THE TECHNOLOGICAL TRENDS AND FUTURE CHALLENGES OF POINT CLOUD PROCESSING TECHNOLOGY FOR THE MAINTENANCE OF CIVIL STRUCTURES

Abstract

There are numerous in-service structures in modern society, and establishing an efficient management scheme is an urgent issue for the sustainability of our life. The recent digital transformation technologies such as SfM and laser scanning are promising for obtaining detailed as-built information of structures. We investigated the 3D digital modeling techniques for the maintenance of infrastructures especially point cloud data. A literature review of practically used systems for infrastructural resilience management in Japan is conducted. Then, we discussed current challenges and prospects for introducing a 3D model in the maintenance engineering of structures. From the above studies, both laser scanning and structure from motion (SfM) techniques are commonly used to construct point cloud data. UAV and other mobile robot systems enhance the applicability for large-scale infrastructures. On the other hand, the cost of the system and handling large amounts of data are challenging issues, and transformation from the 3D model to structural analysis is also another issue to utilize such information in maintenance engineering.