Using various solutions from infrastructure engineering software developer Bentley Systems, lead contractor PT Wijaya Karya (WIKA) was able to complete the construction of an integrated high-speed railway line between Jakarta and Bandungin time for the G20 Summit in Bali, Indonesia, held from November 15 to 16.

The 142.3-km project, which was awarded to PT Kereta Cepat Indonesia-China (KCIC), a joint venture between four State-owned Indonesian companies and construction company China Railway International, is expected to reduce congestion between the two cities and foster a culture of public transportation in Indonesia.

The current travel time between Jakarta and Bandung is three to five hours, owing to traffic congestion. The new high-speed railway will reduce travel time to between 36 and 45 minutes, and includes the Halim (in Jakarta), Karawang, Padalarang and Tegalluar (in Bandung) stations.

The $7.8-billion project secured lead contractor WIKA first place in the Rail and Transit category at the Bentley Systems Year in Infrastructure Going Digital Awards in London, in the UK, last month.

WIKA building information modelling (BIM) engineer Rizky Yusuf Ramadhan said during his presentation to a panel of independent judges that without BIM the project would have been delayed to 2023.

This high-speed railway project has brought about the use of many new technologies and construction methods, such as cast-in-situ, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ (Asean’s) biggest tunnel-boring machine.

The project required the coordination of multiple disciplines and presented geographical challenges, such as steep hills, valleys and landslides, that impacted on the railway construction.

“So, the design phase had to be carefully controlled, as we do not tolerate any construction errors beyond tolerable value. The track, which runs parallel to an active toll-road and light rail transit required significant coordination and integration between these projects, and became more complicated during the Covid-19 pandemic,” explained Ramadhan.

Leveraging Bentley’s open civil design and reality modelling applications, and digital twin technology, WIKA developed a connected digital ecosystem and single source of truth, facilitating dynamic modelling and the generation of an intelligent digital twin, explains the project summary.

“Before the introduction of BIM and Bentley, the feasibility study conducted in the early stage of the project didn’t provide much detail on the current socioeconomic condition. This resulted in inefficiency and cost overrun,” added Ramadhan.

The integrated solution afforded by Bentley Systems software allowed for streamlined workflows, improving efficiency, design quality and calculation. Thereby, WIKA was able to complete the project six months ahead of schedule after construction started in 2019, and saved $185-million in construction costs, while also reducing environmental impact.

Notably, 108 potential conflicts were identified and resolved in the design review stage, avoiding costly rework during construction. Thereby, design review quality was improved by 40% compared with traditional methods, stated Ramadhan.

A labour cost saving of $22-million was also realised, reducing the need for 1 500 additional workers.

As Asean’s first high-speed railway, the project is expected to help reduce $500-million in losses owing to traffic congestion and promote rural revitalisation through transit-orientated development.

Based on passenger demand of 30 000 people a day, the project is expected to achieve return on investment after 40 years, before KCIC’s 50-year concession ends.

“Although high-speed railway will not become profitable in the short term, this will have a transformative effect on the macroeconomy in the long term,” said Ramadhan.

WIKA plans to apply the lessons learned from this project and use its digital twin as a starting point to build the next high-speed railway line from Bandung to Surabya.