AWWA WQTC58943

Started in 1997 as part of New York City Department of Environmental Protection's (DEP) enhanced surface water quality monitoring program, the distribution water quality testing and sampling of New York City's surface water supply systems changed exclusively to using specially designed fixed sample stations instead of internal consumer taps, fire hydrants and a small number of fixed sample stations. With such a large amount of sample locations to sample from, it is difficult for field personnel to remember the exact location of each sample station in a large metropolis like New York City. When sampling from a compliance site, a sample should be collected from the regular station, which is the middle one in an array of three. Complicated and crowded streets may confuse field personnel and result in an incorrect station, either the upstream or the downstream, being sampled. To facilitate the sampling operation and to ensure that the correct sample stations are being sampled, a small portable device can be used to assist field staffs with the following three functions. First, this device must have an identification recognition function. Second, this device has to have the capability to perform logic operation and store a certain amount of information such as date, time and field test results. Third, this device has to be able to perform a batch operation to transfer the stored information into a personal computer for follow-up operation. These requirements lead us to consider using a handheld barcode-scanning device with enough memory for storing customized programs and captured water quality field testing results. However, the barcode scanners could not immediately be used for water quality sampling when received from the vendor without conducting a great deal of additional preparation and support work being done. The preparation and support work included developing and implementing: a programming language used to develop customized application programs to run on HHP IIIe scanners; the barcode symbology used to represent the sample site index numbers; barcode label formats for both sample stations and daily assignment sheets; barcode label generating software, label medium material and corresponding label printing equipment; database management and interfacing from daily sample schedule to sample barcode label printing and sample pre-registration; and, dedicated staff to perform the above tasks. Though the preparation and support work appear trivial and tedious, our experience showed that they could be the bottleneck which sometimes hinder the entire operation. Includes table, figures.