So, how is all that homeland security data for the 133 cities being used? Here’s one story:


In 2005, “after Des Moines hosted the National Governors Association's meeting, a disk with some of the data was given to government officials in Iowa. It contained information about buildings, trees, forests and topography.” After the event? I thought perhaps they’d want the data in hand before to prep for any issues?

That data ended up in the hands of David Croll, GIS coordinator for the city of Johnston. When flooding threatened the city this summer and intern suggested using the LiDAR data to determine the most risky areas. It worked:

"Instead of taking sandbags to 15 houses, we took them to one," he said. "It was incredibly accurate" in predicting where flooding would occur. He has since used the information for a tree inventory in the city.

- Des Moines Register

With news of two satellite launches in as many weeks and many deals around imagery in the news, it's time to look at the new data that will be available and explore how it may be delivered and used. Among the soon to be available data: red edge, a part of the spectrum that can help evaluate stress on vegetation. Join our editors as they review the facts and speculate about the future.


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I've noted before that Pictometry does a great job getting its story into local papers. That continues to be its marketing strategy. This week I found two examples:

New aerial photo system develops into government tool (Minneapolis St. Paul Star Tribune)

New kind of map proving useful (Rosemount MN, Town Pages)

The article details how DigitalGlobe collects imagery and very little on how its imagery and that of others are knit together. Amusingly, NASA is listed among a long list of "companies" that provide data.

I don't know Robert Gaskell but from what I read, he'd make a great keynote speaker at one of our conferences! He maps bodies in solar system to 40 centimeters (yes, higher res than our commercial satellites!) using tereo-photo-clinometry techniques which use light from various directions to develop 3D terrain models. From what I read there's a bit of Photosynth-y stuff going on, too: "Gaskell has created sophisticated software that combines hundreds of spacecraft images of varying resolution to produce the maps." I for one want to learn more about that!

- Astrobio.net

The news popped Thursday night. Of course the bird is not in the sky yet (it launches next week) and the imagery won't be available for another 45- 60 days. But after that assuming all is well with the satellite and receiving stations, Google will add .5 meter (corrected was: .41 meter; corrected per direct communication from Google and comment) to Google Maps and Google Earth.

No word on the price tag, but it should be a good deal: the deal stipulates the imagery not go to any other on-line mapping websites. And, if it matters, Google's logo is on the rocket.

- Reuters