Credit: 4057915 © Ralf Broskvar | Dreamstime.com
Company-X has enhanced a national transport quality assurance tool to help improve decision-making across the sector and is helping councils migrate to a new Asset Management Data Standard (AMDS).
The Waikato-based software specialist has added a Traffic Count Estimation (TCE) module to Transport Insights.
Company-X designed and developed the TCE module for use by Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency and city and district councils, on behalf of the Te Ringa Maimoa Transport Excellence Partnership.
Traffic estimation plays a key role in various aspects of roading network management and planning. Where previously Road Controlling Authorities (RCAS) user manual and labour-intensive processes, the TCE module removes manual analysis for more consistent results.
“If I had to put an amount of time saved by using the tool, I would say it was in the two-to-three-month realm,” said Waka Kotahi road asset information specialist Simon Chu.
“Taking the process away from a manual to a more automated process means there’s a much lower chance of errors.”
The module is based on the Traffic Monitoring Estimation Best Practice Guidelines published by the Institute of Public Works Engineers Australia NZ (IPWEA NZ) Roading Infrastructure Management Support (RIMS) special interest group.
Company-X is also working with Waka Kotahi to help councils migrate to the new AMDS.
Without a national data standard, Waka Kotahi and 68 RCAs, including the Department of Conservation, have an inconsistent approach to data capture and definition across the transport sector.
AMDS enforces a tighter level of control on data that is loosely defined. The tightening of constraints means those datasets need updating to comply with the standard, leading to more consistent use across the roading sector.
Company-X worked with the AMDS Programme at Waka Kotahi to help define the standard, providing critical advice to ensure the standard was implementable at Waka Kotahi and the 68 RCAs.
Company-X was also intimately involved in prototype migrations and resolved issues which fed back into changes to the standard.
Data standards are documented agreements on the representation, format, definition, structuring, tagging, transmission, manipulation, use, and management of data.
“AMDS is starting to have a real impact on how we are thinking and working,” said Wellington City Council team leader data analysts Pamela Brown.
“We are preparing for the implementation into our database and already planning how it will enable us into digital engineering.”
Te Ringa Maimoa, formerly the Road Efficiency Group, is a joint initiative between Local Government of New Zealand and Waka Kotahi. It has partnered with Company-X since 2015.
Another recent project under the partnership was the launch of the Asset Management Competency Framework (AMCF) - a survey and report portal to help transport sector professionals begin a unique personal development journey.
The AMCF allows the transport sector to ensure it has the right teams of appropriately skilled and experienced people to plan for and deliver great service under extraordinary pressures, particularly under the transport sector’s public mandate to manage activities and assets appropriately.
