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Network Rail Uses Point Clouds and Scalable Terrain Models

Network Rail Uses Point Clouds and Scalable Terrain Models
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Network Rail Uses Point Clouds and Scalable Terrain Models - 1

CASE STUDY Project Summary Organization: Network Rail Solution: Rail Point Clouds and Scalable Terrain Models Support Network Rail’s Great Western Rail Electrification Programme Location: United Kingdom Bentley Descartes Enables Project Teams to Comply with BS 1192, and Provides Cost-saving Tools to Leverage Point-cloud Data in Engineering Projects Project Objective: • Design overhead line equipment for 1,000 kilometers of single-track railway in western United Kingdom Scalable 3D Model Allows Collaborative Designs and Live Asset Management • Create a 3D model of the entire project by combining survey data and design models • Use the model to provide context to assess designs provided by engineering contractors, support signal sighting and driver training, create 4D simulations for construction for vegetation management, and lastly as a live asset management model Products used: Bentley Descartes Bentley Navigator Bentley Rail Track Bentley i-model Composition Server MicroStation ProjectWise Fast Facts • etwork Rail used Bentley Descartes N to create a hybrid 3D model of the entire project by combining survey and engineering data. • Survey data includes 950 routewide point clouds (+/-50 millimeter accuracy, 60 points per meter density), and close to 30,000 images (5 centimeter resolution). Images stored in ECW format and managed with ProjectWise. ROI • scalable terrain model 250 A miles in extent was created in one week, as opposed to 25 miles of traditional digital terrain model that would usually be created in the same time. Bentley Descartes allowed the scalable terrain model to be created 10 times faster. • Tunnel modeling was improved by a factor of three with a tunnel 1 mile and 152 yards long being modeled in one to two days with Bentley Descartes against one week with a standard CAD tool. The Great Western Electrification Programme represents an investment of GBP 1.5 billion that will allow faster, quieter travel, with increased seating capacity, and improved reliability on one of the United Kingdom’s oldest and busiest railways. This program will enhance the railway line between London and Oxford, Newbury, Bristol and Cardiff. With a project of such scope, owner-operator Network Rail needed a way to incorporate enormous amounts of survey data with design models from multiple consultants, to aid efficient project collaboration and streamline interactions between designers and contractors. In addition, to encourage efficient data collaboration and increase productivity, Network Rail followed the BS 1192 code of practice for the collaborative production of architectural, engineering and construction information. Network Rail used Bentley Descartes to merge point clouds, scalable digital terrain models, and raster files with the consultants’ design models to create a scalable 3D model. Using Bentley Descartes provided Network Rail with a complete view of the entire project, enabled efficient design review and effective team collaboration, and allowed the organization to meet BIM criteria included in BS 1192. When construction is complete, Network Rail will then be able to use the 3D model to support its asset management program. Bentley Descartes Combines Scalable Terrain Models, Point Clouds, and CAD files Among this project’s many requirements is the need to assess, retrofit, or construct significant amounts of infrastructure, including 1,000 kilometers of single-track, 12,000 steel piles and 4,000 reinforced concrete foundations, and 164 structures that require gauge clearance analysis – including bridge interventions, lowering of track, canopy cuts, and more. Managing such a project requires efficient collaboration between Network Rail and the organization’s many business partners and subcontractors. Using Bentley Descartes, Network Rail has established a scalable 3D model as the geo-coordination platform to aggregate the as-constructed and design information, including scalable terrain models, orthoimages, Bentley i-models (containers for open infrastructure information exchange), and DGN files. The model is used to streamline the interaction between design consultants and contractors by enabling the coordination in a 3D environment of all the designs from design consultants. This scalable 3D model also supports design review by providing efficient 3D visualization of the designs, including all engineering intelligence. The individual design models created in industry-specific design applications, including Bentley Rail Track, are available when reviewing and navigating the entire 3D model in Bentley Descartes. By combining a large terrain model draped with thousands of orthoimages, point clouds acquired by helicopter, and designs provided in the DGN format and i-models – which Bentley Descartes supports natively – the scalable 3D model provides a unique environment to enable collaborative review, condition assessment, and construction simulation together with 4D animations. But the value of the 3D model goes beyond the design and construction phases, to support Network Rail’s longer-term asset management program by providing a live 3D map that indexes and references asset documentation. As a long-time user of Bentley software, Network Rail uses ProjectWise as its engineering information management platform to enable team collaboration and data exchange in a secure environment among all partners and stakeholders. John Nolan, CAD manager at Network Rail explained: “We have been early adopters of Bentley Descartes V8i (SELECTseries 4) and this new release provided us with exactly what we needed. The software’s ability to create scalable terrain models now allows us to create and manage terrain models with hundreds of millions of points. With its fast scalable terrain model manipulation and very powerful modeling tools, Bentley Descartes allows us to integrate point clouds and engineering data into intelligent hybrid models.”

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