Turnkey Pole Replacement

PROJECT SCOPE

A large New Jersey utility received a grant to replace several defective poles. Their design and construction staff already had a backlog of projects and could not perform the work. They were looking for a turnkey, design and build, solution. Wagner Technical Services partnered with Riggs Distler to provide the designs for 750 poles. We did the field survey of all the poles, prepared the drawings and used the NextGrid Line Designer application for job instructions and bills of material. We also provided material forecasting so that everything needed could be ordered in time for construction.

WAGNER'S APPROACH

Wagner Technical was provided with access to the client’s construction standards and locations of poles to be replaced. With our experience working with many utilities in the region, we were able to create construction units from the utility’s standards and begin producing work orders with bills of materials, including utility stock codes from our NextGrid Line Designer software, within three weeks. We worked closely with utility engineers, who clarified questions about their standards. They also provided us with standard drawing nomenclature, so that our drawings would be compliant with their standards.

While the work management system was being set up, filed forces began surveying poles to be replaced. They collected photos, field notes, and GPS coordinates for each pole. From that information, designers were able to create work orders from our work management system. Each pole had a separate one page work order. The work order had a utility compliant drawing and photograph of the pole on the front of the page and the bill of materials on the back.

From our NextGrid Line Designer work management system, we were able to provide long range material forecasts and requests. Special reports were available for long lead time items.

RESULT

Wagner Technical delivered the pole replacement designs in time to allow the contractor to complete the work within the utility’s timeframe. Since the project was on schedule and the utility had advance forecasts of labor and material costs, they were able to determine that there were additional funds in the budget and award us more work in time to prevent losing the additional funds.