Cost of entry into Mobile Mapping work is a considerable expense according to Lewis Graham of GeoCue from the ASPRS Hot Topics Session at ILMF 10 in Denver.

• $750 to 900K for the mapping system
• Vehicle $50K
• Production hardware $150K
• Production software $125K (can share some hardware and software if you already have airborne)

Personnel costs include the need for a driver, equipment operator and surveyor on the collection side. On the office side there’s a need for a production manager, geometric correction specialist, and at least two data collection technicians.

Mobile mapping has hit its commercial stride in 2009. As many as 10 different systems were sold last year even in a down economy.

Software is lagging now to exploit the data, but more software and solutions will emerge to speed up the data processing and visualizations of the final product.

I recently spoke with an engineering firm that has contracts with a number of small municipalities to manage their civil and sanitary engineering projects. They manage the mapping, planning, design and analysis for smaller cities that can’t afford their own in-house expertise. The manager that I spoke with indicated that the current focus on infrastructure spending, and the downturn in construction has been very good for them and their clients. Instead of cutting back, they’ve hired eight new workers in the past year.

The increase in work is due in part to stimulus spending, but also due to the bargains that can be had with many construction firms being idle. Projects that were planned and on the books at a specific budget amount can often be had right now for 20% or more off the originally estimated cost. This cost savings has spurred a great number of projects to move forward.

The philosophy of this firm was always to focus on public sector work, as the founders saw this as much more stable than development work. The decision has been a positive one for the firm in this downturn, but there’s concern that this flurry of activity is preceding a drought as many of the budgets and projects will be tapped as a result.

While aging infrastructure still poses real problems in most municipalities and good opportunities for work, a sustainable level of projects and maintenance may be difficult to achieve unless the economy stabilizes and moves toward steady growth.

Today Bentley announced the acquisition of Enterprise Informatics, Incorporated (www.enterpriseinformatics.com) and Exor Corporation (www.exorcorp.com), two key providers of infrastructure asset management software. The eB Insight software provides configuration and change management capabilities for mission-critical infrastructure asset operations for the energy, nuclear, rail, and government sectors. Exor information modeling software provides for the management and operations of linear networks for infrastructure, including roads and railways. The combined capabilities are being rolled into a new ‘AssetWise’ offering that is focused on lifecycle management.

eB Insight captures and models the relationships among both structured and unstructured information critical to infrastructure operations. Its information modeling services are able to capture, (beyond “what”), the “why,” “how,” “where,” and “when” about information objects, and can identify what may affect, change, or impact them – or be affected, changed, or impacted. Like ProjectWise, eB Insight fully leverages Microsoft technologies including SharePoint to provide broad user access to asset information.

Exor information modeling software provides for the management and operations of linear networks, including roads, railways, and water networks, as well as all components connected to them. For instance, sixty percent of all roadway miles in the U.K. are managed by Exor. The software enables owner-operators to manage multiple networks while relating structures, safety, pavement conditions, permits, and right-of-way information to the network.

Autodesk recently acquired Dynamite VSP and Dynamite SIM visualization software tools from UK-based 3AM Solutions. This software provides an easy and automated workflow for engineers that are working in Autodesk’s AutoCAD Civil 3D software to port their data directly into the powerful visualization environment of 3ds Max Design software. The tools is specifically optimized for road design and corridor modeling in the transportation market, but there are plans to extend the toolset into other domains.

The VSP part of this toolset primarily provides the connection capability for 3D visualization, retaining all of the original design detail without losing the intelligence in the model. It also contains elements that help add to the realism of the model, such as country kits with the appropriate signage and foliage for the location of the project. It also includes a wide array of “street furniture” that can be manipulated to fit the design specifications, and includes road surface textures that are automated for greater realism, including patterns of wear to make the textures more real.

Dynamite VSP includes a library of infrastructure-related content such as vehicles, signage and textures.

Allowing engineers to become design and visualization specialists in an automated way breaks some new ground. Traditionally top-quality visualization has been the realm of designers and artists, but software is slowly filling that aesthetic void. The VSP functionality offers automation and a guided view of 3ds Max so that it matches the engineers intent and domain expertise. For instance, there are tools for the engineer to control the camera that are specific to roadway visualization, allowing them to match the speed of normal travel.

The ability to quickly move into the 3D visualization environment provides a great degree of flexibility for communication and collaboration. The intuitive features of the product that don’t require a high level of artistic input means that the engineers can complete both the design and visualization work themselves, and have the visualization provide direct feedback that informs their model in a way that allows them to do things that you couldn’t do in a 2D environment–going beyond simply plan and profile..

The SIM component provides the ability to import and simulate traffic data so that the designer can review the performance of their design and test it against different scenarios to evaluate and optimize their design with different real-world scenarios. The analysis capabilities currently center on visual analysis, but there’s research into extending this capability to noise analysis, and other dynamic feeds such as weather.

View the following YouTube video to get a sense of the kind of visualizations that are possible with this product.

Autodesk has a vision for a fully integrated Civil BIM concept to meet the growing demand from designers and clients who are designing large multi-year projects. These customers want an integrated digital model of the whole project with interoperability between structural, civil, geospatial, analysis and visualization tools. The intent is to maintain the intelligence of the model and to manage iterative change in a the complex lifecycle of many-year projects.

In the past, the AEC community only created visualizations at crucial project phases (bid, design phase, public inquiry). Today, this community is creating visualizations at any moment possible, because it can provide insight that informs the design process and helps communicate and handle change. With these new approaches, construction on large projects is starting before design is actually finished, which saves both time and money. Having the visuals very early in the process can speed and meet the urgency of design.

Autodesk holds all the pieces to integrate all the different disciplines and design flows that take place in the AEC space. This Dynamite acquisition provides a window onto future development where the intelligence of the model is preserved, and the power of 3ds Max for visualization is tuned to the demands of a subset of users. We can expect other custom workflow tools in the future that aim for greater interoperability between tools and greater collaboration.

Few places in the world are as meticulously planned as Singapore, and with their latest land use plan, the public will be active in the planning process. The Concept Plan is undertaken every ten years, and each plan determines the land use and transportation plan that will shape the city’s development for the next 10-15 years.

To reach out to a wide spectrum of society and engage people from all walks of life in the review of the Concept Plan, the Urban Redevelopment Authority is adopting a two-prong strategy in its consultation efforts:

• Conduct in-depth focus group discussions with representatives from a broad segment of the population including professional bodies, non-governmental organisations, community groups, businesses, academia, youth, etc; and

• Offer a variety of platforms for the general public to give feedback and ideas, e.g. Lifestyle Survey, online survey, public forums and exhibition.

You can read more about this planning process via this story in The Gov Monitor.

The U.S. Department of Transportation has indicated that the agency will begin to look at livability-based funding guidelines for future projects. This move is part of the new Sustainable Communities Partnership among the Department of Transportation, EPA, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

“We’re going to free our flagship transit capital program from long-standing requirements that have allowed us only to green-light projects that meet very narrow cost and performance criteria,” LaHood told the Transportation Research Board annual meeting on Jan. 13. “Instead, as we evaluate major transit projects going forward, we’ll consider all the factors that help communities reduce their carbon footprint, spur economic activity and relieve congestion. To put it simply, we will take livability into account.”

These new guidelines will require project planners and analysts to come up with solid measures for community impact and economic development. The expanded parameters will require a tool set that’s well tuned to both community and infrastructure, so GIS will play a strong role in moving these measures forward.

Read more about this initiative and reactions in this piece via the National Journal.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has made a purchase of NAVTEQ data. The agency will use the data for their internal analysis, and also as a means to improve their Web mapping applications.

Of significant note is the use of this data for the large-scale pilot program called the Texas Ecological Assessment Protocol (TEAP). TEAP is a planning and screening-level assessment tool that uses GIS data to identify ecologically important resources throughout Texas. The results of the TEAP can be used in project planning (i.e. scoping, alternatives analysis), to determine appropriate areas to conduct detailed field investigations, and in mitigation discussions to avoid ecologically important areas, minimize impacts to those areas, and compensate for unavoidable impacts. The NAVTEQ data will be used to describe how resistant specific areas are to changes in the amount of emissions. Critical to this calculation are the number of roads in the area, and the amount of traffic on those roads.

For more information about TEAP, see http://www.epa.gov/region6/6en/xp/enxp2a4.htm.

The project to transform Union Station in downtown Denver in a multi-modal transportation hub will begin construction this week, and there’s a new website to mark this progress. Currently the station houses Amtrak rail service, with the redesign making the station a hub for four new commuter rail lines that are part of the FasTracks project. The redevelopment work on the station is a $500 Million project that is expected to be complete by 2013. The new website has renderings, floor plans, history, public space plans, and real estate details.

The City of Vancouver has developed a cycling map, with the help of the University of British Columbia, that factors in such things as maximum slope restriction, least traffic pollution, most vegetated route, shortest path, and least elevation gain. The route finder also returns such details as estimated time, the amount of greenhouse gases prevented, calories burned, and overall elevation gain. They also have enabled an Earth button to see the route in Google Earth 3D.

Reading about the 2010 Mercedes E-Class Sedan is instructive because of its increasing use of sensors to improve safety. There are sensors that monitor driver habits and actions to create individual driver profiles, as well as sensors to monitor each wheel, every acceleration, and every maneuver. If the driver inadvertently drifts into the next lane, there’s a ‘Lane Keeping Assist’ that checks hundreds of variables to see if the move is intentional, and if it’s deemed accidental then the steering wheel gently vibrates to bring you back on track. There’s a radar-based adaptive cruise control that monitors the traffic around you, and if a car ahead of you slows or comes to an abrupt stop, the car maintains the same distance, including coming to an urgent stop if necessary. The car senses traffic in your blind spots and alerts you. And, there’s a headlamp feature that automatically brightens and dims your lights, with a night view assist that filters light to see in darkness or fog, beyond the range of human eyesight.

The comparison is designed to point to a number of developments in our acceptance and reliance on machine-based control for safety that can and should be extended to how we collectively approach the management of our environment. While relating automobiles to sustainability, the focus here is on this marvel of engineering, and steers clear of the fact that this is a high-priced and gas guzzling personal vehicle.

Speed and Heat

It’s not a stretch to compare individual personal safety in the high-speed and potentially chaotic environment of highway driving to the dangers that our planet faces as the global temperatures rise and repercussions are felt. At higher speeds of travel, there’s less time to react and thus greater hazards from unexpected roadway conditions or the driving mistakes of others. We strive to cushion ourselves from impacts, and engineer our vehicles to assist beyond our own sensory limitations.

Similarly, with higher temperatures on our planet, the repercussions of increased heat compound themselves as we face a tipping point where the feedback loops of decreased reflective ice and released carbon emissions accelerate planetary warming. While the problems of climate change are far more complex, there’s an acceleration taking place here that requires creative applications of technology to cushion and combat the temperature rise.

Engineered Assistance

The radar assisted cruise control and driver monitoring system are giant leaps forward for sensor performance that integrate sensor feedback to assist the driver in real time. The speed with which these systems must combine inputs to inform driver decisions bodes well for advancements in other sensor systems that require real-time response.

The fact that this system has reached production in high performance automobiles means that it will soon propagate to lower priced vehicles, and will advance the idea of smart cars. The idea of intelligent transportation has advanced, promising to one day allow us to give over complete control of our vehicles for high-speed, long-distance trips that greatly increase vehicle efficiency.

Sensor reliance in personal vehicles provides a point of advocacy for the reliance on increased sensor inputs in our environments. If we come to increasingly rely on the sensor systems in our personal vehicles for our personal safety, that trust and reliance can be transferred to the broader scale for greater reliance on sensor systems for our collective safety.

Exposing Blind Spots

We need to devise systems and solutions that can pick up on the many chaotic changes taking place around us. Each individual change in climate adds a great deal of noise about how we should respond to threats to our ocean, land use, biodiversity, economy, etc. We need to devise sensor webs to take in all the feedback of what is going on around us in order to prioritize what needs to be done.

Amalgamating sensor inputs will allow us to cut through the fog of all the changes and point to practical and meaningful changes that make a difference. The more sensors and systems that we create, the better we’ll be able to assess what needs to be done. Relating back to the vehicle on a highway analogy, perhaps we’re traveling now at 55 m.p.h. with some time to react, and some distance to those objects that threaten to crash us. We need systems now in order to deal with our rapidly accelerating state.

Human ingenuity has long strived to provide machine-based inputs and controls upon our most dangerous behaviors. While there may be some pushback on these systems due to some limitations on freedoms, the time has come to create a highly engineered system to help cushion our planet from the many impacts of climate change.