How Measuring Points Protect Historic US Districts: The Boston Brownstone Example.

How your vibration measurements stay consistent, even when your sensor moves.

In complex projects, what matters most isn’t the sensor itself, but the place where data is collected. That’s why you can make measuring points in Honeycomb instead of tying data to the physical device.

A measuring point stores all data for a specific location, no matter how many times the sensor is moved, replaced, or re-used elsewhere.

This gives project teams:
🔹 Clear, location-based data history
🔹 Flexibility to re-use sensors across sites
🔹 The ability to pre-set configurations building-by-building
🔹 Continuous data, even if a sensor gets damaged

Example
Protecting Boston’s historic brownstones during utility upgrades

Imagine a major utility-upgrade project in Boston’s Back Bay or Beacon Hill, where rows of 19th-century brownstones sit on old foundations, many built on reclaimed land. These structures are beautiful, and extremely sensitive to construction vibration.

A contractor needs to monitor vibrations as crews replace aging water and sewer infrastructure block by block. But the excavation work moves every few days, and placing a dedicated sensor at each house would be costly and inefficient.

Why measuring points matter here

With Omnidots’ measuring-point approach, the monitoring team doesn’t track “where the sensor is,” but “which building is being protected.” Each brownstone receives its own digital measuring point inside Honeycomb, representing the location, not the device.

As crews progress down the street:

• The team simply moves the same sensors to the next house.
• Honeycomb ensures each location keeps its unique dataset and configuration.
• Custom thresholds can be pre-set for each structure, crucial in Boston, where building conditions vary widely.
• If a sensor is damaged (snowplows, delivery trucks, scaffolding impacts), the data stays safely attached to its measuring point.

Result

With just a handful of physical SWARM sensors, teams can monitor an entire Boston block, maintain precise historical data per building, and ensure that some of the city’s most cherished architectural heritage remains protected.

While this Boston example is hypothetical, the workflow is real. It’s the same method used to protect historic canal houses in our case study.