Digital Underground

Contributing to the development of a reliable map of subsurface utilities in Singapore

This project was completed in December 2023.

Latest News

31/12/21 - Digital Underground: Imagining a digitally enabled future

19/11/21 - Digital Underground 3.0: workflows for reliable data quality

12/11/21 - Going Deeper: Leading Digital Underground into 3.0

About

Singapore is going underground. In March 2019, the Urban Redevelopment Authority of Singapore unveiled the external page Draft Master Plan 2019 to guide Singapore's development in the future. For the land-scarce city state, the use of underground space is a key strategy to create space for its growing needs. As a consequence, Singapore's already heavily developed underground space is bound to become more and more congested, with many activities and developments expected to take place.

Extensive networks of utility infrastructures exist underground, remaining unseen for most of their life spans. Reliable information on what exists where below the surface is therefore essential for the planning, administration and development of underground space. A reliable digital twin of the underground – an accurate, complete, and up to date 3D digital representation of the physical world below the surface - is needed.

The Digital Underground project is a collaboration between Singapore Land Authority and the Singapore-ETH Centre that aims to establish a reliable digital twin of all subsurface utilities in Singapore. Through research and collaboration following an integrated approach, the project aims to identify, develop, test, and recommend the workflows, supporting instruments, technology, and capabilities for the establishment of a sustainable utility mapping ecosystem.

Digital Underground consists of multiple phases. Upon conclusion of the first phase, a roadmap was delivered that details an integrated approach and strategy to achieving the desired goal. In the second phase, the foundations of the ecosystem were further developed and described, resulting in detailed recommendations for subsurface utility data governance, an infrastructure for data management and consolidation, techniques for surveying and mapping, and capability development. In October 2019, the external page Digital Underground Connect Community of Practice was established.

Digital Underground Phase 3: Workflows for Reliable Data Quality started in 2021 and is expected to run until the end of 2023. It aims to put previously developed recommendations into practice and evaluate and further refine them as workflows in pilot studies, together with utility companies, surveyors, and other key stakeholders. Furthermore, it will continue to build a thriving community of practice and public-private sector engagement and address challenges for the reconciliation of legacy data quality and the visualisation of subsurface utility data quality through new research.  

The Digital Underground project is a collaboration between Singapore Land Authority and the Singapore-ETH Centre. The project is supported by the City of Zurich, Between The Poles, Singapore Institute of Surveyors and Valuers, Esri, Bentley Systems, and Leica Geosystems.