Projects

Providing railway engineering expertise to the MNRR team to support evidenced based asset health assessment for use in capital and operating investment planning. Responsible for introducing the concepts of Track Quality Indicators (TQIs) for Rail Wear, Track Structure, Substructure, Insulated Joints, Turnouts and Tie Condition. The current work is to introduce the utilization of these TQIs for capital and operating prioritization and investment planning. Encada collaborated with Bentley Systems on this work where Bentley provides the Optram toolset for asset condition and performance visualization and Encada provide the functional railway expertise.

Small Business Innovative Research Project - US Department of Transportation

Encada was awarded a Small Business Innovative Research contract managed by VOLPE and funded by the FTA to develop an Integrated Framework for Transit Asset Management Information. Encada developed an integrated information framework not just for Railroad and Transit Asset Management, but for Management Information that supports the railroad and transit functions of asset management, resource planning, service delivery, revenue and ridership. This model identifies the end state need for integrated information to support the Transit Service Operating Plan, Asset Management Plan and Resource Plan. Specific functional designs, requirements and guidelines were provided for: 1) a prototype hierarchical structure for each typical Transit Primary asset defining the parent child relationships and attribution elements to support asset management and state of good repair decisions, 2) a Computerized Maintenance Management System providing the foundational information to support the asset management plan and 3) an Incident module that ties a service incident delay e.g. a service asset failure, to its cause through a service request with an associated work order. The hierarchical structure allows for the aggregation of management information to the asset and service level under consideration.  Additionally, proposed procedures and tools were provided to inventory and tag Primary assets and to populate the asset hierarchies.  Phase 2 will build a working model of an asset register using a pilot transit agency and a tool to manage the asset register.

Port Authority of Allegheny County , EAM Program  Implementation

Encada developed the transit Asset Management Plan (TAM) for all Authority owned assets that supports the Authority’s policy, asset management goals and objectives and FTA requirements. Deliverables included TAM plan, reporting suite for NTD, performance and condition assessment and integration into their work order system. Encada was also responsible for the design, risk advisement, engineer's estimate and implementation oversight of an enterprise asset management solution (AMS) and register supporting all Authority owned assets including Bus, Railcar, Facilities and Linear Infrastructure. The design incorporated interfaces to financials, inventory, procurement and operations.  The deliverables included the functional business process designs for maintenance activities, the technical specifications for the AMS, the inventory and register for all assets that must be inspected and maintained and the documentation of select PMs required to support maintenance. 

Port Authority of Allegheny County, Track Asset Management Plan Development

Encada provided the Authority track asset management plans primarily focused on capital investment but also identified sections that could be remediated using operating funds. The approach utilizes analysis of successive condition measurements to develop asset performance indicators (TQIs) for Rail Wear, Track Structure and Substructure, Insulated Joints and Turnouts. Encada collaborated with the Authority to determine track quality maintenance thresholds using track geometry and ride quality analysis for proactive maintenance intervention, avoiding safety level threshold exceptions.