Case Study: Major Atlanta Engineering Firm

Atlanta Firm Cuts Stormwater Design Time in Half

Background Information

Between 2000 and 2006, Atlanta, Georgia was the fastest growing region of the U.S.—adding nearly 900,000 people. Now, the Atlanta metro area is home to more than five million people. With the rapid pace of expansion over the last decade, some areas were developed without adequate stormwater management planning.

“There weren’t regulations in place like in other parts of the country, so there are lots of areas without adequate conveyance capacity to get stormwater out of subdivisions and between houses,” said a managing partner of a major Atlanta engineering firm. “Now there’s a lot of troubleshooting as a result of previous land development.”

The firm has delivered quality services to counties and municipalities since 1968. Its active civil engineering division frequently designs storm drainage systems for city, county and state governments.

Engineers previously used several different software programs for their stormwater projects. They had to switch back and forth depending on the type of hydrology or hydraulic routing methods they were required to use. In addition, lack of integration with ArcGIS® and AutoCAD® resulted in a considerable amount of duplicate data entry.

Seamless Integration with ArcGIS and AutoCAD

The firm evaluated a variety of stormwater modeling applications before finally selecting StormNET by BOSS International. The fully-dynamic hydrology and hydraulic model analyzes both simple and complex stormwater systems using a variety of methods and models, including water quality.

“We liked the integration of hydrology and hydraulics in StormNET, the graphical user interface for data input, and the integration with ArcGIS,” the managing partner said.

The firm now leverages StormNET for all urban stormwater drainage projects. The flexibility of using various hydrology and hydraulic models enables the firm to run designs through multiple methodologies in a single application. Most often, engineers use EPA SWMM and SCS TR-20 for their project work, both integrated in StormNET.

Instead of using separate stormwater software to perform runoff computations, size detention ponds, check pipe sizes, etc., engineers can model all aspects of the project within StormNET. “We don’t use any other stormwater programs now. StormNET does everything we need,” the managing partner said.

Integration with ArcGIS and AutoCAD also greatly reduces the amount of manual data input typically required to complete a project. Engineers easily import digital terrain images of watersheds into StormNET for modeling and then interactively add drainage divides and subbasins. Existing stormwater network data can be directly imported from GIS. When finalized, engineers can export the completed stormwater model back to ArcGIS or AutoCAD.

The friendly graphical user interface in StormNET also enables engineers to enter data quickly and then move into analysis. At that point, StormNET helps them identify the cause of current stormwater problems and allows them to design remediation measures. Engineers are able to look at different design alternatives to determine the most viable option, subsequently showing clients the graphical results and supporting analysis of those different alternatives.

In preparing reports for clients, the firm also takes advantage of StormNET’s reporting capabilities to create detailed appendices, graphs and result summaries. Engineers can print the reports right out of StormNET, instead of having to manually enter it into Excel or another program.

Expediting Project Completion

StormNET supports better design, efficiency and client service. Engineers can easily check and correct input data for errors, resulting in more accurate designs.

The firm has found that StormNET also reduces the time to complete projects, allowing it to take on more work. The managing partner says that integration with ArcGIS and AutoCAD, along with the ability to do all their stormwater modeling in one software application, shortens project times.

On average, modeling takes about half the time it did with more traditional modeling methods. Engineers can complete an urban stormwater watershed project between the time the field work starts and when the data gets into the system.

“We can complete a typical watershed project in under a month now, where in the past it would have been two to three months,” he said. “We’re more efficient, so we can complete more projects in a given period of time.”

As a result, the firm increases its bottom line and improves client service. Client satisfaction depends on the ability to complete projects quickly. In many cases, county and municipal representatives request watershed remediation in response to complaints from residents, making rapid turnaround essential.

Moving forward, the firm anticipates that engineers at some of its municipal client sites will also adopt StormNET, which will enable more streamlined collaboration between engineers and clients.