Open Data from Land, Sea and Space: What we learnt from #tbim2018 Summer Conference

The title tried to convey the theme we were sharing but it’s always hard to try and sum up the afternoon – so much great and interesting stuff always happens at thinkBIM. In particular the task to sum up the conference feels even harder to do after the great speakers our Conference sponsors, GroupBC, secured for the event.

But first we opened with our now standard spot of ‘Digital News’. Even though our conferences are only three months apart there is always a load of new reports, documents or updates to share with our delegates. This last quarter has been no exception.

The first update was a sobering one, particularly as our conference took place on the eve of the first anniversary of the terrible Grenfell fire. The resulting Independent Review of Building Regulations and Fire Safety was led by Dame Judith Hackitt. The report, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/independent-review-of-building-regulations-and-fire-safety-final-report published in May 2018, examines building and fire safety regulations and related compliance and enforcement. It sets out over 50 recommendations for government as to how to deliver a more robust regulatory system for the future.

The report advocates clients, designers and contractors make applied use of

• Building Information Modelling
• Robust Information Management
• Consistent digital records from inception to handover to Operation & Maintenance

The next update shared was the expected publication of the first of the suite of ISO19650 standards – the international standards for BIM based around the BS and PAS 1192 suite of documents. BS 1192:2007 and PAS 1192-2 are expected later this year with PAS 1192-3 and PAS 1192-5 due in 2020.

Then came the latest BIM Reports that have been published.

• PWC Report – BIM Level 2 Benefits Measurement https://www.cdbb.cam.ac.uk/BIMLevels/BBM
• Centre for Digital Built Britain (CDBB) – L2C Programme https://www.cdbb.cam.ac.uk/BIMLevels/BIML2c?platform=hootsuite
• UK BIM Alliance PDT Working group – Meeting 2 http://www.ukbimalliance.org/news-and-events/articles/ukbim-alliance-product-data-working-group-meeting-2-interim-report/
• UK BIM Alliance – The constructing plain language pledge http://www.ukbimalliance.org/news-and-events/articles/uk-bim-alliance-publish-constructing-plain-language-charter/

As an aside it was good to see the Plain Language Pledge getting immediately adopted by the rest of our speakers – everything explained clearly for the delegates.

Our first keynote was from Trevor Mossop, Technical Manager at JT Mackley & Co Ltd and a GroupBC customer. Trevor showed precisely why businesses need to adopt and use Common Data Environments. Through their use of Business Collaborator Mackleys have been able to geo-locate project data for their projects and borehole data from the EA as well as overlay utilities information to help them improve site safety. It was great to see how numerous structured data sets can be brought together to help their business work more safely and effectively. There is more information on this on the thinkBIM guest blog from Trevor also published here.

Our next keynote was from Karen Alford, FCRM Manager – Digital Data and Information at the Environment Agency. After Trevor’s great presentation it was really good to have Karen back at thinkBIM to provide the client side and wider view of the Environment Agency.

One of many things that the EA have been doing since Karen last spoke at thinkBIM I making their data sets open. This is great news for everyone and shows how Government departments and agencies can really assist in making the step to digital adoption very small. As ever Karen is keen to keep pushing the Environment Agency and also shared their list of current DADI Projects (Digital Asset Data and Information) as well as their roadmap to 2021 showing their next steps in even greater digital adoption.

After our round table sessions we were all treated to an amazing presentation from Sakthy Sulvakumanan around her PhD research on Monitoring minute movements of infrastructure assets from space. It turns out that there are Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) satellites orbiting the earth that can accurately measure the movements of structures, to within millimetres per year, with measurements taken at regular intervals. Sakthy started by sharing some amazing satellite images of cities where tunnelling works have had a few millimetres effect on buildings before focussing on the more complex interpretation of bridge movement, with the help of some bright steel pyramids fixed to these structures. It was a fascinating presentation and again showed how bringing together various data sets can really add value. For more information on Sakthy’s research we recommend you view her TEDx Newnham talk here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4tEQ79eWU8

thinkBIM’s summer conference was a great success – again. This is in no small part to the well-oiled machine that is the awesome events team of Liz and Donna at Leeds Beckett University as well as the fantastic support we get from our hosts Squire Patton Boggs, and in particular Lauren Guest

You can see more of the conversation by checking the Twitter feed on #tbim2018

NEXT EVENT

Our next event will be taking place at the National College of High Speed Rail in Doncaster on Wednesday 19th September and will feature presentations from Clair Mowbray (Chief Executive of National College for High Speed Rail), Rob Jackson (Bond Bryan Digital – architects for the NCHSR scheme) and Richard Osbond (Director at Curtins Consult).  Details can be found by clicking the image below or by clicking here.