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GIS for Asset Management at the United Arab Emirates University

M. M. Yagoub
Department of Geography
Faculty of Humanities & Social Science
UAE University.
myagoub@uaeu.ac.ae


Mohsin A. Abbasi
Department of Geography
Faculty of Humanities & Social Science
UAE University.
mabbasi@uaeu.ac.ae

Abstract
The Campus Development Department (CDD) at the UAE University (UAEU) is responsible for daily maintenance of the infrastructures in the university. This department has various drawings of assets in hardcopy and some in AutoCAD format. These drawings are static and do not help its engineers and staff in dynamic way. In the present system, if there is a fault in the electric cable, water pipe leakage or pipe burst or some excavation work is to be carried out in the area where underground facilities are present, then, a request is made from the website or by a phone to CDD and it is submitted to the concerned department for its rectification. In this case there is no integration of the work order request with the online system as GIS, where the concerned engineering department and staff can get online status of the problems in a particular area in the university campus, get spatial as well as attribute details, like online dynamic map of the area with pan, zoom, query and other details of a particular asset by the click of a mouse and can also update their asset maintenance records and drawings from time to time.

This paper presents the use of GIS technology for managing assets at CDD in UAEU by giving some examples of GIS being used for asset management technology in different parts of the world. It discusses the key application of GIS in asset management, reviews the present system of managing assets at UAEU and proposes methods for integrating GIS with asset management for its use in the university.

1.0 Asset Management
Asset management is the collection, processing, analysis and maintenance of extensive information about various types of assets such as equipment, facilities and other resources to plan work to be executed to maintain these assets at an operational level in the most cost-effective fashion possible. In terms of public-works infrastructure, asset management is the process of keeping track of and deploying the public’s capital. The priority of asset management in this context is making decisions about the effective and efficient development, use, maintenance, repair, and retirement or replacement of utility lines, highways, street furniture, and other public infrastructure. The goal of asset management therefore is to achieve the best possible return on the investments made by the public in infrastructural development. While this may not be the view of many, it is an essential ingredient if the objectives of asset management are to be met.

2.0 GIS and its Capabilities
According to (Longley et al., 2001), Geographic Information Systems handle locational data. These are information systems of hardware, software, and procedures designed to support the capture, management, manipulation, analysis, modeling and display of spatially referenced data for solving complex planning and management problems. Detailed discussions on GIS may be found in (Berhansen, 1998; Burrough and McDonnell, 1998; DeMers, 1997; Longley et al., 2001).

GIS can easily display map-based information graphically on a computer.
Pipeline facilities, land features, and geopolitical boundaries are represented by an accurate, digital “intelligent” model in an easy to use, map-based application. These items are organized by separate groups, or “layers”, which allows the user to view only those items desired for a specific task.

GIS can view and analyze data geographically. The System also contains descriptive information tied to these facilities with a database. This means the user can display, for example, all sleeves on the pipeline in a given area of interest, and then look at descriptive information tied to those specific sleeves, (Johnson, 2001).

3.0 Applications of GIS in Asset Management
Although GIS is a nascent technology, it has been successfully used in various aspects of asset management. In North America and Europe, GIS in asset management is becoming a standard approach. Many researchers have described approaches for designing and developing asset management systems based on GIS (Brun et al., 1999; Lubeley and Bishop, 2001; Peng and Tsou, 2003; Schurle et al., 1998; Theirren, 1996; Vanier, 2001; Vanier and Danylo, 1998).

The broad area where GIS can be applied for assets are:

Data Collection: Conventionally data for any asset, to take an example of waterline network were collected and stored in paper format. This is less effective, labor intensive and error prone. With the advent of newer technologies as GPS and digital cameras data collection can be made faster and accurate and better integrated with GIS.

Data Storage: Data for assets whether it is a network component or buildings and other assets can be stored in GIS for spatial querying. If for example pipe line is taken for GIS asset management then the main data for storage will be pipe and node locations and characteristics, reservoir details, type and details of consumer locations. The data can be collected and entered by field staff in spreadsheets (MS Excel) and later imported to GIS. This helps reduce costs as technicians with minimum skills can do bulk of data handling operations. Data can be input in the GIS system by digitizing the pipelines and then attaching details of each component of pipe and valve details. The details which can be added for pipeline system can be Date of installation, maintenance history, diameter of pipe, material, pipe manufacturer, supplier etc. It depends on the records which a particular department wants to keep.