Like most water and wastewater utilities, the Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati constantly strives to do more with less.

Beginning in 1989 with the release of the Smale Commission report on community infrastructure, the district’s Wastewater Collection Division recognized that a GIS-centric and GIS-forward approach would play a key future role in asset management.

In 2016, the collection division developed an innovative and integrated model to seamlessly connect long-term planning, short-term projects and daily operations. The program enhances stakeholder communication and collaboration, boosts productivity and significantly improves the division’s overall efficiency.

At the core is a GIS-centric asset management database, a dynamic GIS dataset that delivers real-time updates on asset conditions, refreshes the asset’s risk matrix and provides cost-driven rehabilitation recommendations and risk-based maintenance schedules. The geodatabase also integrates with multiple systems and platforms, including GIS, Cityworks, the CCTV program, the district’s hydraulic model and an estimated asset replacement cost model.

Innovative, integrated

From the outset, district teams — engineering, treatment, administration and other internal and external stakeholders — sought different types of information and held varying definitions of success. The collection division recognized these diverse perspectives and unique informational needs and in response assembled a project team of engineers and IT staff.

Together, they developed a cost-effective, decision-oriented solution by leveraging existing but previously siloed resources in various formats. The solution was integrated with a practical asset maintenance strategy and ultimately was deployed in a GIS format, forming the foundation of the collection asset management program to support ongoing operational needs.

With broad reach throughout the organization and beyond, the asset management program provides access to information centralized in the geodatabase. The dataset brings everything together and enables personnel to prioritize work. It expands capabilities to draw powerful insights and deliver eye-opening results.

Using Trimble Cityworks with embedded capabilities of the Esri ArcGIS platform, the district enjoys access to comprehensive and accurate geospatial data. The asset management program delivers a connected data environment, leveraging capabilities of the asset management platform and linking to other business tools. It empowers field-to-office asset management, effective priority-setting and better risk assessment.

The integration of CCTV with the GIS-centric mainline risk model and Cityworks greatly improved work-order management. Previously, the collection division conducted about 40 asset reviews per month. Now, streamlined and efficient workflows built into applications enabled more than 400 reviews per month. Maintenance has shifted from 85% reactive to 85% proactive.

This transformation supports better decision-making and operational performance. Tangible data generated from the program helps justify operational expenditures, and projected results can create a compelling case for new and ongoing funding.

Expanding reach and visibility

The district operates and maintains more than 3,000 miles of public sewers and about 100 pump stations, plus remote wet-weather facilities within the collection system, including three high-treatment facilities and nine wastewater treatment plants.

The district is committed to reducing combined sewer overflows and eliminating sanitary sewer overflows under a consent decree. Communicating that vision is vital. Asset management with an expanded view helps identify and directly mitigate issues before they escalate. It also breaks down barriers between internal divisions, departments outside the district and the community.

The district’s goal is to work efficiently and effectively alongside other municipal agencies by sharing relevant information with them and fostering a broader, more holistic perspective to support better decision-making and enhance work planning.

Consider a simple capital improvement project. Repairing a segment of sewer is essential to the district, but if the transportation/public works department recently repaved the area, tearing up the pavement for sewer work would appear to waste taxpayer dollars and overshadow the improvements. Inter-agency coordination helps avoid such negative scenarios.

The benefits of public outreach are generally less obvious: Most residents don’t think about sewers unless sewage backs up in their homes. A proactive, data-driven solution that prevents visible issues is the best defense and one of the most valuable deliverables from a strong asset management system.

Dynamic technology

Like technology, wastewater asset management is rapidly evolving. Moving forward, the asset management team must focus on aging out of a geometric network and moving toward the next-generation utility network model.

The older, more rigid geometric networks model focuses mainly on the spatial relationship between asset features, while the more advanced utility network model offers greater flexibility with complex, connected systems. The team is then better equipped to handle real-time data and dynamic behaviors.

As the saying goes, necessity is the mother of invention. In Cincinnati, GIS-centric asset management is at the heart of a progressive operational approach. With limited resources to manage a complex network of assets, digital transformation helps extend, amplify and optimize business practices.

Organizations contemplating a similar transition to an asset management solution need to embrace research. Measure twice and cut once. Paint a clear picture of organizational needs, analyze in detail what is to be accomplished and specifically define how success will be measured. In addition, evaluate how operations affect and are affected by various stakeholders. Choose solutions based on these well-defined needs.

Implementation is an ongoing process, not a one-time action item. Solutions continually evolve, and so will operational needs. Don’t purchase a system focused only on today. Evaluate solutions that lead to new levels of success. Look at where the organization is headed, what you aspire it to be and what capabilities are needed to get you there.

Great tools offer flexibility and enable customization to fit business needs. The good news is that solutions are becoming easier to deploy. Today, it’s less about creating solutions and more about configuring them.

Geocentric asset management offers powerful solutions for wastewater facilities. With advanced planning, ongoing analysis and an integrated collaborative approach, a clean-water agency can absolutely do more with less.

About the author(s)

Aimei Chen (aimei.chen@cincinnati-oh.gov) is assistant IT manager, Christian Rodríguez-Viera (christian.rodriguez@cincinnati-oh.gov) is assistant superintendent of wastewater collection, asset management and Joshua Murphy (joshua.murphy@cincinnati-oh.gov) is Cityworks administrator with the Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati.