Victoria to let homeowners tap into its digital twin

Digital Twin Victoria has taken the covers off a tool that helps automate planning compliance checks.

A year in development, the tool, called eComply, gives homeowners a way to have house plans checked against Victoria’s building codes before they begin the costly and complex process of seeking planning approval.

It was developed by Digital Twin Victoria in partnership with private company Archistar.

Currently being tested by users in the planning and building sector, eComply is “going to help make the housing approvals process faster and easier”, DTV’s automated approvals lead Luke Bassett told a Digital Twin Victoria online showcase.

The building design and approval process has always been “paper intensive”, with “a lot of back-and-forth between homeowners, designers, and authorities," Bassett explained.

“Understanding the building codes and planning code is actually quite a complex and quite a difficult task. 

“It really requires you to go to a statutory plan or a building surveyor to give you that feedback to help you get compliant with those codes.

"The end result is a lot of design iterations, lost time and cost as well."

eComply is designed to give the citizen a way to use the digital twin as an interface between their plans and the DTV platform to reduce paper processes and speed up design iterations.

“We're aiming to introduce digital twin technology into the process, in the form of building information modeling and advanced analytics, to help streamline that process.”

With an API to the DTV platform, eComply leverages those analytics to perform automatic self-service checks for building and planning code compliance.

“Users can upload their building design into an online tool, while they're actually designing the house or even during the actual permit process. And that allows them to pre check the design for submitting through to approval,” Bassett said.

Compliance check with eComply

A design can be tested against planning rules in as little as 30 seconds, he said, with the interface highlighting non-compliant aspects of a design (for example, insufficient set-back from a footpath) and identifying the code breaches for the user.

DTV director Carys Evans told the showcase other capabilities planned for the DTV platform include a partnership with Before You Dig Australia (fornerly Dial Before You Dig) to capture and show utility infrastructure locations; enhanced disaster response support; asset management; and subdivision registrations.