Infrastructure Management

In order to leverage the waterways’ potential for the economy, the environment and tourism, the infrastructure must be maintained and upgraded to meet current needs. Owing to the relatively long period that is necessary for the planning and implementation of maintenance measures, obsolescence and investment backlogs are a major challenge.

The BAW supports the German Federal Waterways and Shipping Administration (WSV) in this task by providing structured maintenance management, including early identification, evaluation and prioritisation of required repair measures. High-quality data, targeted data conditioning and a structured and transparent approach play a major role in this context.

We maintain comprehensive condition data collected during regular inspections of the WSV’s hydraulic structures. We use, for example, advanced inspection methods such as laser scanning and we deploy drones. Data on different levels of robustness of the structures and potential consequences of damages are also relevant with regard to the prioritisation of maintenance activities.

Data capturing and maintenance are digitised on an ongoing basis, since only complete and high-quality data allow effective decision-making. Thanks to optimised business processes, data capturing is seamlessly integrated into regular work processes. Building Information Modelling (BIM) makes a major contribution towards this end.