Transportation agencies across Canada are facing various risks arising from climate change. Assessing the magnitude of these risks and quantifying impacts, vulnerabilities, and controls is a daunting task. The City of Toronto had developed a small-scale, database-driven software to help assess risks to various transportation considerations. The software was distributed to interested parties across the country, but suffered from scalability and usability issues. As a result, the Environmental Issues Standing Committee of the Transportation Association of Canada (TAC) enlisted a number of agencies from across the country to drive the development of a more robust software.
After an open, competitive process, TAC awarded the project to develop this software to Associated. With a team of information management, transportation, and climate change experts, Associated provided a needs assessment to the Project Steering Committee; managed the software design, development, and deployment; and provided training material for the software’s launch.
Climate Change adaptation and mitigation considerations are the main focus of the project. Project Manager, Sid Kwakkel, tells us, “This software will allow agencies to apply a consistent risk assessment framework to their future transportation considerations, and will bring Canada’s transportation community to the forefront of climate change management.”
The new tool, Canadian Climate Change Risk Assessment Software, leverages cloud technology and the latest software architecture. These features will allow the tool to scale indefinitely and ensure service 24/7 across the country. By deploying to the cloud, the Transportation Association of Canada is able to provide this tool to members with a minimal support, while delivering a robust service to users.
Sid says, “The new tool is based on ISO 14001 and 31001 environmental and risk management principles, and provides a number of utilities that make auditing seamless and efficient.” Associated’s familiarity with ISO 14001 and with the core principles of risk management for transportation assets facilitated the development of the new risk assessment tool, and enabled efficient communication with the Transportation Association of Canada and the Project Steering Committee stakeholders.
Our key personnel on this project include Sid Kwakkel, Jase Zwarich, Bryan Petzold, Brian Guy, and Martin Rowland.