PBA reduces risk and improves efficiency in multi-disciplinary projects

Leading development and infrastructure consultancy Peter Brett Associates (PBA) has recently enhanced its use of GIS to help improve collaboration between its multi-disciplinary teams.   Employees can now share an understanding of the many diverse factors involved in successful development and infrastructure schemes, reducing project risk and increasing efficiency. 

Successful employee collaboration is operationally critical for PBA, a thriving practice that regularly designs, plans and delivers huge multi-million pound developments. On major infrastructure projects across the UK, the organisation brings together multi-disciplinary teams of experts including engineers, hydrologists, ecologists, economists, energy specialists, transportation analysts and infrastructure planners.  Over fifty such professionals from different teams now use Esri’s ArcGIS solutions to combine their data and share understanding of the myriad factors that can impact large projects.

Aided by a newly formed core GIS team, this enterprise GIS platform enables the business to reduce project risk, as key decisions can be made based on accessible, accurate and comprehensive data.  ArcGIS gives the practice a robust and transparent methodology for making critical and invariably complex design decisions, which gives clients added confidence in the organisation’s abilities.  Furthermore, the use of GIS helps PBA to justify its designs and withstand the scrutiny of panels during planning processes. 

Across different teams, PBA’s employees can now work more efficiently, as the information they need is managed in one place.  Consequently, they can devote more of their time to performing in-depth analysis for more flexible fee rates, whilst ensuring a high quality, cost-effective service for clients.  PBA can also add value for its clients by using ArcGIS Desktop and ArcPy to develop bespoke GIS services that will help them manage spatial data throughout the construction process and afterwards in the ongoing operation of their new assets once they are built. 

“GIS is vitally important in multi-disciplinary consultancy practices like PBA, enabling different teams to collaborate more effectively and work more efficiently.”

David Roberts-Lock, GIS Developer, Peter Brett Associates