15.03.16
The BIG5 geospatial challenges – building a BIM lighthouse
Source: RTM Feb/Mar 16
Barry Gleeson, survey manager at Network Rail and a member of the Survey4BIM Technical Committee, on the opportunities and challenges of geo-enabling BIM.
Geo-enabling of the internet (i.e. Google Maps, Bing Maps) and smart devices (i.e. smart phones, tablets, sat navs) has taken hold over the last decade. Its impact has been incredible. Uber took something as simple as hailing a taxi, added geo-enabled internet (a live map), and created something which has taken the world by storm. Five years ago it was worth nothing today it is worth £50bn.
Geo-enabling BIM may not have the same potential for an individual company, but its impact on the successful implementation of BIM Level 2 could be very significant. The surveying profession has started to take this responsibility very seriously. This has happened under the auspices of the UK BIM Task Group, Survey4BIM, an open collective of geospatial professionals, which formed in 2014. Its first outputs were client guides on Scanning for BIM and the Digital Plan of Works. Lately, it has been taking a closer look at the pending start for BIM Level 2, to see if it is really geo-enabled. In doing so, it came up with five challenges, the Big5 – a phrase borrowed with pride from the AGI (Association of Geographic Information).
The Big5
The Big5 are:
- Accuracy
- Meta-data
- Interoperability
- Level of Detail
- Generalisation
These challenges are technical, and ones which the geospatial profession has a significant and unique contribution to make to. If BIM does not solve these there is a risk the geospatial industry will not only miss a huge opportunity, but become complicit in watching it hit the rocks. Indeed, the analogy of building a lighthouse to keep BIM off the rocks is a good place to start thinking about what is needed to geo-enable BIM.
The Big5 – Lighthouse
The image (at the top of the page) shows the Big5 challenges as building blocks in a lighthouse that geo-enable BIM Level 2. The benefits of keeping off the rocks are clear: avoid risk, rework, delay, added cost, clash etc. Each of the building blocks has been assessed in three ways:
- What is the maturity of each process in the UK BIM industry context, not just geospatial?
- Where should it be to enable BIM Level 2?
- Where on the BIM Roadmap should this maturity be available?
Using the standard maturity model to show stages rather than levels, we have identified where the Big5 challenges sit now and should be in our view. This assessment applies to processes and organisations. The required stage is not the same for each, nor the optimum. The range of maturity represents the opportunity for each to improve further as BIM evolves through Level 2 and beyond.
Most of the challenges have been assessed as at the initial/chaotic stage of maturity. This is worrying – accepting some firms are individually very mature. The effort needed to bring these up to the standard also varies (accuracy has a long way to go). This is further impacted where they fit on the BIM Roadmap. Some are already overdue as well as behind.
When placed on the BIM Roadmap it can be seen that some of these key enablers should have reached their required maturity long before we reach BIM Level 2. Accuracy as an example should have been quantitatively managed when BIM was conceived. Now the challenge has been assessed, the next step is to see what opportunities the geospatial industry can take up to address them, and which ones should be prioritised.
What next – Call to action
Survey4BIM is launching “a call to action” for the Big5. We believe geo-enabling BIM is a huge opportunity, not only to deliver commercial benefits for clients, businesses and UK plc, but to deliver the social benefits which geo-enabling the internet has brought.
If you are interested in helping take the next step, register your interest at:
www.bimtaskgroup.org/survey4bim
Tell us what you think – have your say below or email [email protected]