How Venerque council brought its 16 buildings into a single estate database

Venerque is a municipality in Haute-Garonne. Like any local authority, it is responsible for the upkeep, safety and compliance of its public buildings: the town hall, the school, the presbytery and the public facilities. Buildings from different periods, with different uses. It is this mix that makes the case telling, because it looks like the estate of many municipalities.

What the council lacked was a single database, easy to consult and maintain, to replace plans and data scattered in inconsistent formats. It chose frugal BIM, in other words a digital model limited to the right data, at the right level of precision.

The council chose the Essential package, which centralises the plans, equipment and fittings of its buildings, with nothing extra. A very sensible choice: first, get to know the estate. The Operational (maintenance work, safety registers) and Strategic (master plan, multi-year investment plan) packages remain open for later. The survey was carried out by 3D scan, without interrupting activity in the buildings.

These are the figures from the project carried out on the council's estate. The main gain is the end of manual re-entry. The surveys now serve as a reusable foundation for future diagnostics and works.

For Venerque, the outcome can be summed up in a few words. The scattered plans are brought together in a single, up-to-date database, where each building, each space and each piece of equipment is documented at the right level of precision. The town hall and the presbytery, which deserved to be better known, now have their spaces and equipment surveyed. And works can be planned ahead on a reliable basis, shared between everyone involved. For a council, it is the right order: first know, then plan.