Kimley-Horn will be discussing how Studio Sessions and Bluebeam tools were used to establish a Survey Tracker for large-scale transit projects. Our firm ensures all staff have the most up-to-date Bluebeam tips and tricks by communicating best practices via “Treasure Tip” emails and “Bluebeam Knowledge Share” workshop sessions. With this knowledge, KH staff can leverage Bluebeam tools and practices to unleash human creativity to provide solutions for clients.

An example of this ingenuity is leveraging Studio Sessions in Bluebeam to request detailed survey limits and track real-time statuses of those survey requests. On previous projects, survey information was requested via email and tracked in an Excel document. By housing all requests in Bluebeam, the survey is accurately documented, the status of each request is time-stamped, and users can visually understand where there are gaps in the surveyed data.

We will then discuss the process of setting up the Bluebeam Sessions; roll plot PDFs that are populated with aerial images, existing topography, existing utilities, and existing ROW are uploaded to the Bluebeam Sessions. After the sessions and PDFs are created, users can use Bluebeam tools such as clouds and text to request the desired survey area in the PDFs. With the use of the Bluebeam “Reply” feature, the requester can provide a detailed description of what needs to be surveyed, which structures need to be captured, and a deadline for the survey to be completed. The requester can then use the Bluebeam “Status” feature to update the status of the request to “Requested.” The requester can also use the Bluebeam “Alert” feature, which allows the surveyors to be alerted via email that there is a new survey request assigned to them. As the surveyor schedules, performs, and updates the CAD file for their surveyed work, they can also use the Bluebeam “Status” feature to provide an update to the original requester. The data for these statuses and descriptions can then be exported to an Excel spreadsheet via the Bluebeam “CSV Summary” feature. In conclusion, leveraging Studio Sessions to track survey efforts on large scale projects allows for a more streamlined and organized approach and ensures that the survey is captured to the full extents of the requests.