Virtual Civils

I recently got my hands on, and head in, a virtual reality (VR) headset for use on a large and complex data centre project. When lost in VR reviewing the model, I can hear my colleagues’ sniggers and smartphone camera clicks to inevitably ridicule me later for looking a bit silly or pointing ‘at’ them, but I put that down to jealousy that I get to use the latest new toy while at work. Once I get over that motion sickness feeling, I’ll find a way to get them back.

VR has advanced the engineering and construction industry rapidly by creating a digital world for our projects, providing them with a multidisciplinary metaverse rather than ‘traditional’ 2D drawings. What a leap the industry has taken within a single working lifetime.

The VR headset and metaverse accelerates collaboration, communication and interfaces with not only the design model but also with colleagues, bringing a whole new aspect of multi-disciplinary coordination and the way you see, hear and interact with them.

We have already experienced the application of a digital twin and augmented reality (AR). As civil engineers, when we are tasked with coordinating extensive underground services for large industrialised and mission-critical sites such as data centres where there could be anywhere between 50 - 100 kilometres of underground ducts and pipework, it allows us to troubleshoot the designs prior to construction and minimise mistakes. This positively impacts costs, programmes and health and safety. Any future works can then be easily analysed as there is a complete digital model of the entire site.

Have a look at this short video of our own experience combining digital twin and AR here.

But does this new metaverse take things a step further?

Aside from the motion sickness (that subsides when you get used to moving around the virtual environment) and setting my avatar to have less grey hair than I really do, the VR headset gives you an immersive experience that allows you to feel where you are and give perspective to particularly large sites. While there are already desktop versions in existence, they don’t quite have the same collaboration factor. Being able to virtually meet your colleagues’ avatars inside a model, despite physically being at opposite ends of the country, is an experience unique to the headset.

As a design tool however, the question that must be asked is: are they good enough to replace traditional methods?

While sometimes it can feel that there is no need to replace a good old fashioned hand sketch, it is important for me to remember that what we design in the virtual world will be brought to life in the real world. The VR headset, however, can certainly compliment the tools, means and methods already available to us, and in the future may be as much of a gamechanger as the digital twin and 3D models that came before it.