Southern Land Development is a multidisciplinary land development consultancy in New Zealand, offering services across land surveying, geographical information systems, civil engineering, resource management planning, and cycle trail design and development.
Customer Story
How Southern Land Development Tracked 80,000 Project Changes Flawlessly & Preserved Profits
Southern Land Development needed a more reliable way to manage large and complex project data across the Clearview Wanaka development in New Zealand. By implementing 12d Synergy, the team improved data control, reduced administrative effort, supported remote work and confidently tracked close to 80,000 file changes across a project involving 119 residential lots and 40,000m³ of earthworks.
The Challenge
The Clearview Wanaka project involved 119 residential lots and around 40,000m³ of earthworks, making it a significant undertaking for Southern Land Development. As consultants involved in every stage of the project, the team needed to manage large and complex datasets, including 12d Model projects and CAD drawing sets, without losing control of current information, issued files or project history.
As the project evolved, administrative pressure also increased. More files, more revisions and more reporting requirements created growing risks around misnamed files, misplaced information and uncertainty over which revisions had been issued and when. Southern Land wanted to avoid spending valuable time correcting preventable human and system errors that could erode both budget and productivity.
The need for flexibility became even more important during COVID, when remote work conditions became unavoidable. The team needed a system that could support reliable data access and collaboration regardless of location.
The Solutions
Southern Land turned to 12d Synergy to create a more flexible and reliable end-to-end work environment. The platform gave the team stronger control over current project data, while also creating a more structured process for issuing large datasets to stakeholders and tracking when files were sent, by whom, and in which revision.
12d Synergy also helped improve administrative efficiency by pushing project data into Attributes, which Southern Land then used for plotting, drafting and reporting. This reduced the time spent manually generating inspection reports, completion certificates and other supporting documentation.
The platform also supported remote work across the business by managing 12d Model customisations, node files, user library files, feature code libraries and updates across Southern Land’s offices and users. This became particularly valuable when Grant Wandel continued undertaking much of his earthworks and civil design work remotely from Slovakia.
The Result
- Tracked close to 80,000 file changes across the Clearview Wanaka project.
- Supported data management for a development involving 119 residential lots and 40,000m³ of earthworks.
- Improved confidence in issued revisions and project accountability through issue sets.
- Reduced administration time for inspection reports, completion certificates and other documentation.
- Enabled flexible remote work, including international delivery from Slovakia during COVID disruption.
- Improved productivity by reducing drafting time, errors and miscommunication.
“Issuing file sets is something that I’ve found helps the process when you’ve got multiple projects running. You can just go to issue sets and say, ‘I issued that revision on this date. There is an update here.’ You know you have the latest current data. It gives you confidence … it’s really key.”
Civil Designer, Southern Land Development Consultant
Grant Wandel
A growing data environment needed stronger control
For Southern Land, the challenge was not just the volume of files. It was the commercial and operational risk created when project information became harder to control as the job progressed. On a development like Clearview Wanaka, where multiple revisions, reporting requirements and stakeholder handovers were all in play, reliable data management was essential to keeping the project moving efficiently.
That makes this case study about more than remote access or document storage alone. It is also about reducing avoidable errors, improving accountability and creating a more productive way to manage project information from end to end.
Final Thoughts
Spotlight Project: Clearview Wanaka
Clearview Wanaka involved the delivery of 119 residential lots and around 40,000m³ of earthworks, making it a substantial land development project with high demands on design coordination, file management and reporting. Southern Land Development was involved in every stage of the project, which made current, accurate and traceable data particularly important.
Using 12d Synergy, the team was able to make up-to-the-minute datasets available to key stakeholders, helping ensure that everyone had access to the latest revision and that file issue history could be checked with confidence. Across the life of the project, close to 80,000 file changes were tracked.
Reducing administrative workload and improving productivity
A key benefit for Southern Land was the reduction in administrative effort. As project data was pushed into 12d Synergy as Attributes, the team was able to use that information for plotting, drafting and reporting workflows, making it easier to generate the documentation required for project delivery.
Grant Wandel specifically noted the reduction in admin time for inspection reports, completion certificates and other routine outputs. This freed up more time for higher-value work and helped reduce the productivity loss that often comes with repetitive project administration.
Supporting remote work without losing control
12d Synergy also gave Southern Land much greater flexibility in how and where work could be done. By managing 12d Model customisations and pushing updates to users’ local hard drives, the platform helped the team maintain continuity across offices and remote work locations.
This became especially important during COVID, when Grant Wandel was overseas and continued much of his earthworks and civil design work remotely from Slovakia. He described the platform as giving the team the freedom to work from home, from the office or from anywhere in the world.
Positioned for more confident land development delivery
For Southern Land Development, 12d Synergy became more than a file management tool. It gave the business a more controlled and efficient way to manage revisions, reporting and collaboration across a live land development project.
By improving data control, reducing administrative effort and supporting remote flexibility, the platform helped Southern Land deliver Clearview Wanaka with greater confidence, stronger productivity and less risk of costly errors.
