Bentley Year in Infrastructure Kicks Off in London

Bentley Year in Infrastructure 2013 kicked off Monday in London with a series of keynotes. Antony Oliver, former editor of New Civil Engineer in the UK, who is moving into the role of ACE consultant, remarked that “London is the home of infrastructure right now,” and there is a lot going on above and below ground, with Crossrail and Network Rail and other large transportation projects that the UK views as an exemplar of how public transportation will develop in the future. I learned in another conversation that the teams who worked on one were moving over to and from Crossrail after their stint was finished, bringing their incredible knowledge base with them.

The Olympic Games was in London last year, which set a benchmark for what could be delivered in tight times and on budget. A number of big building projects are also in the works, 18 billion pounds of private money spent on infrastructure since privatization. Malcolm Walter, Bentley COO, reinforced Oliver’s message by noting that there are more cranes in London now than in Beijing. Beijing wants to be the next London. He mentioned that the countries with the most BE nominations this year are India, U.S., Australia and China.

Offshore was a topic that came up, because the project teams are almost always “virtual and complex.” Because it is offshore it has to be built somewhere on shore and constructed in a modular format, then floated to its final destination. The use of simulation for these types of environments is critical since onshore resources are beginning to become exhausted. Bentley announced a product called MOSES for the design of floating platforms.

CEO Greg Bentley noted that last year we had no speakers from the Olympics because Bentley Systems was a sponsor while it was going on, and they weren’t allowed to discuss it. On Wednesday morning, a keynote featuring Sir John Armitt, chairman, National Express & Former Chairman of the Olympic Delivery Authority, London 2012 will be presented. Bentley also said that although “Asset Anchor” is not a product yet, Crossrail has had an asset registry from the beginning of the project, and is now getting as-built 3D models from its contractors. This is the first time a project linking between 3D models and collaborative BIM. Hybrid modeling is also being used by Network Rail, bringing together point clouds, 3D modeling and BIM to view a safe representation. Optioneering was discussed as a way to generate more scenarios, with SiteOps Optimization Technology, a company Bentley is the primary investor in, providing a simulation environment where you can upload your site characteristics and it works out of your site. They can substantiate an average of $15,000 savings per acre.

Bentley’s new mobile apps, including Field Supervisor App, Navigator App,  move operations from the trailer to the field. I-Models, Bentley’s containers for deliverables for information mobility, have been optimized for mobile devices. eB Information Manager tracks changes among information elements that are found in i-models. A new product is Construction Work Package Server which will help with tracking before a design is completed. Bentley CONNECT will reach all field devices and apps, within projects, for enterprises across projects, and for performance dashboards. Bhupinder Singh, senior vice president, talked about Bentley CONNECT, ProjectWise and LEARN Services. All of these services and technologies will be discussed at length over the next few days at the conference.

Tags: AEC, Bentley Systems, Bentley Year in Infrastructure, BIM, Crossrail, London, Olympic Games

Categories: AEC, architecture, Bentley Systems, BIM, building information modeling, Cloud, construction, engineering

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