In a continuing effort to educate our audience with Utility Network topics, today I will show you how to create a new circuit in GIS. By placing some features and tracing them from the source, you’ll learn how to get all the way to the end points in just few steps. Yes, you read that right! Just a “few steps!”
Create a New Circuit in GIS, Overview
Hopefully by now you are familiar with the terminology introduced by Utility Network. If so, this article should be easy to follow. If not, I recommend you go back and read the previous articles we have published so far, especially Esri Utility Network – Data Model 101 by Skye Perry, to help you follow along a little better.
I will show you how easy it is to create a new circuit in the Utility Network, using the following steps:
1) Create a new circuit in GIS (Utility Network)
2) Place some features
3) Set connections
4) Verify the work with a subnetwork trace and perform traces from the source all the day down to the end points
Let’s get started:
First, Create a New Circuit in GIS
In order to create features, we first go to the Create Features pane. Next, select your Circuit Breaker template, and place this on the map within the desire Substation. (This should feel no different than what you do today!)
Then, name your new circuit by updating it in the Subnetwork Controller: (I’ll call mine “ssp-001.”)
Second, Place Some Features
For the simplicity of this article, I’m not going to describe how to place each feature (that would take awhile). But I will tell you the features I will be placing, so you can follow along.
a) Place an Underground Three-Phase Feature going out of the substation. (Notice that we are not snapping to the Circuit Breaker. Instead, we are starting a small distance away)
b) Place a Connection Point at the start of the primary (closer to the circuit breaker)
c) Place a Riser at the opposite end of the primary
d) Place a Three-Phase Primary Overhead starting from the Riser and drop some vertices along the way (3) to snap “taps” to them
e) Tap off of the primary at the first vertex using a Tap template (set its phase to A). This will allow the main line to maintain its phasing
f) Place a single Transformer Bank
g) Place a Single-Phase Overhead (set its phase to A)
h) Place a Connection Point (set its phase to A)
i) Place a Secondary OH (A) and a Service Point at the end
j) Repeat steps (d) through (i) by using B and C phases respectively. Do place them at each vertex created in step (d)
(Note: To minimize the clicking and speed up the process, you can create templates that will allow you to place multiple features with couple of clicks)
Third, Set Your Connectivity Associations
Setting your connectivity associations will allow us to establish point-to-point connectivity, without geometric coincidence. Here are the connections for the new circuit:
a) Create connectivity association between the Circuit Breaker – Load side and the Connection Point at the start of the Three-Phase Underground Primary:
b) Create connectivity associations from the Tap to the Transformer (high side), and from the Transformer (low side) to the Connection Point. Do this for all three Taps (A, B, and C)
Fourth, Verify Your Work!
To verify our work, we will select our brand-new Circuit Breaker (Load side) and utilize the Trace Subnetwork Geoprocessing Tool:
If we have set up our connections properly, we should have a successful trace!
In addition to having the circuit name propagated, we can now perform traces on the new circuit by phase. We created some templates to perform a Downstream Trace A, B and C phases. Here are the results:
Trace A Phase:
Trace B Phase:
Trace C Phase:
I hope this article was educational! Please let us know if you have any questions or comments.
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