To stimulate the economic development of Kunming City and the surrounding region, Yunnan Yunling Engineering Cost Consultation (YYECC) was charged to create a rapid transportation system in the city’s southeastern section
Part of a larger urban revitalisation project worth RMB 90bn, this RMB 9.914bn project included a total construction mileage of 65.48 kilometres, consisting of roads, bridges, tunnels, and urban underground pipe corridors. As the BIM management organization, YYECC was responsible for coordinating industrialised and automated processes for data transfer and sharing through a connected data environment leveraging Bentley Systems’ ProjectWise.
Leveraging a CDE based on the collaboration and management capabilities of ProjectWise, combined with the engineering and design capabilities of other Bentley applications, YYECC developed a comprehensive and owner-supported BIM methodology. The process was designed to ensure that information was shared, but it also established the digital DNA required for future decision making by the owner-operator. Because this project will run for 20 years, and include more than 25 different participating organizations, a robust BIM process that is supported by enabling technology is paramount to success.
LumenRT’s visualisation capabilities enhanced the appearance of the model and allowed the team to share simulations with the executors and directors of the project so that they could better understand the progress of construction. The process improved visualisation efficiency by 70%.
Additionally, YYECC organised and supported the creation of a sophisticated digital twin model of the project, covering the entire 20-square-kilometre project area. This process resulted in a 90% coverage of the entire project area, with 3,650 design and test drawings, plus management of process standards, cost information, and project supervision data numbering in the hundreds of copies.
Through its robust use of BIM methodologies to industrialise the project execution and delivery, YYECC has achieved significant ROI. Where in previous projects, four full-time employees were required for managing approvals of cost submittals, only one person is now required to accomplish the same scope.
Additional benefits included reducing the review and approval process from one week to one hour, lowering the deficiency of acquired early-stage materials by 40%, improving information quality on site by over 30%, enhancing design efficiency by 25%, and reducing design drawing errors by 60%. These tremendous benefits were recognised by the government as well, which has issued numerous citations to the project and has introduced a new directive to other projects in the region to adopt similar BIM methodologies.
YYECC already sees benefits of their industrialised project delivery. By creating a robust CDE, YYECC says that the digital twin model will serve as the basis for not only better construction projects, but also a key factor for improving digital urban management for future generations in Kunming City.
Chao Li, deputy director, Yunnan Yunling Engineering Cost Consultation, said: “Bentley’s ProjectWise decreased the time it took to approve materials used on the project by 40%, and giving the project team the ability to access information in the field improved information integrity by 30%.”
