Digital pen technology streamlines paperwork for civil and environmental engineering inspections and project management.
|
Civil and environmental engineering firms face increasing pressure to provide high-quality work, competitive bids, and efficiency while meeting strict compliance requirements. And, timely and complete access to data collected at project sites is an important part of managing these competing priorities.
|
However, much of the operational data for inspections, site surveys, and project tracking is still recorded by hand on printed forms, maps, and CAD designs. While it’s easy to get data on paper, getting actionable data off paper slows processes and creates risk. Many of these workflows have resisted data collection with laptops and PDAs because of the highly mobile nature of the work and the challenges of complex equipment, training, and support.
Engineering leaders, such as HNTB, MACTEC, and others, are using emerging software solutions for digital pens to streamline data collection for inspections and project management.
Problems with paper-based data
In many cases, data collected on paper creates an administrative burden. Completed forms and marked-up maps and CAD designs usually need to make it back to the job site trailer or central offices. Depending on the workflow, data is either scanned or manually entered back into project-tracking software for analysis, sharing, or archiving.
Data entry has both real costs and opportunity costs for the engineering firm. The data entry task occasionally falls on administrative staff, but it often falls on the shoulders of the highly trained engineers who collect or analyze the information. In these cases, rather than inspecting and assessing structures and projects, the professionals are taken away from their core tasks to spend hours doing paperwork.
Data entry also leads to delays between data collection and action. The delay in getting information uploaded leads to delayed visibility of issues. Poor visibility and unrecognized issues lead to project risk, rework, and inefficiencies. In addition, data collection on paper also involves risk because of lost or misplaced documents, which can create compliance risk and liability in the case of disputes with regulators, customers, subcontractors, or other stakeholders. Even a document loss rate of 1/10th of a percent can create serious risk when thousands of documents are collected in the field relating to environmental or structural inspections, health and safety compliance, or documenting issues attributable to other stakeholders.
Many teams have explored deploying mobile computers to field engineering teams because they are fixtures for project management, data tracking, design, and analysis in project trailers and offices of most firms. However, for highly mobile engineers doing inspections, mobile computers can be cumbersome to carry around because of weight or limited battery life. Engineering environments can also be challenging for fragile computers — whether because of the rough nature of project sites or environmental factors such as sunlight and rain that can make it difficult to see information on computer screens.
For teams collecting data on large CAD drawings or GIS maps, the keyhole view for a single document can make it difficult to see the big picture and navigate among maps and drawings. This assumes, of course, that the teams are trained not only on PC use, but also the CAD and GIS applications, which can be complex.
Data-collection options
Digital pens enable field teams to collect data on paper as they always have, while also instantly scanning and digitizing the data, which gets stored on the pen. Data can then be shared with central offices immediately through a cell phone connection or later when the pen is returned to the office.
The underlying digital pen technology is mature and has been around for years. However, companies such as Adapx have finally made this technology viable for engineering firms. Its software solution, Capturx, enables engineering firms to print their own CAD drawings, maps, and forms that can be used with digital pens to collect data automatically and integrat it directly into Office, ArcGIS, and PDF files from CAD systems.
Bridge inspections with digital pens
Even before the tragic I-35W Bridge collapse in 2007, National Bridge Inspection Standards (NBIS) were being revised by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). Revised standards took effect in 2005, in part, to deal with regulation ambiguities and to incorporate advances in inspection practices. The standards include details on inspector qualifications, inspection frequency, quality control/quality assurance (QC/QA), and follow-up procedures for critical findings.
A QC/QA process is underway as part of the Missouri Department of Transportation’s Safe and Sound Bridge program to improve more than 800 of the state’s most worn-out bridges by the end of 2013. While the current program is ambitious, it’s also a scaled back plan from the original design-build-finance-maintain project that became unaffordable in the aftermath of the nation’s financial market meltdown in 2008.
Given the large scope of work, the ambitious schedule, and cost concerns, there is a strong focus on quality and efficiency. A typical bridge inspection involves 60 inspector hours, reflecting a six-man team working 10 hours on and around the structure. After completing data collection, teams typically spend as much as 120 hours entering data for the QC/QA process for each bridge.
Using the Capturx software solution for digital pens to minimize data entry by integrating the data directly into Microsoft Office, for example, has a significant impact on cost and time savings. Just cutting the data entry process to a quarter would enable inspectors to double their inspections.
Inspectors can now simply fill out forms — on normal paper or waterproof paper — using Capturx digital pens that instantly record and store the handwriting. When the data is sent back — either through a cell phone or through a direct connection between the pen and a PC — the original handwriting and converted data are automatically uploaded into Microsoft Office.
|
Another team from an engineering firm was exploring using digital pens as a more efficient alternative to scanning large-format design redlines. In this case, the team had just completed a large design project involving six regional offices. As is common in many engineering projects, they printed out a large number of tabloid-size PDF files generated from CAD systems, marked them up in the field with red pens, scanned the documents, and e-mailed them back to the office for design review and updates. The design team then reviewed and edited the designs and e-mailed them back to the field teams. The total cost for outsourced scanning alone for this project was $9,000.
Now the team can simply print those tabloid-sized CAD prints from PDF files and mark them up with digital pens. All the red-line markups are instantly recorded on the digital pens, showing author, date, and time. When the data is sent back from remote offices or from the field using cell phones, all the red-line markups are automatically integrated into the original CAD PDF files for immediate sharing and review. The team not only can save thousands of dollars by eliminating scanning, but also gets immediate access to markups to keep projects on track and minimize risk from missing documents.
Engineering firms are working with software for digital pens to help streamline paperwork for a broad range of field and site inspections that have resisted automation with PCs in the past. In addition to the examples above for structural inspections and environmental project tracking, teams are automating paper form processes for safety reports and time sheets. The common thread is teams working with paper but needing digital access to either scanned paper, structured data tables, or immediate access to sketches and signatures. For these applications, software for digital pens has emerged as a compelling option.
Ken Schneider is CEO at Adapx (www.adapx.com).