Asset management software to be used by Highways Agency

The Highways Agency has awarded a £600,000 contract to Atkins and Yotta for the supply of software that maps the condition of roads to help plan renewal work.

The Atkins and Yotta team will deliver and enable the use of the Horizons software to inform and improve the development of the Agency’s road renewals programme. This tool will allow the Highways Agency to carry out modelling to understand the current and future condition of the network based on its national pavement condition survey data. This model will then be used to predict where and when maintenance is likely to be needed.

The project was procured under the transport-related technical engineering and research advice framework. This task started in November and will have a duration period of 15 months. Yotta partnered with Atkins to take the bid forward, with Yotta providing the Horizons software (a significant portion of the contract) and Atkins providing project management and quality assurance service.

The Horizons software is a visual and user-friendly asset management system developed by Yotta, and this marks the largest implementation of Horizons to date worldwide.

Alan Taggart, Atkins’ asset management service director, said: “It is vital that highway authorities can make the most of their existing assets, to provide efficient and effective services to road users. This partnership demonstrates how collaboration between technology providers and asset management consultants can ensure the Highways Agency can deliver on their business objectives by using effective asset management solutions.”

Horizons will incorporate data gathered from a package of condition surveys.

Nick Smee, Yotta CEO, added: “The bid process was extremely challenging as we were up against well established highway infrastructure management software providers; however, we were able, along with our partners Atkins, to demonstrate the benefits of Horizons for ease of use, user adoption, deterioration modelling and also its improved ability to guide decisions.”