Page 7 - Louisiana 811 Magazine 2021 Issue 1

Using Subsurface Utility Engineering Wisely
SUE can be costly, but good communication can help to reduce the price tag.
By Michael Downes 811 Magazines
How well do you know SUE? No, not your mother’s best friend, but the project manager’s best friend for the last 30 years—subsurface utility engineering.
The main goal of SUE is to define
a standard of mapping for existing underground utilities, with quality levels ranging from “A,” which is the most accurate, but also the most time consuming and costly, to “D,” which is the most basic.
The traditional approach to SUE requires an entire job to be located at the same class level of accuracy—which is necessary when major excavations will take place in crowded rights-of- way but might not be necessary on the margins of the project where no digging will take place.
But over the last few years, engineers have been approaching SUE more wisely, saving money and time while still providing accurate facility locations where it’s critical.
The SJB Group in Baton Rouge, said many project designers, engineers
and construction companies are now using “selective” SUE, a way to divide a project into different sections and pin down utility locations only as accurate as is necessary for each portion of a project.
“The biggest issue is people see the price of SUE and get scared away because they aren’t thinking about the long-term project, they’re thinking
about the immediate design and the costs associated with it,” SBJ Group said.
“One of the things we are trying to do is reduce the cost of the initial SUE investigation, provide engineers with the information they need and do it at a more reasonable price by not having the full quality level through the entire project.”
The example he used to highlight
the benefits of selective SUE is a hypothetical highway expansion project, where the median is being converted into traffic lanes, but where the shoulder and land beyond will not be disturbed.
“The way it’s been done in the past, everybody got the project limits and said, ‘OK we need quality level B throughout the entire thing.’ Well, if it’s a roadway widening project where they’re just tearing up an existing median and covering that up with pavement, you don’t need great utility information outside of the existing roadway, since no construction is going to be done there, because you’re not going to be doing any digging,” SBJ Group said.
Since the majority of utilities would be located outside of the digging area, just eliminating that portion of the SUE work and focusing on where the construction is going to be done, you can save time and money, still get the utility information you need to design a successful project, and catch the benefits of using SUE.
The SBJ Group recommends a conversation about the necessity of SUE quality levels be discussed before every project.
“For us to provide the best information at the best cost, we need to know
what the purpose of the project is. What needs to happen in the initial conversation, which has been in the [SUE] Standard of Care since it came out in 2002, is to have the discussion between the engineer and the project owner to determine what’s the best route to provide utility information,” SBJ Group said.
Looking at each project in-depth before the design phase helps to eliminate unnecessary costs and revisions and reviewing the SUE plan prior to
starting the investigation is the first step. Since each project is different, there’s not a one-size-fits-all approach to implementing SUE.
“There are some projects where you need it all. You need every bit of utility information you can get throughout the entire project,” SBJ Group said. “But once again, there are some where you can alleviate some of those costs. The conversation needs to be initiated by one or the other—the owner or the SUE engineer—if not both.”
The SUE quality levels involve different steps to ensure precise location information where it’s critical and cost savings where more general information about utility locations is sufficient.
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2021, Issue 1 Louisiana 811 • 5