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Ground Penetrating Radar Systems recently launched a mobile app for SiteMap, its cloud platform that can bring together GIS and BIM project data in a single workflow. It is already being used by field staff who need updates on all excavation activities at a $389 million hospital expansion in northern Illinois.
Power Construction is the general contractor for Northwestern Medicine’s 290,000-square-foot hospital expansion. Having project data in hand is helping the project, says Bryant Drechsel, Power’s site safety coordinator.
“You can be in the field, draw, take whatever you need at that moment,” he explains. “Being able to click on a line and say ‘How far is this line of communication?’ It’s between 3 and 4 feet.’ Guys might say “Oh yeah, 3 to 4 feet, so it’s probably 2 feet.” Then they dig in and it’s exactly 3 feet, 6 inches.”
Available through the Apple App Store for iOS or the Google Play Store for Android devices, SiteMap has both a GIS viewer for displaying project data on a map and a room for uploading digital plans 2D plans, 3D model information and other construction information. As in the desktop version of the application, design information can be referenced from geolocated points in the SiteMap GIS viewer. Users can view files in a directory or as lines and points on a map.
When scanning the site, the GPRS crew had to figure out the location of old and abandoned utility lines on the 160-acre property in suburban Chicago. GPRS is capable of handling all location updates as trades complete their work.
“We draw a geofence boundary basically around the area and any subcontractors that work in that area, we update it for them, and everything that their subcontractors and self-execution have done is immediately updated in the system,” he says Michael Trump. business development manager for Illinois and Wisconsin for GPRS.
Drechsel said Power has been able to reference previous scans that GPRS performed for the contractor and the company has been able to use those maps. The site map has also become a planning tool.
“We actually take our drawings that we have for the planned work and GPRS can overlay that with their locations,” says Drechsel. “We can see ahead of time where this is going with the localization they found with our drawings.”
Drechsel cites how Power had to divert the sanitary line from the site because it was going to be directly in line with a natural gas line and they were able to act on the information from the application. “It’s not just that ‘these are the [locations].’ You can use them for the project,” says Drechsel.
