In recent months the State has witnessed multiple incidents where either power cables or water lines were damaged during work to lay other utility lines.
To prevent such damage and waste of resources, the government has now proposed to undertake GIS mapping of all below ground utility lines. Such mapping will enable workers to trace a damaged line and also ensure existing services are not impacted when laying new ones.
There is a virtual maze of networks from water lines and power cables to sewerage trunk lines, telecom lines, optic fibre cables and gas pipelines below the state's road shoulders all laid at different times by different agencies. Citizens have frequently criticized the officials' ill planned digging of roads to repair a utility line within days of a fresh layer of hot mix asphalt being laid on the road.
With no mapping, engineers seem to be playing blind man's bluff when looking for defects, blockages or breakages in pipelines and cables resulting in more harm to roads and pavements. Hopefully this GIS exercise would be completed in time and it would become far easier for government agencies and contractors to lay or repair service lines.
