employers are equally or sufficiently knowledgeable, or engaged, or have scale and resource even if recognition and desire exists. At times, this only adds to the puzzle of seeking clarity on what is BIM or DT, and who is in charge – and why so many parties view it all differently.
In Chapter 6, WG22 puts its recommendations for applying the ISO 19650 Series under four headings: typical underground asset life cycle; involved parties; process (answering what, why, who, when, how basics); and, where responsibilities fall (in a matrix).
Working out responsibilities is always so much of a challenge in most endeavours and it is no different here, and so Chapter 6 points to a whole Appendix (No3) to study the aspects of the Responsibility Matrix that is advisedly to be used in working out the cogs and key holders in information management of BIM.
Usefully, too, the appendices also compare and contrast – again in a helpful matrix – how different countries (ITA member nations) approach the stages of information management of BIM, from concept to build in the short-term to handover asap to then operate & maintain for the long-run.
In Appendix 3, diagrams abound, in a visual progression of the stages. They’re good.
The two reports on BIM from ITA’s WG22 should go some way to coalesce points of understanding and allow more industry discussion, and debate on ways forward, to use the powerful new – and accelerating – data and digital technologies more effectively to help develop and run increasing numbers of tunnel projects and underground assets.
