Overview
Midcoast council located in Taree, NSW undertook an AUD18.6m transformation and relocation of an old Masters Warehouse in Taree, to create a new council head office that incorporates the council chambers, library, customer service centre, and café and meeting area, as well as incorporating an office and meeting area for 450 council staff.
The transformation of the facility started in July 2020 completing when the offices opened at the beginning of January 2021.
The Challenge
PTS was asked to assist the council in validating the current IT designs, ensure that the builds undertaken by the contractors met the needs of the council and that best practices were implemented in the installations of IT systems and services.
PTS was also engaged to project manage the Council’s IT Systems transition from its existing two Data Centres to the new Data Centre facility.
PTS worked with both the IT Project Team and the Main Contractor for the co-ordination and fit out of key facilities that supported the transitioned core IT systems.
The council elected to connect all of its IT devices to a fully secure and meshed Wi-Fi system of 37 Wi-Fi Access Points that supported both internal council employees and public who attended the facility. PTS undertook a final survey of the installed Wi-Fi system to identify areas for improvement of the installation.
The Solution
PTS undertook a review of all designs from specialist contractors, identifying areas of clarification or shortages, specifically regarding core Data Centre MEP systems, infrastructure cabling, and telecommunications services.
Remediation of shortfalls raised by PTS were addressed by the Main Contractor to meet the needs of the Council’s ongoing services.
PTS reviewed final installations and test results of the Infrastructure Services, undertook the Integrated System Testing Witness review of the Data Centre Critical Systems to ensure they were working as an integrated system, executing systematic failures across the infrastructure to ensure services were maintained.
PTS undertook the Lead in the IT Systems Migration, working with the IT Technology teams to develop a set of Run Books which when executed successfully transitioned the Council’s IT Systems to the new Data Centre ready for Day 1 operations.
The Benefits
PTS’ unrivalled expertise in the delivery of complex projects, Data Centre and IT infrastructure expertise, enabled the Council to benefit from PTS’ knowledge and experience in avoiding the common pitfalls in such complex projects resulting in zero impact to the business operations during the project.
The outcome has been an exceptional working environment where new technologies have been seamlessly implemented into a new collaborative working environment, leaving the working areas clean of clutter and cables.
The Data Centre implementation has enabled the team to implement a resilient infrastructure which has reduced the risk of service interruptions and has provided an area the council can grow into.
PTS’ expertise to validate the Data Centre design and build through witnessing the Integrated Systems Testing has provided the Council with peace of mind in knowing that the systems have been tested as a single integrated system.
Data Centre Fit Out
PTS was able to quickly collect the critical data needed to validate the new Data Centre facility design for space, power and cooling systems, ensuring sufficient air flow and sufficient resilient power was to be provisioned to support the Council’s core business systems.
PTS also validated and reviewed all IT rack designs to ensure IT layouts met industry best practices.
PTS undertook the witnessing of the final Integrated System Test to ensure that the Data Centre met the minimum industry standards, and that the Data Centre environment did not place the Council’s IT systems at risk of damage due to malfunctioning systems.
The Challenge
The challenges in maintaining continued support in a project that was delivered under strict COVID restrictions, ensuring that services were delivered before the main facility was ready and that the room was maintained in a clean environment to support the pre-installation and configuration of core IT Systems.
Once all systems had been tested including IT failover testing only then could the transition of systems be co-ordinated with the IT Technology Teams whose normal roles were Business As Usual support and were new to the supporting a full Data Centre Migration.
