One of the spin-offs of privatizing London’s vast subway network has been the creation of a cutting-edge asset-management system, says an IT project manager with one of the operators.

The contracts that give Tube Lines Ltd. and Metro Rail Ltd. 30-year control of the 408-kilometer system’s infrastructure and train maintenance require detailed asset inventories, says Bill Whetstone, IT project manager at Tube Lines, which controls about a third of the Underground. Tube Lines plans $8.5 billion of work by decade’s end and expects the system to improve decision-making. "Having a full asset management system in transportation projects is not common," he notes.

Both Tube Lines and Metronet inherited IT systems that had slowly evolved piecemeal. Whetstone reckons London Underground Ltd., the previous operator, ran over 20 major systems dealing with Tube Lines’ section, and hundreds more on spread sheets and in other forms. "The data needed a lot of cleaning. We did a massive amount," he says.

Since Tube Lines began phased implementation of the $58-million IT system a year ago it has transferred more than 2.5 million data records, some containing 130 individual fields, created over 100,000 work orders and paid 35,000 invoices totalling $900 million, Whetstone says.

Agilisys Ltd., London, developed Tube Lines Enterprise Application Integration tool with software from TIBCO Software Inc., Palo Alto, Calif. MRO Software Inc., Dallas, provided Maximo asset management tools. London-based Milestone Software Ltd. implemented Primavera P3e/C and Expedition systems for project and contract management.

The Tube Lines package also uses Oracle software for human resources, finance and procurement. Other service vendors include The Woodhouse Partnership Ltd., Kingsclere, U.K., LogicaCMG Ltd., London, and Intergraph Corp., Huntsville, Ala.

The Metronet solution uses a similar, multi-product approach.