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Get Real: Powerful 3D Software Brings The Future of Infrastructure to Life in Just a Few Clicks

Greg Demchak stood before an enormous LED screen in a dark hotel conference room. With a game controller and a keyboard, he moved his audience through a digital model of Barcelona. The glowing screen showed a bird’s-eye view of the Spanish city’s famed “manzanas,” the octagonal block of buildings designed by the visionary 19th century urban planner Ildefons Cerda. Demchak zoomed in on a new construction site in the historic area, navigating the planned building’s future rooms and corridors as if they already existed. He explored design features, assessed how the project fit into the city’s historic grid, and even peered at underground infrastructure beneath the foundation—all without setting foot on site. This wasn’t a sci-fi simulation. It was a sneak peek into a bold new open platform for displaying infrastructure digital twins. The new advanced visualization solution was developed by Bentley Systems, the infrastructure engineering software company, and merges real-time renderings with geospatial data, engineering details and other information to give users a fully interactive view of their projects. “When people see what’s possible, they’re floored,” Demchak, Bentley’s vice president for emerging technologies, says as he toggles between underground utilities and panoramic cityscapes. “This is the future of infrastructure

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Bentley’s Year in Infrastructure and Going Digital Awards: Where AI, Digital Twins and Open Data Shape the Future

Infrastructure leaders from around the world recently gathered in Vancouver for Bentley System’s Year in Infrastructure and the Going Digital Awards. The two-day event, often called the Oscars of Infrastructure, drew more than 300 professionals to the Canadian city, while more than 1,000 joined online. The focus this year: How AI, digital twins and open data ecosystems are transforming infrastructure. Bentley CEO Nicholas Cumins opened the event on Oct. 8 with a vision for the future: “Together, we’re laying the groundwork for a future where open data ecosystems and AI seamlessly work together to create more sustainable and resilient infrastructure for better quality of life, for generations to come.” (Did you miss the event? Check out the highlights video.) The 20th annual event featured Bentley’s iLab, a stunning immersive experience powered by geospatial and digital twin technology, artificial intelligence (AI) and generative AI. Attendees lined up to step inside the exhibit and interact with infrastructure’s future. “The technology we’re seeing here is absolutely amazing for cities,” said Jamie Cudden, smart city program manager with the Dublin City Council in Ireland. “It’s a game changer. You can layer 3D data, engage citizens, and I’m so excited to use it in Dublin.”

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Get The News, Meet The Winners: Going Digital Awards Winners, Bentley Partners With Google, Generative AI And Carbon Analysis For Infrastructure And Other News From Vancouver

This week in Vancouver, Bentley Systems hosted its 20th Year in Infrastructure and Going Digital Awards. Over 300 attendees from around the world joined in person, while more than 1,000 participated via livestream. The event featured interactive demos, real-world case studies, keynotes, and major announcements, all showcasing how AI, digital twins, and open-source visualizations are transforming infrastructure. Check out the key highlights and announcements in our video.

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Cutting Carbon: Bentley’s New Carbon Analysis Capabilities Are Helping Engineers Tackle Infrastructure’s Environmental Impact

When the U.S. began building the Federal Highway System in the 1950s and 1960s , sustainability wasn’t a big topic of conversation. Few engineers and policymakers thought about the long-term environmental impact of shifting away from railroads and the growing reliance on oil as personal vehicles became the norm. The carbon footprint of such a massive transportation network? Hardly anyone gave it a second thought. Today, the focus has shifted. “Carbon is now taking a more central role in how we design and deliver projects,” says Kelvin Saldanha, a highway engineer and associate director at WSP, one of the world’s leading civil engineering firms. He notes that even 15 years ago, engineers rarely considered a project’s carbon emissions. Learn more about Carbon Analysis The infrastructure sector — which includes everything from roads and railways to wind farms and tunnels — now accounts for roughly 80% of global greenhouse gas emissions, Saldanha says. As the world grapples with the effects of climate change, the sector is rethinking how to reduce its carbon footprint while building the future. Bringing carbon emissions into the equation is an important step. But firms like WSP have struggled with compiling carbon data for projects because of

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Meet Your New Design Copilot: This Software Powered By Generative AI Is Changing The Game For Civil Engineers

Joe Viscuso always chased the next big thing. “Growing up, I just wanted to be the first to have it,” he says. “The new Ford Mustang, it didn’t matter what it was.” That passion and curiosity have also propelled his career. His latest obsession is generative AI and how it’s transforming his field — civil engineering and construction. Viscuso is responsible for strategic growth at Pennoni, the Philadelphia-based engineering and design consulting firm, and he has spent 15 years teaching land development as an adjunct professor at Pennsylvania’s Widener University. “Our goal here at Pennoni is to be at the forefront of the technology,” he says. In the age of AI, that pursuit has become a lot more urgent. “We used to measure change in decades. Now we measure it in weeks, days and minutes,” he says. Viscuso and his team, and other civil engineering firms, have been advising Bentley Systems on the development of OpenSite+. The next-generation software uses generative AI to help civil engineers design land development sites for new industrial facilities, shopping centers, schools, parks or entire neighborhoods. Bentley Systems, the infrastructure engineering software company behind the new solution, says OpenSite+ creates site designs up to 10

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Street Smarts: Bentley’s Partnership With Google — And Its Acquisition Of Cesium — Chart A New Era For How We Design, Build And Operate Our Infrastructure

In March 2024, a huge container ship lost power as it navigated out of Baltimore Harbor. The 100,000-ton vessel veered off course and crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge. The collision claimed the lives of six construction workers who were performing maintenance on the bridge. It also shut down port operations and severed a vital traffic artery. The tragedy highlighted the need for more resilient infrastructure, an issue that has been on the radar of government agencies and infrastructure operators across the country, includingthe Delaware River and Bay Authority (DRBA). Starting in 2023, DRBA began installing an advanced collision protection system for the Delaware Memorial Bridge. The work involves eight massive, stone-filled “dolphin” cylinders, each 80 feet across, designed to shield the bridge’s towers. The visionary project also includes a digital twin. Digital twins are detailed virtual models of physical assets, such as bridges, water systems or even entire cities. The models unlock insights, improve collaboration and add other benefits across the lifespan of the asset — from planning and design to construction and asset operation. The digital twin of the Delaware Memorial Bridge work was created by the Philadelphia-based engineering consulting firm Pennoni. The model has allowed stakeholders

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The Time Traveler: Bentley’s Resident Visionary Gives the Infrastructure Industry a Glimpse of its Future

Greg Demchak has two views from his desk on the 43rd floor of a glass tower in London. He can look down at the cityscape — the pale dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral, the Victorian Gothic splendor of Tower Bridge and the silty River Thames. Or he can look up at the virtual version. “It’s a pretty sick view,” he says, though it’s hard to tell which view he means. As vice president of Bentley Systems’ Emerging Technology Group, Demchak and his team built a detailed digital twin of London at the company’s innovation lab, or iLab for short. The virtual model gleams from a giant LED screen in the office foyer. The view of real London is grand, but the virtual one combines geospatial and engineering data with the latest gaming technology, like Epic Games’ Unreal Engine. The digital model allows users to zoom around London’s new crop of iconic skyscrapers. Like a seagull, users can hover high above “The Walkie Talkie,” the handset-shaped building at 20 Fenchurch Street; zoom in on “The Cheesegrater,” the wedge-like structure of 122 Leadenhall Street; or explore “The Jenga” of 8 Bishopsgate, which houses the U.K. headquarters of Bentley, the infrastructure engineering software company. “Architects

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Navigating The Future: Government, Industry Leaders Discuss AI’s Potential to Transform Transportation, Infrastructure

There’s a discreet charm to drawbridges, and Florida is the perfect place to experience it. The state boasts 50 drawbridges along the Intracoastal Waterway alone, including the picturesque Bridge of Lions in St. Augustine, which has served locals and visitors for nearly a century. These engineering marvels periodically transform the landscape, lifting their roadways to the sky and letting boats quietly slip through. Keeping them in good shape is crucial, though aging drawbridges can quickly turn from a charming sight into a bottleneck. “Any of y’all have bridges where you’re from, well, I sure hope yours are flat,” said Eileen Higgins, Miami-Dade County commissioner, whose district includes parts of Miami and Miami Beach. “You are living the dream. Ours are all drawbridges and there’s a lot of moving parts […] When they break, they got to stay up, which causes a traffic nightmare because boats can only go on water, and cars can usually go other ways.” Navigating the future Higgins was speaking at Navigating the Future of AI and Transportation, a gathering of policy and industry experts hosted by Microsoft in Washington, D.C. last week. Speakers at the event included Senator Maria Cantwell, who talked about AI’s potential to

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From Da Vinci to Digital Twins: These 5 Engineering Innovations Changed How We Build The World

Some of the most famous inventions were happy accidents. In 1827, English pharmacist John Walker was puttering around at home when he clumsily scraped a chemical-coated stick across his hearth, which burst into flames, sparking the idea for the friction match. A century later, Scottish microbiologist Alexander Fleming returned from vacation to an untidy lab and noticed a strange mold in a petri dish, which he called “penicilin.” But most groundbreaking discoveries aren’t so serendipitous. The world’s architects and engineers have spent centuries meticulously advancing the science of designing and building bridges, roads, dams and other infrastructure. Their work is deliberate, iterative and empirical. It builds on the knowledge and insights of those who came before them. Their journey started with a letter from the Old Babylonian Empire, which ended about 3,600 years ago and commonly used clay tablets to record and share information. The letter “documents the drawing of architectural ground plans,” according to historians. More than 3,000 years later, Leonardo da Vinci drew on paper stunning conceptual plans and sketches for buildings, bridges, and cities. A few hundred years later, at the start of the Industrial Revolution, French mathematician Gaspard Monge invented descriptive geometry, a system that allowed

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Give Me Shelter: These Digital Technologies Are Helping the World’s Infrastructure Prepare for the Changing Climate

In early May, you could hear a pin drop in Bangladesh’s classrooms and playgrounds, as the country’s schools and colleges closed in response to a ferocious heatwave. But there was no respite for rickshaw driver Mohammed Shameem, who had no choice but to ply his trade in the roasting, congested streets of Dhaka. “It is too hard to work under the sun during a brutal heatwave,” he told Reuters. Meanwhile, over in Porto Alegre, southern Brazil, citizens were launching a rescue operation with boats and jet skis to save their neighbors from the city’s most devastating floods since 1941. Marcelo Moreira Ferreira only sought shelter and abandoned the house his father built and where he had lived his whole life when the muddy waters of the Guiaba Lake reached his chest, The Guardian wrote. Although Shameen and Ferreira live on opposite sides of the world, their plight is an urgent reminder that climate action needs to remain two-pronged: Mitigation and adaptation. We must keep reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the root cause of global warming. But we must also make our towns and cities more resilient. This includes strengthening roads, dams, bridges, and power grids to withstand extreme weather, and also

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