Two Asset Management Case Studies

Over the past three years I have run across two municipalities which I think have some unique examples of how they are integrating the Asset Management principals into their organizations.

The first is Hamilton Ontario Canada, which was presented at an Asset Management Conference in San Francisco in March of 2006. Hamilton has taken a very strategic approach to their Asset Management program by recognizing that they need to be sustainable from a funding perspective. This means that they can sustain the services the community requires with the revenues they receive from their assets. The focus is a very Life-Cycle based approach and they provide a State of the Infrastructure (SOTI) Report, which rates the status of the community's assets, including everything from the streets, water, wastewater, storm water, to the trees. While the SOTI is a high-level, or strategic, look it very quickly, and for a relatively low cost, identifies the hot spots that the community will need to review in more detail. Please consider reviewing the Hamilton 2006 SOTI as an option on how you might provide a similar report to your community on your assets. Find a copy of the report here (skip to page 16 of the report to see the report card): http://www.myhamilton.ca/NR/rdonlyres/9513BF04-C983-4F5F-AE33-221B38534FEE/0/SOTI_REPORT_II.pdf


The second example was the basis for many examples during the EPA 2-Day Asset Management Presentation (Tom's Bad Day). Orange County Sanitary District (OCSD) did a detailed analysis of all of their assets to determine their rate requirements to sustain their services. This approach is more detailed then Hamilton's, but for planning specific capital improvement projects, it provides the specific supporting information to help gain the support of the commissioners and ultimately the community. You can review a copy of the 2006 OCSD Asset Management Plan here (skip to page 13 of the report to see the sustainability graph, very interesting!): http://www.ocsd.com/civica/filebank/blobdload.asp?BlobID=5818 (this may take a while)