Building a Spatial Project Dashboard with FME

We recently heard from Wes Hardin and James Katz from Burns & McDonnell — an international engineering, architecture and consulting solutions firm — about an innovative tool they’ve developed to deliver access to critical data in near real-time for large-scale construction projects.

Burns & McDonnell’s clients include organizations working on billion dollar+ construction projects in a wide range of industries including energy, transmission and distribution and transportation. These organizations often need to provide project managers, field inspectors, construction superintendents and public relations specialists with access to up-to-date project-related data. In response to this need, the firm’s Business & Technology Services division developed OneTouchPM™, a spatial project dashboard that organizes all the information related to a project so it is can be easily accessed anytime, anywhere.

OneTouchPM was developed by using FME to first integrate data from over eight different formats — including 3D data — into Google Earth Enterprise™. The Google Earth Enterprise platform allows for custom worlds to be built for each individual client so the data is as relevant and accurate as possible. The solution also employs FME Server to manage translations and serve up real-time ad-hoc reports to end users.

End users can use the tool to conduct a spatial search to access up-to-date information, usually no more than one minute old, to help them manage their particular role in the project. It’s as simple as searching the area, locating the parcel of interest and bringing up all the information associated with that parcel. From there, the user can click on the embedded hyper-link to access the information they need.

OneTouchPM has proven to be a valuable tool for Burns & McDonnell’s clients. The tool has helped to eliminate the need for paper-based methods of sharing data, as well as to enable better decision-making and virtually eliminate many errors on the job site. This has translated into significant cost reductions, increases in field productivity and decreases in customer calls.

For more details on how the OneTouchPM tool works, check out Wes and James’ presentation at the FME International User Conference: www.fmeuc.com/BurnsMcDonnell.