Utility Networks - Enterprise Deployment

LanceCole

With the separation of utility networks into separate schemas from the local government model how is it best to deploy this to an enterprise environment?  We are a small city with existing GIS data for water, storm and sewer that we are getting ready to move these items to a managed networks for each.  With ESRI removing this data from the LGIM and creating separate GDB and schemas, has a deployment guide, best practice or whitepaper been published?  Should the utility data be maintained in a separate SDE geodatabase from the core LGIM data?

HowardCrothers

There is no one size fits all answer.  The best approach could depend on factors like what you are trying to accomplish and your system architecture, so some things to keep in mind.

If you're going to deploy more ArcGIS for Water Utility configurations than it will be less deployment work if you are using the WaterUtilities.gdb schema.  But keep in mind, that schema will evolve over time.  Only update your schema to support deploying more configurations.  Don't upgrade your schema every time waterutilites.gdb or the LGIM is updated.   

As to whether you should put the LGIM schema and the WaterUtilities.GDB schema in one geodatabase or separate geodatabases, not knowing more about your implementation (other than a small city) hard to determine if it will have a measurable impact.  Keeping them separate gives you more modularity however there will be more overhead.