How to bring data online - CSX Transportation usescentral Internet-based system - Brief Article

Railway Age, August, 2000 by Marybeth Luczak

CSX Transportation is using a central Internet-based system to merge project management across the board.

Paper files crammed with multiple versions of plans, estimates, and schedules can be a nightmare for railroad project managers juggling thousands of documents each year. But it needn't be. To help employees retrieve the latest data easily and track projects from cradle to grave with a click of a mouse, CSX Transportation has selected RailDOGS (Daily Operations Control System) from The AIMS Group.

RailDOCS, a "business Internet portal" with a suite of software applications, allows CSXT and its suppliers to manage design and design-build projects using the Internet. The system merges individual files and disparate systems so project managers and suppliers can work across departments. Any form of documentation--memos, photographs, CAD files--may be attached to electronic files and accessed by those with authorization.

RailDOCS can direct such day-to-day operations as data management, storage, and distribution; project estimating, planning, and engineering; employee management; project monitoring; and materials management. Additionally, rail managers can set up project schedules for staff and suppliers to follow. Once project milestones are established, managers are notified via e-mail so that work can be completed on a timely basis.

Why RailDOCS?

"We began using RailDOCS to control and move plans around," says Rick Kadlick, chief engineer-train control and a RailDOCS initiator at CSXT. "Before, we used hardcopy signal plans that had to be checked in and out. Outside design contractors who update those plans had to send couriers back and forth to get them. Now those couriers are little electrons." Plans are always accessible, in one central location.

"Plans are sent electronically and can be printed out by designers wherever they may be," Kadlick says. "If you can get to a phone line, we can get you the plans."

Prior to RailDOCS, checking for project overlap in one geographic location between departments was difficult. "There is no way a human being can keep track of every project," Kadlick says. With RailDOCS, "we now know if design work has been done previously at a location, or if work was not done but planned."

Railroad/supplier interface

CSXT project estimate standards are posted through RailDOCS to help managers and suppliers create detailed materials and labor estimates. "Third parties can also look up our standards on the materials required for a particular project," says Mike Choat, general manager-signal engineering for CSXT. "All we have to do is give them access and update the standards." With access, suppliers can check newly-assigned work against outstanding projects, request plans and CAD files, retrieve the latest design specifications, and produce transmittal slips for completed design work.

All RailDOCS transactions are monitored so they can be billed directly to CSXT- or outside-party-funded projects. "Cost is based on usage, with a very small cost per transaction," says The AIMS Group CEO Joseph A. Seher. "Since the system is hosted by us, there is no up-front cost for software, maintenance contracts, or other fees."

The next step

CSXT recently signed a four-year contract with The AIMS Group and is looking to expand RailDOCS use. For example, the Class I plans to implement "change management" ensuring that employees are informed of product recalls. CSXT will send service bulletins explaining problems via RailDOCS instead of sending individual e-mails and making phone calls to get the word out. "With RailDOCS, all we will have to do is create a standard status report and follow it up," says Rick Kadlick. Management also wants the system to track and allocate employee hours. Such information can be compared across projects to identify the need for further employee training, the potential for shortfalls in estimating standards, the need to upgrade equipment, and the need to revise work instructions and procedures.

RailDOCS, says The AIMS Group, offers CSXT a level of organization impossible without the Internet. Now projects are managed from start to finish using one central system. Explains Kadlick, "If the planning process isn't efficient, project execution can't be efficient."