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Showing posts with label Ordnance Survey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ordnance Survey. Show all posts
This weeks NewScientist has a good article entilted '3D mash-up maps let you 'edit' the world. Written by Colin Barras it notes that armchair explorers who soar over 3D cityscapes on their computer may be used to the idea of maps with an extra dimension. But they are now getting accurate enough to offer much more than a preview of your next holiday destination. Accurate, large-scale 3D maps could soon change the way we design, manage and relate to our urban environments.'
We have a lot of time for the good people down at the Ordnance Survey Research Labs and they have just released an interesting video of some 3D Cities work they are carrying out:
The Telegraph has a good story on this along with a quote from Glen Hart, head of research at Ordnance Survey who states that - “Three-dimensional maps in themselves aren't new, but what we've achieved in Bournemouth is a level of accuracy and detail that's never been done before,".
The Ordnance Survey plan to roll out the rest of the UK over the next 5 years and with Google/Microsoft and various other commercial outfits also scanning our cities these are interesting times.
A whole post without a dig at the Ordnance Survey, we are almost proud :)
See also the Skape Blog for the latest news on the software, views and development.
We like the GeoInformation group here at digital urban, they have provided us with various datasets over the years - allowing work such as the LiDAR movie below possible (note the movie was captured in real-time)
As such their launch of UKMap is intriguing, UKMap forms part of a five-year programme to map over 500 towns and cities covering all urban areas with a population greater than 10,000 some 24,000 square kilometres throughout the UK.
London is the first complete UKMap city covering over 1,700 sqkm and is available on 1 September 2009. Areas to be published in 2010 include the West Midlands conurbation, Merseyside, Manchester and parts of Yorkshire.
The press release states that the UKMap is a highly detailed, feature rich mapping database, which comprises integrated map layers and attribute tables. Captured for use at 1:1,000 scale, UKMap includes buildings with 3D information, road detail including pavements, lane markings, pedestrian crossings and speed humps, a full address gazetteer, inferred property boundaries, land use coding and a wide range of points of interest. It also includes aerial photography and terrain layers.
"The technology changes of the last few years have made the creation of UKMap not only technically feasible but commercially viable. There is a growing demand for choice when it comes to mapping. We believe the time is right for the UK mapping industry to provide GIS users with that choice." says Seppe Cassettari, CEO of The GeoInformation Group.
We will have more on UKMap in future posts - we are getting more information via a sneak preview soon...
These are interesting times, as Ed Parsons notes the Ordnance Survey monopoly finally faces a challenge and that can only be a good thing.
Also of note is the inclusion of height data, finally the possibility of flexible licensing on building outlines, heights and therefore 3D cities in the UK could be upon us.
Victor Keegan, writing in The Guardian, takes a look at the number of companies working on building London as a 3D model. From high end architectual represenations to Second Life the article takes a look at the history and the gold rush to build a three-dimensional replica of London, complete with streets, shops, parks, even the underground system.
Our work is covered, although its almost six years of work we would like to forget, being ahead of the field, new planning laws about to go through and a real chance of changing how Londoners view and have a say about their city - still c est la vie, as Victor states:
The biggest - covering not just central London but an area stretching out to the M25 - is also the most bizarre: a publicly funded project that the public can't see. Built by University College in association with Connect London, it boasts 3.2m building blocks and could have gone live two years ago, well ahead of the competition, as part of Google Earth, but for our friends at Ordnance Survey, which controls the vital database refused permission. Cue the Free Our Data campaign.
This weeks NewScientist has a good article entilted '3D mash-up maps let you 'edit' the world. Written by Colin Barras it notes that armchair explorers who soar over 3D cityscapes on their computer may be used to the idea of maps with an extra dimension. But they are now getting accurate enough to offer much more than a preview of your next holiday destination. Accurate, large-scale 3D maps could soon change the way we design, manage and relate to our urban environments.'
