Scenario planning for infrastructure
Gain a unified GIS workspace to design, plan, and simulate future infrastructure scenarios, enabling smarter investment for sustainability and reliability
For organizations managing linear assets, building new infrastructure requires precision. Every decision depends on meticulous design and planning, balancing a wide range of factors, from terrain complexity and environmental impact to construction costs, regulatory requirements, and long-term reliability. Finding the optimal scenario is critical to avoiding costly overruns, project delays, and unsustainable outcomes.
The challenge
How complexity and constraints stall network decisions
As the world becomes increasingly urbanized, more and more people are living in cities and densely populated areas, a trend that will only accelerate in the coming years. This shift puts immense pressure on utilities, infrastructure providers, and public services to modernize and expand their networks sustainably.
From planning new power grids, water and gas pipelines, and telecommunication networks, to designing transportation corridors, each decision must balance precision, cost efficiency, and minimal environmental and geological impact, all while ensuring reliable service delivery to millions of people.
In this context, there is simply no room for trial and error.
A pipeline route that is too long becomes prohibitively expensive.
A path that crosses unstable geology risks structural failure.
A route that disrupts ecological corridors or sensitive habitats may face regulatory rejection or community opposition.
Yet, planning these networks is far from a simple task.
Many companies still rely on fragmented data sources, disconnected systems, and decentralized planning tools. Environmental, geological, and social constraints often live in separate databases, making it difficult to visualize the full picture, evaluate trade-offs, or identify the most effective solution.
As a result, planners and engineers struggle to answer fundamental questions:
Which scenario delivers the greatest coverage with the least environmental and geological impact?
What would be the cost and service implications of each option?
How do we balance expansion with sustainability?
The solution
Design, compare and optimize infrastructure scenarios
The scenario planning for infrastructure feature empowers GIS planners and infrastructure designers to simulate, visualize, and compare multiple development and expansion network scenarios, all within a single and centralized environment.
With an intuitive GIS-based visualization and impact assessment tools, planners can design alternative infrastructure layouts, analyze expansion options and costs, and instantly understand the implications of each decision before committing resources.
Users can:
- Design and edit different network configurations with easy-to-use modeling tools
- Visualize and compare each scenario directly on the map, attaching risk assessments.
- Simulate and evaluate alternatives side by side, based on cost, coverage, environmental, or operational criteria
- Promote the most cost-efficient and sustainable scenario, approving the “winning” design and discarding less effective ones, all while ensuring compliance with regulatory and environmental standards
By consolidating all geospatial and asset data in one place, the solution eliminates silos, accelerates analysis, and enables data-driven planning.
Benefits
The benefits of scenario-based network planning
Ensured adherence to regulatory requirements
Improved data-driven decision-making
Optimized costs and investment options
Enhanced collaboration across all stakeholders through a unified solution
Integrated with Esri ArcGIS User Types
OverIT’s Scenario Planning for Infrastructure extends the value of ArcGIS by transforming authoritative GIS and Utility Network data into structured, comparable infrastructure investment scenarios.
The solution operates within existing ArcGIS user types, enabling planners, engineers, and the decision makers to participate in controlled scenario workflows according to their assigned roles and permissions. No changes to ArcGIS licensing structures or governance models are required.
ArcGIS remains the system of record for spatial data, network topology, and asset information. Scenario Planning for Infrastructure leverages this trusted data to evaluate alternative network evolutions, capital investment strategies,and infrastructure development paths without impacting production GIS environments.
ArcGIS user types supported
Scenario Planning for Infrastructure aligns with Esri’s ArcGIS user type model to ensure secure, role-based participation across planning workflows.
Viewer
Access and explore infrastructure maps, scenario comparisons, and impact visualisations to support investment discussions.
Contributor
Collaborate on scenario inputs, validate assumptions, and refine planning alternatives using authoritative GIS data.
Creator
Prepare and manage the maps, feature layers, and datasets that feed structured scenario simulations.
Professional and Professional Plus
Configure advanced GIS analysis and Utility Network models that underpin technically accurate scenario evaluations.
All user capabilities remain governed by ArcGIS permissions and licensing assignments.
A dedicated environment for infrastructure decisions
Scenario Planning for Infrastructure complements Esri ArcGIS capabilities without duplicating GIS authoring or Utility Network configuration. Advanced spatial modeling and network management continue to reside within ArcGIS under the appropriate user types.
By preserving this architectural separation, organizations gain a secure environment to compare planning alternatives, assess network impacts, and support capital prioritization decisions while maintaining full data integrity and governance continuity.