Operations & Maintenance Service Center and Transit Maintenance Garage

The City of Asheville turned to IBI Group to support the programming and site selection for its consolidated municipal facility. To streamline and optimize the site selection process, we helped the City understand the available location options, their characteristics relevant to the project and the cost implications of each.  

Providing the City with these insights required processing and analyzing a large volume of data systematically. The City wanted to combine its Public Works, Parks, Traffic, and Facility Maintenance Divisions. Moving and co-locating these functions would create cost implications for development and ongoing operations.  

To accomplish this, we scored all parcels of available land according to a set of 11 criteria approved by the City. In scoring parcels, we used two key metrics: characteristics of the land, such as zoning and slope, and location. To assign a location score, we assessed network distance. We reviewed historical work orders provided by various City departments to understand how new dispatch locations could impact travel requirements. Each parcel’s final score combined its scores for characteristics and location. 

In conducting this site analysis, we leveraged the power of parametric design. Parametric design uses algorithms to efficiently sift through large data sets according to predetermined constraints to help decision makers rapidly solve complex challenges and recognize optimized solutions.  

After we completed the siting study for the new municipal operations center, the City of Asheville chose to engage us for a second study using the same parametric model to locate their Transit Fleet Maintenance Garage.