Spatial Features

An elemental facet of the Metrix Asset Management system is spatial representation of asset components. At a basal level, this is enforced by the mandatory requirement that every component maintained in the system MUST reference a valid spatial feature. The system has been built around the existence of spatial features, and several tools exist to make this both beneficial, and easy for end users, including:

• Feature sharing across asset components.
• Built-in geometry editing tools,
• Integration with 3rd party GIS editing platforms such as QGIS,
• Attribute updates tied to relative spatial properties, and
• Performing asset operations using spatial techniques (line split),

Shared Component Geometries

Each spatial feature in the system is its own record. That is, the geometry is not ‘just’ another attribute of the asset component. Instead, by maintaining spatial features as distinct entities, we are able to ’link’ a single geometry to more than one component. This means, you can have the same line feature representing the earthworks, base, and surface of your road asset. Editing the line once, will update the representation for all.

It should be noted, however, that this sharing feature is not mandatory. Within an asset, each component could have their own distinct spatial representation. YOu could even maintain a hybrid approach, with two components sharing a geometry, whilst a third maintains a distinct feature.

The only caveat is that geometries cannot be shared across components with different asset parents. The relationship must stay within a single asset.

Managing Spatial Features

The system come with built-in spatial editing tools for basic geometry creation and updates. These tools are simple to use and support all simple geometry types; points, lines, and polygons. In the case that your geometric construction requirements are more advanced that those offered in system, the Metrix Asset Management system has published a free to access QGIS plugin that can connect to your cloud environment (using your Metrix account details), view your geometry data, as well as make edits and save changes back to the system.

Asset Operations with Spatial Tools (the line splitting tool)

With such a strong relationship to underlying spatial features, the Metrix Asset Management system is able to leverage geometric principles in offering advanced asset management operations, in an easy to use and understand package. Such an operation is the ability for users to SPLIT assets or components at a given point with the system handling all the financial apportionment of capital value for them. This is great for recording partial renewals, re-segmenting your network assets to cater for additional installations.

Smart Attributes

Another added benefit of mandating spatial features is the ability to leverage spatial properties as attribute information. See smart attributes for more information.