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Case Study- ARTC MLS Interstate Network

Agonics delivers digital twin and updated asset inventory across 9,000 Km of Interstate Freight Network

CLIENT

ARTC

LOCATION

Adelaide, Australia

Challenge

The Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC) manages and maintains the interstate freight network across 5 Australian states.


To support ARTC’s new direction of moving to a “time and tonnes” to a “risk and condition” model to underpin strategic technology investments, ARTC needed to create and leverage foundational spatial datasets for its asset management systems and to support the design and implementation of new technologies on its network.

To obtain these foundational datasets ARTC needed a partner experienced in data acquisition at scale on railways networks and which could efficiently process dataset in order to meet internal ARTC project deadlines.

With a strong track record in large scale mapping on rail networks Agonics was selected to partner with ARTC to help design, plan and execute a survey program covering 9,000km of interstate track.
With such a large network to record and high volumes of data to collect, process and analyse, the project required careful planning to ensure that the desired outcomes would be met.

Solution

The agreed approach with ARTC was to record LiDAR, 10 metre spaced 360-degree digital imagery, GPS & IMU data across the interstate freight network using an integrated MLS solution deployed on an ARTC owned hyrail vehicle.


The AIMS3D MLS solution integrates LiDAR, panoramic imagery and inertial systems into a single solution for rail asset capture.


The project required close collaboration between the project teams to design a
recording program that combined the local network knowledge at ARTC with the
extensive experience of the Agonics team and that would be low impact to ARTC operations. In this way valuable train paths and safeworking resources could be preserved for ARTC operations.

Upon completion of field capture all data was backed up onto AWS secure storage hosted in Sydney. After post-processing by the Agonics team, the imagery and LiDAR datasets were combined with proven asset extraction workflows to create an extensive, validated asset inventory as well as matching reports on
existing Ellipse asset data.


Using the power of cloud computing the LiDAR datasets were analysed using the industry leading Agonics XERRA platform to efficiently deliver encroachment reports across the interstate freight network reducing the need for manual clearance measurements.


Final deliverables included asset geodatabases, track centrelines, DEMs, LAS tiles, panoramic digital imagery and survey accuracy reports.

Outcome

  • The close collaboration between ARTC and Agonics ensured that a smooth and efficient recording program could be achieved across what is Australia’s largest railway network.

  • Proven project work flows ensured that final deliverables could be supplied to ARTC in line with tight internal project deadlines and to a high standard of accuracy. Furthermore, existing legacy datasets e.g. Ellipse asset data could be preserved for the business.
  •  Key strategic projects at ARTC including the Electronic Track Access (eTAp) and the Advanced Train Management System (ATMS) benefitted from the project’s digital datasets.

  •  It is estimated that in NSW Interstate Network alone more than 6,000 fewer man-hours will be spent in the danger zone performing manual clearance measurements.