Sophisticated Mapping for Increasing Railway Capacity April 17, 2012 Engineering Architecture Design-Build Surveying GeoSpatial Solutions
Workshop Agenda Introductions Corporate Overview Market Drivers LiDAR Technology Review Project Challenges GIS Data Integration Project Benefits LiDAR Eye Candy Presenter Bios / Q & A
Corporate Overview Corporate headquarters: Aurora, Colorado Founded in 1955; employee-owned $115M annual revenue (FY11) ~ 500 employees at 10 national and 3 international offices Market Focus Energy Security Life Sciences Infrastructure Business Units GeoSpatial Solutions Civil Engineering Solutions Military / Gov t Facilities Fuels & Energy Science & Technology Nuclear Services & Technology PREXXXX 3 Copyright 2010 Merrick & Company All rights reserved.
Merrick s Office Locations Aurora, CO (Headquarters) Colorado Springs, CO Los Alamos, NM Albuquerque, NM Ottawa, Canada Washington, DC Charlotte, NC Oak Ridge, TN Duluth, GA Atlanta, GA San Antonio, TX Guadalajara, Mexico (MAPA) Mexico City, Mexico (MAPA) PREXXXX 4 Copyright 2010 Merrick & Company All rights reserved.
Market Drivers Significant increase (50%) in Class I carloads over the past two decades; intermodal traffic (rail, ship, truck) has more than doubled in the same period Rail transport has become more fuel efficient over the last decade; overall rail is the most environmentally friendly form of freight transport Railroad freight transport becoming more appealing with increased energy costs and current (+ future!) clean air and water initiatives
Market Drivers With the increasing rail traffic, railroad companies are under more pressure to increase rail capacities within their corridors Case Study: Barstow-to-Oakland route (BNSF Railway Co.) Railway planning phase for significant improvements requires high-precision, sophisticated map products to accurately describe rail network and facilities
Solution Project completed using a combination of advanced airborne and ground-based geospatial technologies: Airborne Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) Digital Orthophotography Ground Surveying GIS Application Development
What is LiDAR? LiDAR (Light detection and ranging) is an active optical technology that uses pulses of laser light to strike the surface of the earth and measure the time of each pulse return to derive an accurate elevation. Airborne LiDAR data acquisition system includes: LiDAR sensor Digital camera(s) Airborne GPS IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit) Power Supply / Data Storage Pilot / Flight Operator
LiDAR Acquisition Platforms
LiDAR Platform - Benefits Airborne Fixed Wing Ideal for large, contiguous areas with low ground sample distance (GSD); 1 8 points per square meter Supports simultaneous collection of LiDAR & digital imagery Airborne Helicopter Well-suited for narrow corridors (ex. utility, transportation) and small area, high-density collections; 10 1,000+ points per square meter Ideal for high precision mapping required for additional corridor tracks, highway lane widening, and utility corridor construction Mobile High GSD with survey grade accuracy Ideal for complex railroad environments
Data Differences Higher LiDAR Density Fixed Wing LiDAR Example Approx. 1-2 points / square meter Helicopter LiDAR Example Approx. 20-30 points / square meter
Flight Efficiencies Powerline project flown by Merrick s Cessna 402C; 24 miles in length; 0.5 meter GSD Fixed Wing Results: Turn Radius: 4 7 miles Turn Length: 9 20 miles Turn Time: 4 8 minutes each Flight Time Over target = 0.5 hours (15%) Flight Turns = 1.8 hours (59%) Flight Taxi = 0.8 hours (26%) TOTAL = 3.1 hours Helicopter Results: Flight Time: 20 minutes each 9x savings in flight time (over fixed wing) Flight Time Over target = 0.2 hours (61%) Flight Turns = 0.1 hours (30%) Flight Taxi = 0.03 hours (9%) TOTAL = 0.34 hours
Project Challenges Base Station Placement Proper placement of GPS base stations required within the long, thin ROW to maintain accuracy of the LiDAR data Changing Zones Railroad corridor passes through three California state plane zones and requires 15 modification factors within the state plane zones
Ground Survey Support Base Stations To achieve the required one-foot contour interval in the final mapping products, the aircraft should never fly more than 25 miles from a GPS base station To optimize data accuracy, a 15 mile limit was set for the BNSF project, thus, base stations would have to be set-up about 30 miles apart along the ROW corridor Per day, six (6) GPS base stations need to be placed so the aircraft could cover significant area per flight
Ground Survey Support Thinking ahead to GPS-based machine grading during construction, the client requested to have base station validation points set every mile within the ROW corridor At every fifth mile, crews drove 7 foot stainless steel rods into the ground near the railroad track Each mile in between was marked with a 2 foot length of #5 rebar Both rods were topped with 2 inch aluminum caps bearing the control point number
Modification Factors 15 modification factors required to support moving from state plane projection to ground coordinates without introducing error in the process The 453 mile ROW corridor was divided into 24 segments determined by combined factors that would yield less than one-tenth of a foot error along its entire length
GIS Data Integration Utilizing the high-precision LiDAR data and orthophotography, Merrick delivered highly accurate planimetric basemap features in compatible formats for ESRI ArcGIS and Microstation hardware platforms Modified Projection Files were established for each of the 24 ROW corridor segments Customized ESRI ArcReader viewer application developed to support client s internal needs Merrick provided application training to BNSF personnel; user feedback helped refine functionality of application
GIS Data Viewer
GIS Data Viewer
GIS Data Viewer
GIS Data Viewer
Project Benefits to BNSF Optimized Route Design and Selection Railway Modeling (congestion points) Proactive positioning to expedite engineering design Enhanced project estimation capabilities All project data available from external hard drive for on-call and pre-qualified consultants Participating End-users: BNSF Engineering / Public Projects / Environmental CA Div. of Rail, CA High Speed Rail, Amtrak Engineering Consultants (Design, Environmental)
LiDAR in Railroad Corridor
3D View of LiDAR in Railroad Corridor
Railroad Corridor LiDAR Data Rendering
Advanced Data Modeling
Railroad Corridor Breakline Compilation Stream Water Feature Stream defined by breakline; contour display Stream displayed in orthophoto
Railroad Corridor Grade Analysis Profile View of LiDAR
Railroad Corridor Bridge Feature View of Bridge Profile Oblique View of Bridge
Presenter Bio Bill Emison Senior Account Mgr. / MARS Product Mgr. (GeoSpatial Solutions) Professional experience includes solutions consulting, software / service sales and technical marketing B.S., Business Administration, University of Louisville, (Louisville, Kentucky) M.S., City Planning (GIS), Georgia Institute of Technology, (Atlanta, Georgia) E-mail: bill.emison@merrick.com Direct: (303) 353-3634 Twitter : @Merrick_Geo
Presenter Bio Troy Kelts Project Engineer, Civil Engineering Solutions (CES) Focused on public and private infrastructure projects Registered Professional Engineer (PE) in Colorado, Louisiana, and Alaska B.S., Civil Engineering, Michigan State University, (East Lansing, Michigan) E-mail: troy.kelts@merrick.com Direct: (303) 353-3926