Virginia DOT engineers success with document management

With the ambitious goal to be the best Department of Transportation in the nation, the Virginia DOT is boosting productivity with an investment in document management technology.

VDOT engineers and outside contractors share project information about roadways, structures and bridges, traffic engineering, utilities and environmental design, which exists in various formats across different applications (Bentley Systems' Microstation and Powerscope, C.W. Beilfuss & Associates' IGrds, and CAiCE Software Corporation's CAiCE software). VDOT wanted to improve efficiency in managing that information, and eliminate the redundant and time-consuming process of locating project files by hand.

The new system, built on TSA/Advet's Falcon/DMS engineering document management system, will make CAD files and related information available on demand for all of the DOT's engineering groups. TSA's Session Accounting software helps track and manage time spent on projects. An Oracle database and an automatically-updating workflow system run on the back-end, on both Unix and Windows NT platforms.

After a successful pilot in the DOT's central offices, the system is being rolled out over the next two months to 800 users in nine DOT districts. Future expansion plans will include information exchange between other divisions and districts, outside contractors, suppliers and the public.

The VDOT project is a win-win for vendor and customer alike, according to TSA/Advet president Andrew Synnot. "They meet their document management requirements and we identify and refine features and processes that will benefit all of our customers," he said