Position 69

February/March 2014 – No. 69

The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information

NEW EXECUTIVE DIRECTION THE GIS GAME PLAN THAT’S SAVING COUNCILS MILLIONS

Official publication of

inside DIY Spatial Doing spatial your own way

Volunteer surveyors

Surveying for speed

Helping the poorest countries

Surveyors aid in the land speed record

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contents

February/March 2014 No.69

page

26

36

16

page

page

Features 14 Cover Story: Councils’ new GIS game plan

32 Beyond the GPS

Organisation-wide spatial strategies have seen the use of GIS in local government burgeon.

16 Napier’s unique assets

CRCSI research into the potential of GNSS demonstrates why we need more than one satellite navigation system.

36 Surveying for the World Land Speed Record

The world-heritage nominated city has upgraded its asset management system.

20 3D GIS spectacular

Land Surveys is using the latest in high-accuracy survey equipment to find the perfect site for a World Land Speed Record attempt.

40 Putting GoGet on the map

The City of Sydney discovered the economic impacts of its New Year’s Eve fireworks display with the help of 3D GIS.

24 Train systems go Melbournes’ first new major rail line in 80 years is challenging engineers, surveyors and builders alike.

26 For profit or not-for-profit – transferrable spatial skills Volunteer design professionals are working in the world’s poorest countries to design, update, and expand community facilities.

GoGet has built a suitable spatial system without using spatial software.

Regulars 4 7 8 12 43 46

Upfront, Calendar Editorial News Company News New Products SSSI

www.spatialsource.com.au 3

upfront

Upcoming Events 7 November 2013 - 10 March 2014: Mapping Our World exhibition; Canberra, ACT. www.nla.gov.au/ exhibitions/mapping-our-world.

THE VOYAGE OF THE PEQUOD The Voyage of the Pequod is one of a series of twelve literary maps based on British and American literary classics produced by the Harris-Seybold Company of Cleveland, Ohio, between 1953 and 1964.

The map follows Captain Ahab’s doomed voyage in Herman Melville’s American classic, Moby Dick.

The ship sets out from New England, moving down the Atlantic Ocean between West Africa and South America, around the Cape of Good Hope to traverse the Indian Ocean in a northeasterly direction, passing between Java and Sumatra and past the Philippines into the Pacific Ocean, then sailing south to meet its fate somewhere off New Guinea.

What makes this map interesting is that the story’s narrative is overlaid onto the crew’s geographic voyage. Illustrations depicting various key scenes, are fixed

upon a startlingly coloured track that moves closer to its final blood red as the tale becomes increasingly grim and Ahab grows nearer to his deathly prize.

The map formed part of a calendar printed for the purpose of advertising the capabilities of the Harris-Seybold Company’s lithographic printing equipment. Illustrator Everett Henry was a well-known New York commercial artist also noted for his mural paintings.

Interestingly, one of the story’s main characters, Starbuck, lent his name to the coffee chain that we are all familiar with, after the initial proposal – of naming it after the ship Pequod – was rejected by some of the company’s founders.

The original copy of the map now resides at the Library of Congress. http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/ tri064.html

13-14 February 2014: High precision GNSS workshop; Sydney, NSW. http://bit.ly/1foF91q 17-19 February 2014: International LiDAR Mapping Forum; Denver, Colorado. www.lidarmap.org/ international.

25 February 2014: Remote Sensing & EO Fields Seminar; Sydney, NSW. http://bit.ly/1foERHC 26 February 2014: GeoNext; Sydney, NSW. www.geonext.com.au 27 February-1 March 2014: GPSGlonass-Beidou sat nav workshop; Brisbane, Qld. http://bit.ly/1foFmle 18 March 2014: Business Leadership Seminar; Sydney, NSW. www. corporategis.com.au/seminar.htm 7-9 April 2014: LOCATE 14; Canberra, ACT. spatial@ret.gov.au.

5-7 May 2014: ANZ Disaster & Emergency Management Conferece; Gold Coast, Queensland. http://anzdmc.com.au.

5-9 May 2014: Geospatial World Forum; Geneva, Switzerland. www.geospatialworldforum.org/2014.

15 May 2014: FME World Tour; Melbourne, Vic. www.1spatial.com/ events/fme-world-tour.

16-21 June 2014: XXV FIG International Congress; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. www.fig.net/fig2014.

25-27 June 2014: Digital Rural Futures Conference; Toowoomba, Qld. www.usq.edu.au/digital-crn/drfconference.

1-4 July 2014: GI_Forum 2014; Salzburg, Austria. www.gi-forum.org

4 position February/March 2014

The problem wiTh workarounds is They’re more like long-way arounds.

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© 2013–2014, Trimble Navigation Limited. All rights reserved. Trimble, the Globe & Triangle logo, and GeoExplorer are trademarks of Trimble Navigation Limited, registered in the United States and in other countries. Flightwave and Floodlight are trademarks of Trimble Navigation Limited. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. PN GEO-008

The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information

Publisher Simon Cooper Editor Charles Pauka charles@intermedia.com.au Journalist Simon Chester Graphic Designer Alyssa Coundouris National Advertising Manager Troy Hale thale@intermedia.com.au Circulation/Subscriptions Chris Blacklock Production Jacqui Cooper www.spatialsource.com.au Position is published six times a year, in February, April, June, August, October and December by Interpoint Events Pty Ltd. ABN: 9810 451 2469 Address: 41 Bridge Road, Glebe NSW 2037 Ph: +61 2 9660 2113 Fax: +61 2 9660 4419 Editorial inquiries should be sent to: charles@intermedia.com.au Advertising inquiries should be sent to: thale@intermedia.com.au Ph: +61 2 8586 6103 Designed and produced by The Intermedia Group, 41 Bridge Road, Glebe NSW 2037 Position is available via subscription only. To subscribe visit www.intermedia. com.au, phone 1 800 651 422 or email: subscriptions@intermedia.com.au.

Subscription rates and information can be found on page 51.

Reprints from Position are permitted only with the permission of the publisher. In all cases, reprints must be acknowledged as follows: ‘Reprinted with permission from Position Magazine’, and must include the author’s byline.

The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the publisher.

Supported by

from the editor T

he news from McCrindle Research that surveying is the smartest choice for prospective students in which to enrol (read about it at http://tinyurl.com/odvrorq), ranking it as ‘Australia’s most underrated degree’ will probably put a wry but knowing smile on those in the industry, rather than come as a surprise.

This is because not only are surveying firms continually battling to recruit well-rounded graduates, but also as many in the industry and academia have already recognised, the profession must be proactive in communicating its attractions to the workforce of tomorrow to fill present and future vacancies – hence programs run by the Surveying and Spatial Sciences Institute (SSSI) as well as ‘Destination Spatial’ and ‘A Life Without Limits’.

Like with so many other things in life, it is perceptions and set-in-concrete ideas against which the profession is battling. The notion of surveyors in the public’s mind is of the men in fluoro vests standing by an unwieldy tripod. While cadastral surveying forms an important part of the surveyor’s task, it is just one of many duties a graduate may find themselves doing. In fact, after graduating, their degree could mean working with roads, mapping, oceanography or something with volcanoes – the possibilities are virtually endless.

As this issue of Position magazine illustrates, the spatial industry is as diverse as the Earth is large, and those who dedicate themselves to the profession can find themselves in far-flung places dealing with people of a multitude of nationalities – working to assist with the construction of a new hospital as part of an aid project in Guatemala, providing 3D visualisation to improve the public’s viewing experience for the celebrated Sydney NYE fireworks, or helping lay the groundwork for the Australian World Land Speed Record attempt in the desert.

Enjoy reading your February/March issue of Position magazine, and if you know any young people who may be trying to decide what to do with their working lives, pass it on – you may attract another young mind to the world of spatial.

Charles Pauka Editor charles@intermedia.com.au

Coming soon April/May 2014 Emergency and disaster management – UAS – Defence – Surveying Special June/July 2014 GIS in local government – Utilities – Cloud computing – Hydrography

On the cover Councils’ new GIS game plan Organisation-wide spatial strategies have seen the use of GIS in local government burgeon. www.spatialsource.com.au 7

news GeoNext is nearly here GeoNext 2014 is fast approaching, and the team has announced a host of exciting speakers, events, sponsors, and competitions.

Speakers this year include: • Nick Lowe – GoGet: Building a fine-grain transport network from scratch: what’s changed and what’s stayed the same?

• James Moody – TuShare: Unleashing the Sharing Economy: Mapping the idle assets all around us.

• Billy Haworth – University of Sydney: Social media and information communication during natural disaster events.

• Chris Rizos – University of NSW: High-Performance Indoor Positioning: Going beyond Wi-Fi and A-GNSS.

• Simon Hope – Geoplex: The geekification of GIS. …and many more. See www.geonext.com.au/speakers-for-2014 for the complete line-up.

Big thanks go to GeoNext sponsors, including mapping services giant, HERE (formerly NAVTEQ), as the platinum sponsor for this year’s conference, and silver sponsors AAM, CR Kennedy, and Pitney Bowes.

HERE will supply its detailed street network maps, via the HERE API, for use in the GeoNext GoGet Hack Contest.

As part of the panel on ‘Hyperlocal, Augmented Reality and Wearable Technologies,’ the much-hyped Google Glass will be on show, giving attendees the opportunity to try on this revolutionary device,

as well as a chance at taking home a pair for 24 hours, thanks to buildAR.com.

In addition to the exciting presentations and program, the unique networking opportunities, and state-of-theart technology on display, GeoNext conference also includes a number of supplementary events, including the

NGIS User Forum and Boot Camp, as well as the GoGet Hack Contest.

GeoNext will run at the Australian Technology Park in Sydney on 26 February 2014. For more information on registering for GeoNext, or the supplementary events, visit the GeoNext website at www. geonext.com.au.

Dr Neil Williams recognised with award The former chief executive officer of Geoscience Australia, Dr Neil Williams PSM, FTSE, has been awarded the Australian Academy of Science’s prestigious Haddon Forester King Medal, in recognition of a long and distinguished geoscience career.

The Haddon Forester King Medal is awarded every two years to acknowledge original and sustained contributions to the Earth sciences in

Australia, particularly relating to the discovery, evaluation and exploitation of mineral deposits including hydrocarbons.

When Dr Williams joined the public service in 1991 he brought with him a wealth of knowledge of the minerals industry and economic geology.

He assumed leadership of Geoscience Australia’s predecessor the Australian Geological Survey Organisation

in 1995, eventually becoming the agency’s longest serving chief executive.

Dr Williams’ contribution to his profession and public service has been previously acknowledged in several significant ways. In 1996, he was elected to the position of Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering.

In 2006, he was awarded the Public Service Medal for

Former Geoscience Australia CEO Dr Neil Williams PSM FTSE.

outstanding service in the provision of geoscientific advice to government, geoscience services, industry, and the public.

Archive of SPOT images free to researchers

SPOT 5 satellite image of Oléron, France. © CNES 2003. Distribution Astrium Services/ Spot Image.

8 position February/March 2014

The French government has agreed to open its Spot optical Earth observation data archive and distribute, free of charge to non-commercial users, Spot satellite data that is at least five years old.

The 23 January announcement by the French space agency, CNES, followed a French government commitment made 17 January during a meeting in Geneva of the 80 governments that comprise the Group on Earth Observations (GEO).

CNES said its decision was made in concert with Airbus

Defence and Space, formerly named Astrium Services, which since 2008 has been the majority shareholder in the company that commercialises Spot data.

CNES said the move to open up access to Spot imagery, which dates from 1986, “is the first major contribution from the private sector to the construction of the Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS).”

CNES has already begun processing the first selection of 100,000 images, which will be available later this year.

1500 free spatial datasets added to data.gov.au Data.gov.au has added an additional 2,503 datasets to its already extensive archives, including around 1,500 datasets consisting location information from across Australia.

The new datasets were added in collaboration with Geoscience Australia and the Spatial Policy Branch in the Department of Communications. The data is hosted by Geoscience Australia and includes current and historical data ranging from full web services to old scientific manuals.

The location information, which forms the largest part

of the new collection, breaks Australia up into a series of location tiles, and each tile has a series of data and metadata associated with it. The spatial coverage metadata will allow users to easily browse data by location.

To see datasets that relate to your location, including from the new Geoscience Australia data series, you can select an area with the map tool at the bottom of the left hand sidebar from the datasets page.

You can find the new data at https://data.gov.au/organization/geoscienceaustralia.

RTCM issues an amendment of its DGNSS standard Special Committee 104 of the Radio Technical Commission for Maritime Services (RTCM) has completed another amendment to RTCM 10403.2, the widely-used ‘Version 3’ standard for Differential Global Navigation Satellite System Services (DGNSS).

RTCM’s standard supports very high accuracy navigation and positioning through

a broadcast from a reference station to mobile receivers.

This amendment introduces an ephemeris message and a set of the new Multiple Signal Messages (MSM) for the Japanese Quasi–Zenith Satellite System (QZSS). The new signals join the GPS and GLONASS messages, as well as the recently added Galileo and BeiDou System (BDS) messages.

In this new amendment the QZSS ephemeris message contains satellite ephemeris, accuracy and health status (signal and data) information. This message could be broadcast to ensure homogenous ephemeris information is used at the reference station application and at the user equipment.

Seven new messages for QZSS are introduced in the

new Multiple Signal Message (MSM) format. The messages include compact and full messages for Pseudorange, PhaseRange, Carrier to Noise Ratio (standard and high resolution), and PhaseRangeRate.

The amended standard is available from RTCM at its secure online publication store.

Visit www.rtcm.org and click on ‘Publications.’

McCrindle Research finds surveying is Australia’s most underrated degree According to a recent study by McCrindle Research, surveying is the smartest choice for prospective students to enrol in, as nine out of ten graduates found full time work in their chosen field, with a median starting salary of $52,000. This ranks it as ‘Australia’s most underrated degree.’

The same study found psy-

chology to be Australia’s most overrated degree, with only 63 per cent of psychology graduates finding full-time work in their chosen field, and with a paltry median starting salary of $47,500.

While the surveying industry has been aware of the skills shortage that it faces, and has created several initiatives to

try and address this shortage, including Destination Spatial (www.destinationspatial.org) and A Life Without Limits (www.alifewithoutlimits.com. au), it’s great to see recognition of the problem reaching public channels.

Hopefully, with the findings of McCrindle Research, the shortage won’t last much longer.

Speakers announced for Locate14 The new Australasian spatial and surveying industry conference, Locate14 – which combines the previous spatial@gov Conference, the Surveying & Spatial Sciences Conference (SSSC), and the Asia- Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards (APSEA) – has announced some of its key speakers.

Among the speakers presenting at the event is: • Keynote speaker: Drew Clarke PSM, secretary of the Commonwealth Department of Communications.

• Conference closing speaker: Rachael Robertson, former Antarctic expedition leader, chief ranger and leader with

20 years of ‘extreme’ leadership experience.

• Topic speaker: ‘Locating the Digital Economy’: Denise McKenzie, executive director, Communications and Outreach for Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) UK. Locate14 will be held at the

National Convention Centre in Canberra from 7-9 April 2014, and will be a forum to connect with industry leaders and to learn about new advancements in the industry, IT and government.

For more information, including registration, visit www.locateconference.com. www.spatialsource.com.au 9

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Images: Stephen Lead

Pre-show Forum NGIS Google Maps for Business User Forum 25th February – 8:00am to 12:00pm

26th February 2014 Australian Technology Park, Sydney

Be informed, be inspired, be connected.

Join the extended Geo Community at GeoNext – a conference on location-based technology & business. GeoNext is aimed at all practitioners of location-based technology. The audience will comprise experts from the fields of GIS, mapping, mobility, software development and business – anyone with an interest in the next evolution of geo and the opportunities it brings.

Join the conversation with leading developers, businesses and entrepreneurs, and learn about the future of location technology, data sharing, the latest location start-ups and much more.

Register now at www.GeoNext.com.au or phone 1300 789 845 Platinum Sponsor

Event Partner

Silver Sponsor

In association with GeoNext, NGIS Australia would like to invite you to attend NGIS and Google Maps for Business User Forum.

Learn from experts. Google Geo technology experts from Google and NGIS will provide insights into the latest from Google Maps for Business. Listen to how Google technology is being used within Australian industry and government. See demonstrations from high profile organisations. Share your ideas with other Google Users. Network with the industry’s leading developers.

Light refreshments provided. Cost - $110 + GST

NGIS Google Tech Boot Camp 25th February – 1:00pm to 5:00pm Google Tech Boot camps @ NGIS are dynamic and collaborative technical experiences lead by our senior technical specialists.

Google Tech Boot camps are not your usual workshop as they encourage innovative and thought provoking discussion specific to YOUR applications and spatial systems. Google Tech Boot Camp will include hands on live demos using Google Maps Engine and Google Maps API applications where attendees will learn how to publish their own data in real time. Lunch and refreshments provided. Spaces are limited. Book early to secure your seat today! Cost - $295 + GST

Full Day: $345 +GST - NGIS Google Maps for Business User Forum + NGIS Google Tech Boot Camp.

Forum Sponsor

Map Gallery Sponsor

Media Partners

The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information

Supported By

For complete program visit www.GeoNext.com.au Speakers include: Building a fine-grain transport network from scratch: What’s changed and What’s stayed the same?

Nic Lowe - GoGet Launching Australia’s first car share service with cars that had no ‘home’. Working out how to map members to cars and demand to supply. Developing tools and systems to manage over 1250 vehicles in close to 1000 locations. Refining the human/machine mix to solve both simple and complex service delivery issues On the bus in the network city: the politics of real-time public transport information

typical response to the problems associated with ageing to relocate the individual. In this presentation we explore an approach that could help to link key components of these systems and permit older people and their advocates to engage directly with this interconnected system.

Aspects of spatial science can support community-based ageing by linking and visualising varied components of the spectrum of organisations and services that engage with older people. The result is a ‘virtual earth’ model of population ageing, dementia projections and health and social support infrastructure. Developed using a variety of data sources, the model links population data, epidemiological data and health and social support information to create a virtual environment for inquiring on the current and future implications of population ageing.

Dr Kurt Iveson - University of Sydney In a growing number of cities, smart phone users can access real-time information about the location of public transport services. While these real-time transport apps make use of a combination of locative technologies, they are also the product of combinations of actors making political choices. This presentation will unpack the politics of these real-time transport apps. Using Sydney as a case study, it will chart the range of choices that have shaped the development of real-time transport apps over the last decade, focusing especially on the way that locational data is collected, accessed, licensed, distributed and displayed. The presentation will then discuss the impact of these choices on the public transport experience for users and staff, drawing attention to the ways in which the interests of some actors have been prioritized while others have been marginalized. It will conclude by offering some thoughts on the implications of the analysis for future developments in real-time transport information.

Unleashing the Sharing Economy: Mapping the idle assets all around us James Moody - TuShare How efficient is a car? How much of the food we grow goes to waste? Many of the things that we take for granted around us are much more inefficient than we first thought. This presentation will look at the hidden inefficiencies and idle assets all around us and how individuals and companies are starting to tap into this hidden value through collaborative consumption.

High performance Indoor Positioning: Going Beyond Wi-Fi and A-GNSS Professor Chris Rizos - University of NSW High accuracy and high availability indoor positioning is required in many applications, including warehouse automation, disaster and crisis management, goods and product tracking, and pedestrian navigation in indoor or urban environments where GNSS fails. Locata is a ground-based GNSS-like navigation system which can transmit ranging signals at several frequencies in the 2.4GHz Industrial, Scientific and Medical (ISM) radio bands. The same band as WiFi. Locata has been used in open-cut mines as well as several airborne tests to augment GNSS. The latest development is a beam-forming antenna technology that delivers multipath-mitigated measurements that can be used for both positioning and orientation determination. In this paper, the results of the most recent indoor tests in late 2013 will be presented.

The test results indicate that Locata can be used in the severe multipath indoor environment to support high accuracy, high reliability navigation.

New Location Perspectives in Retail - In the Zone Kolt Luty - Pitney Bowes Software This presentation explores key challenges and trends in the retail sector that are heavily influenced by location. Included are recommendations, solutions and examples of Location Intelligence in practice. Australia is changing, which creates challenges for bricks and mortar retailers that need to maintain the right product mix, in the right place, to the right market segments, at the right time. It is more important than ever to get location intelligent. We explore physical store location in relation to consumer mobility.

Ageing in Place and Space: Spatial Strategies for Ageing Societies Hamish Roberston - University of NSW The majority of older people want to age in place, in their own homes and within their own communities. Yet it is a

Social Media and information communication during natural disaster events Billy Haworth - University of Sydney Communication is of high importance during natural disaster events. Communication among community members and authorities becomes vital for effective disaster management. The rise of social media and various other location technologies allows for a new context in communication and information sharing. Individuals have used social media to share images of disaster impacts, coordinate relief efforts, send cries for help, and express support for family and friends and those effected. Officials have begun embracing social media to issue disaster planning information, warnings, and status updates.

Recent disaster events in Australia have been characterised by an unprecedented use of social media, including the 2010/11 Queensland floods and the 2013 Tasmania bushfires. This study examines two of these examples to assess the contribution of this new communication platform for disaster management.

The Geekification of GIS Simon Hope - Geoplex The pace of change in technology is having a huge impact on the GIS space. This disruption is forcing traditional organisations to rethink their approach to GIS delivery. In this presentation we’ll discuss real examples of how techniques and practises, inherited from the broader technology and innovation space, are filtering into the GIS space. We’ll look at how cloud solutions offer a more agile and nimble approach to traditional monolithic spatial data infrastructures.

We’ll examine software delivery techniques we’ve put into practise to allow organisations to scale and manage large spatial applications. Finally we’ll talk about some interesting software innovations and how they’re beginning to have an impact in the spatial world.

Wearable Technologies Panel Discussion Paul Kouppas - Explore Engage Elliot Duff - CSIRO Rob Manson - buildAR.com Race for the Geospatial Overworld Rohan Fernando - HERE Today in behind the scenes of our everyday lives there is a multibillion dollar race to build a Geospatial Overworld – a spatially precise virtual representation of our real world in complete 3D and updated in real-time. The Geospatial Overworld, more commonly called Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI), deliver advanced interactive digital maps and map-related functionality as a holistic service. SDI’s are available for people and businesses to integrate myriad applications, services and platforms through a suite of Application Programmer Interfaces, middleware and on-demand web services. The foundation of SDI’s are the highest quality and most up-to-date maps, which evolve constantly to reflect real-world changes. These updates include data collected by global teams of professional geographic analysts as well as anonymous data collected automatically from many dynamically interactive systems around the world, including each of us. This presentation discusses the Race for the Geospatial Overworld and how SDI’s will change our lives.

GeoRabble Networking Reception

company news Jacobs completes merger transaction with SKM SKM CEO and MD Santo Rizzuto.

US-based Jacobs Engineering Group has completed its merger transaction with Australian firm Sinclair Knight Merz (SKM), in accordance with previously announced terms.

Jacobs purchased SKM for approximately AUS$1.3 billion in cash. The purchase price reflects an enterprise value of AUS$1.2 billion plus adjustments for cash, debt and other items.

In making the announcement, Jacobs president and CEO Craig Martin stated: “The combination of Jacobs and SKM further diversifies our geographic offerings and the end-markets we serve. We

look forward to integrating the two companies and see many excellent opportunities ahead to support our clients, develop our people, and grow our business.”

SKM CEO and managing director Santo Rizzuto added: “We are very enthusiastic about our future with Jacobs.

Being one integrated company increases opportunities for our employees to build their careers in a range of disciplines around the world. We have significantly expanded our geographies and capabilities. The benefits we can deliver now that our companies are joined allow us to serve our clients better and in more places.”

Altus welcomes Clement Ogaja as GNSS support engineer Californian-based GNSS surveying equipment manufacturer, Altus Positioning Systems, has appointed ex-Geoscience Australia employee Clement Ogaja as its GNSS support engineer.

Ogaja brings over 10 years of experience in GPS/GNSS, geodesy, surveying, GIS and mobile computing. Before joining Altus, he was assistant Professor of Geomatics Engineering at California State University in Fresno. Prior to that, he worked at Geoscience Australia with the Space Geodesy team in Canberra.

“Clement brings a depth of experience to an already great support team that will give Altus customers even more of the quality support and valued partnership they’ve come to expect and rely on,” said Neil Vancans, CEO and president of Altus Positioning Systems.

Ogaja earned a degree in surveying/geomatics from University of Nairobi and a Ph.D. in GNSS from the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.

Parsons Brinckerhoff wins ‘Large Firm of the Year’ At the 2013 Consult Australia Awards for Excellence in Melbourne last December, Parsons Brinckerhoff won the ‘Large Firm of the Year’ award, and was awarded Gold for its Diversity Agenda.

Speaking from the awards dinner, Parsons Brinckerhoff president and chief operating officer for Asia Pacific Guy Templeton commented: “Every award received tonight gives us cause to be proud. The ‘Large Firm of The Year’ accolade in particular recognises our company’s collaborative ethos and the way in which our projects, our people and our processes support our clients, partners and stakeholders, all of whom have contributed to these successes tonight.”

Additional wins on the night included: gold ‘Collaboration’, ’Development of People’ and ‘Client Focus’ categories and Highly Commended for ‘Technical Innovation’ to the Origin Alliance for the delivery of the $1.95 billion Ipswich Motorway Upgrade: Dinmore to Goodna (D2G) Project. The alliance comprised

12 position February/March 2014

Part of the Ipswich Motorway Upgrade: Dinmore to Goodna (D2G) Project.

Parsons Brinckerhoff, SMEC Australia (SMEC), Abigroup Contractors, Fulton Hogan, Seymour Whyte and the client, the QLD Department of Transport and Main Roads (DTMR).

Another gold ‘Safety in Design’ went

to the Parsons Brinckerhoff and Arup Joint Venture (PBA) for the work on the combined Airport Link, Northern Busway (Windsor to Kedron) and Airport Roundabout Upgrade projects (Airport Link).

cover story

Councils’ new GIS game plan Organisation-wide spatial strategies have seen the use of GIS technology in local government burgeon, with million dollar savings now enticing a new breed of executive advocates.

T

hough once considered a niche software known only to an elite band of highly skilled professionals, Geographic Information System (GIS) technology has undergone a transformational change in recent years, particularly within local government.

The intelligent mapping technology has now become such a pervasive, essential tool to councils, it can be downloaded as an app from iTunes to report graffiti; used by disaster response volunteers in emergencies; and provide a snapshot of council activities to executives.

Anyone can access council GIS apps on their smartphones or navigate interactive, online maps to search for information once only available in dusty archives and expensive hard-copy reports.

Out in the field, council workers use GIS technology via tablets or laptops to record data and respond to maintenance issues and emergencies in real-time.

“The flood map provided millions of people around the world with a comprehensive, real-time picture of the 2011 flood crisis as it unfolded – and it made the true capabilities of intelligent mapping technology relevant and highly visible to a mass audience.

“Most councils now use GIS daily to manage asset maintenance; aid development planning, economic management and service delivery; and coordinate education campaigns.

Esri Australia managing director Brett Bundock.

“Executive management is increasingly involved in establishing spatial strategies that streamline workflows, maximise efficiencies and increase return on investment...” – Esri Australia managing director Brett Bundock.

And within offices around the country, hundreds of thousands of council staff – from customer service teams to senior management – use spatial technology daily to map and visualise information, improve internal efficiencies and support decision making.

In fact, the use of GIS technology is now so prevalent in the sector that 85 per cent of councils provide all areas of their organisation with access to spatial applications (source: 2013 GIS in Local Government Benchmark Study).

Brett Bundock, managing director of GIS specialist Esri Australia, says there has been a significant shift in recent years in how councils use spatial technology, brought on largely by a growing awareness of GIS capabilities.

“In Australia, the real turning point for GIS technology use in the sector was in 2011, with the release of the Brisbane City Council Flood Map.

14 position February/March 2014

“It’s come to the point where the technology is so entrenched in local government operations that its management no longer rests solely within GIS departments.

“Council executives are increasingly involved in establishing spatial strategies that streamline workflows, maximise efficiencies and increase return on investment (ROI) through the delivery of geographic insights.”

Mr Bundock’s sentiment is echoed globally, with executives at King County – a local government authority in the United States – recently gaining international recognition for saving their organisation more than a billion dollars with GIS. Under the direction of CIO Bill Kehoe, King County enlisted a ROI study to determine the exact value GIS delivered to the organisation – with the findings indicating that over an 18 year period, the local government accrued new benefits of up to $1.7 billion.

“Our GIS service is an example of a high-performing IT service that is providing a large amount of customer efficiency for the investment,” said Mr Kehoe.

“The GIS service is a model that we want all our services within King County IT to aspire to.”

A new council focus Locally, CEO and CIO are also looking to GIS as a way to generate million-dollar savings – as well as a means to increase productivity in their own roles.

“Our CEO is a daily user of GIS – and has an appreciation of the significant efficiencies spatial technology delivers to our council and community,” says Rod Woodford, manager geographic services at City of Bayswater.

“All the senior management team use GIS daily for everything from understanding community demographics to ensuring our internal departments are operating as efficiently as possible.

“Our spatial strategy has focussed on establishing GIS technology as the ‘go-to’ tool for all staff and integrating it with every one of our technology systems – be it finance, property, assets or fleet management.

“GIS has become so entrenched in every facet of our council that when staff come to work in the morning, it’s one of the first applications they access.”

It’s not only staff that use City of Bayswater’s GIS – with the council also providing access to their wider community.

The council’s award-winning Interactive City Maps website draws on GIS to make property, service and infrastructure information available to the public at the click of a mouse.

“Years ago, I think some people were worried GIS was too complex – but the technology has evolved to a point where it’s completely intuitive and actually makes their job much easier,” said Mr Woodford.

“At the end of the day that’s what our spatial strategy has been dedicated to – enabling greater productivity across the organisation, by providing quick and easy access to all council information.

“Moving forward, with the support of our senior management, our GIS department will continue to ensure the technology serves as the foundation for all business activities.”

Brisbane City Council’s Flood Map highlighted the powerful capabilities of GIS to millions of people globally.

City of Bayswater’s corporate spatial viewer is accessed by hundreds of staff, including council’s executive management, daily.

Connecting government The appeal of spatial has not escaped the notice of higher levels of government, with state and federal ministers exploring how they too can leverage GIS to streamline workflows and provide councils themselves with improved access to information.

The Queensland Government recently used GIS to deliver a cross-council online stock route management system, with Minister for Natural Resources Andrew Cripps praising the technology for enabling timelier and more transparent management of Queensland’s 2.6 million hectare stock route network.

“In the past, councils had to rely on the bush telegraph to find out if routes were open or closed, in good condition or poor, and if watering stations along the routes were operating,” said Minister Cripps.

“Councils will now be able to better manage the network in their area, ensure the more heavily used routes are prioritised for maintenance and can highlight which sections of the network can be

made available for grazing when there is little demand for use by travelling stock.”

The Esri web-based system integrates local government and state government data to clearly show the location of all travelling stock traffic as well as highlight which routes are closed due to lack of pasture or water.

“GIS technology is widely acknowledged for delivering considerable productivity gains to organisations; however, this is the first time the technology has been used to provide all councils with a single, state-wide view of stock route information,” Mr Bundock said.

“The technology delivers an unprecedented level of clarity and precision to support decision-makers – whether they’re determining the most appropriate route for cattle movements, or issuing travel permits to stock owners.

“In terms of GIS technology deployment, this system is a true paradigm shift – and it will no doubt serve as a blueprint for cross-organisational collaboration in other sectors.”

Cross-organisational collaboration may soon be on the rise, with the 2013 GIS in Local Government Benchmark Study

finding that 95 per cent of respondents believe there should be a greater capacity for councils to share information with other councils and with other government departments.

According to Mr Bundock, facilitating greater integration and collaboration will be the next major priority for councils and a key focus of their spatial strategies.

“It’s clear the focus and challenge for Australia’s local governments is integration – whether that’s integrating GIS with core business systems, integrating council departmental silos, or integrating data across all levels of government,” said Mr Bundock.

“Cross-government information access and sharing is considered one of the enduring challenges facing councils.

Encouragingly, the collective view of the benchmark study’s participants is that multi-agency collaboration – facilitated by GIS technology – is inevitable.

“As council executives actively participate in these initiatives and cross-agency collaboration continues to rise, so too will the benefits it delivers.

“Individual councils will realise significantly greater efficiencies, and their residents will in-turn reap the rewards – whether it’s improving emergency response through creating a shared view of a cross-state bushfire crisis, or facilitating the amalgamation of local governments in Western Australia.”

To download a copy of the 2013 GIS in Local Government Benchmark Study, visit esriaustralia.com.au/benchmark-study. ■ www.spatialsource.com.au 15

feature

Napier’s unique assets SIMON CHESTER

N

apier City Council governs the seaport city of Napier, located on Hawke’s Bay on the eastern coast of New Zealand’s North Island.

In addition to Napier City, the Hawke’s Bay region consists of Wairoa District, Hastings District, and Central Hawke’s Bay District, as well as the town of Taharua in Taupo District and the town of Ngamatea in Rangitikei District. These cities form the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council.

Napier city has a population of 58,800, and, thanks to its UNESCO World Heritage nominated Art Deco architecture, attracts around 1.5 million visitors a year.

Napier’s unique concentration of 1930s Art Deco architecture was built after much of the city was destroyed in the 1931 Hawke’s Bay earthquake. The earthquake – measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale – and the ensuing fires not only destroyed the centre of Napier, but caused radical changes to the surrounding landscape, adding about 4000 hectares of land that was previously under the sea.

This wholesale destruction resulted in a massive reconstruction of the town centre during the 1930s. Napier became New Zealand’s newest city, consisting almost entirely of its own version of the popular Art Deco style.

During the 1980s, recognition of the uniqueness of this pocket of Art Deco architecture grew, resulting in the formation of the Art Deco Trust in 1985, and culminating in a UNESCO World Heritage nomination in 2007 – the first cultural site in New Zealand to be so nominated.

Napier City Council switched to a GIS from its paper-based asset management system in 1997. The GIS, known internally as ‘WorkIT’, was a heavily customised GIS product, with additional tools based on the CAD functionality of Bentley’s MicroStation. However, over the following decades, it became clear that improvements were needed.

“We had been looking around for replacement products since about 2005 when we started to see limitations with the products used within the existing solution,” said Ian Tidy, GIS developer and analyst for Napier City Council.

Utilities and services In addition to maintaining the Art Deco heritage of the city, Napier City Council also provides potable water, wastewater collection and treatment, and stormwater management for its residents. The associated infrastructure for this role covers approximately 105 square kilometres and includes the 463 – kilometre water supply network, 365 – kilometre wastewater network, and 216 – kilometre drainage network.

16 position February/March 2014

Slope shading of Napier Hill, blue, green is 45° and red is 90°.

“Making changes to data in the system required multiple manual steps, and manual data entry. Data was stored in an SQL database with a proprietary format that required vendor-specific products to maintain. Limited interoperability among the products used in the system made data reuse problematic.

“Our council operates two main asset management systems, where we store financial data. We wanted to consolidate our data and link the two main asset systems, and create a single source of truth for all our GIS and asset data.”

Napier City Scalable Terrain Model (STM) including LOD1 buildings looking north towards Napier CDB and Napier Hill. As users zoom towards the hill, the triangulation of the STM changes, revealing more detail.

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“In December 2009, we obtained approval to purchase the new products and proceed with the upgrade.”

And so, the NZD$100,000 WorkIT II project began.

Major pieces of existing software were replaced, including the GIS platform, infrastructure asset management system, and back-end database. New software was configured based on data models for all of the city’s features, and in such a way that data could be repurposed to work with other software products.

An Oracle database provided the single source of truth. Bentley Water and Bentley Map were used to maintain the data within Oracle. Bentley Geo Web Publisher provided web services for other applications to read the data in a number of file formats.

“Using a common data maintenance framework improved data flow between applications and enabled the management of data for all assets in a consistent manner,” said Ian. “With Bentley products as the common framework, data was now reusable.”

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feature A simple shading and shadow generation of the Napier STM.

Benefits realised

Photo: CC BY-SA 2.0 Flickr user yashima.

Bentley Water was used to enforce business rules and prevent unauthorised staff from making changes to financial information. The Oracle database tracks data changes and manages a full audit of all changes, both spatially and non-spatially.

As a result, every change is able to be tracked back to the original change request, authorisation, and paper documentation.

“Bentley Map was used as an alternative to the previous customised GIS product, with Bentley Water providing the additional tools required for managing connectivity between features,” said Ian. “The flexibility of the software allowed the project team to define features in as much detail as needed. The additional functionality required for managing financial information was initially developed by Bentley Professional Services, and further customised in-house

by Napier City Council staff.”

The city in 3D In addition to revamping its asset management system, the new software also allowed Napier City Council to work with 3D models.

“We primarily use 3D technology for civil engineering work,” said Ian. “We use digital terrain models created from LiDAR point clouds for engineering work, scalable terrain models for visualisation, slope and aspect analysis, shade modelling (typically hills), and we have started creating 3D views of complex infrastructural structures.

18 position February/March 2014

“Software used for 3D work is largely supplied by Bentley Systems, and includes MicroStation, Map, Descartes, Survey, Power Civil, and InRoads.”

“The initial 3D data was collected by AAM Hatch as an aerial LiDAR survey for the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council [which includes Napier City Council],” said Ian. “We have supplemented this with 3D data captured as part of our aerial photography program, as well as our own topographic surveys.

“The scalable terrain model was created from the LiDAR point files using Bentley Descartes. Discrete digital terrain models are created when needed from sections of the point files that relate directly to the area of interest by whichever tool is being used – i.e. Survey, Power Civil, or InRoads. Other 3D models are created in MicroStation. We also have 3D Buildings for the city (CityGML LOD1), which were generated and managed using Bentley Map, which allows us to also retain the attributes relating to the feature.

These are used for special visualisations and shade modelling.”

CityGML LOD1 is defined as part of the Open Geospatial Consortium’s CityGML specification. Ranging from LOD0 (2.5 dimensional DTM) to LOD4 (full model of a building, including interiors), LOD1 is a plain ‘blocks’ model comprising prismatic buildings with flat roofs (see image, top right).

“Switching to Bentley products has simplified our day-to-day work flows,” said Ian. “The products allow us to use the best tool for the job. We can swap between applications without having to translate or change file formats. We also have the flexibility for users to swap between applications for specific tasks of the same job.

For example, we created the STM with Descartes, and generated 3D buildings in Map, but we do hill shade modelling and simulation – using both the STM and Buildings – in MicroStation.

“Additionally, the software enables us to continuously reuse and build on data during the lifecycle of the assets. For instance, the initial surveys of a site may be undertaken with Survey, and then to Power Civil for the design component where pipe sizes and materials are added, then as construction is completed, this data is used for as-built drawings in MicroStation, which adds more information, and this, in turn, is used in Water for uploading and maintaining our asset management system, and then into other products for hydraulic modelling. Through each step, more and more information is added, which then feeds the next step.”

Switching to a single-vendor environment has led to cost savings, too.

“By standardising on the one suite of products, we have reduced software licensing costs by around NZD$30,000 per annum and fixed our costs by entering into a long-term agreement,” said Ian. “We have estimated time savings to be in excess of NZD$50,000 per annum. Our enterprise agreement enables us to deploy licenses and products, and undertake selfpaced and instructor-led online training for all staff without additional costs.

“Having a common platform for managing all spatial data saves time, money and all other resources.” ■

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feature

Above: Fireworks in 3D. Left: Fireworks staging locations in 3D space.

3D GIS spectacular How the City of Sydney discovered the economic impacts of its New Year’s Eve fireworks display with the help of 3D GIS.

T

he annual New Year’s Eve fireworks spectacular organised by the City of Sydney (CoS) lights up the city with more than 7 tonnes of fireworks, and attracts a staggering crowd estimated to be in excess of 1.5 million people.

Sydney’s fireworks display features a new theme each year, and is televised to millions nationally and also around the world. 3D GIS is a key part of calculating the economic and community benefits.

CoS needed to quantify the audience that can potentially view the fireworks display as accurately as possible, as well as the economic benefits. AAM was engaged to apply an innovative approach to “translate geography into audience size”.

The factors involved The potential economic benefits of this type of event are significant. In order to maximise these, it involves understanding from where the fireworks can be viewed and how many people can take advantage of these locations, whether it is from buildings or public spaces.

20 position February/March 2014

Previous studies based on event ticket sales and census figures had an assumption that the display was only visible from up to two blocks away from the harbour.

This seemed to be a conservative estimate of crowd figures as the number of people outside at event sites, parks and open space, and the number of people in buildings, houses and apartments that can see the fireworks display, all needed to be taken into consideration.

In trying to fully understand the visibility of the fireworks, CoS realised it faced a difficult and complex problem. This required an innovative solution that would stand up to critical analysis, and upon which a full economic impact study could be completed.

In the first instance, the council needed to provide the state government with a 2D map of Sydney (all LGA, not just Sydney) that shows the percentage of buildings that can see the fireworks. If they were to supply the coordinates of the fireworks barges, and the median height of the fireworks, could they conduct a view shed analysis using the 3D buildings to determine visibility?

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FACTS AND FIGURES 7 tonnes of fireworks.

814 individual fireworks.

250,000 observation points.

205 million individual visibility calculations.

• 2,000hrs, 84 days or 12 weeks of non-stop processing time.

• • • •

AAM’s 3D expertise, combined with K2Vi 3D GIS technology, was used by CoS to create a solution for calculating fireworks visibility. This included the visualisation of fireworks and the best vantage points across Sydney and surrounds. Pyrotechnic characteristics supplied to AAM were used in K2Vi 3D GIS

to determine the trajectory for each individual firework for the entire fireworks spectacular delivered from five launch points throughout Sydney Harbour.

This formed the basis of calculating the visibility of the fireworks from 250,000 potential viewing locations, with each location being scored in terms of visibility

of each individual burst of firework and its overall visibility of the spectacular.

High-quality 3D visualisation products were crucial for CoS in making sense of the millions of visibility calculations. Understanding the data in an easily digestible and visual manner not only provided the foundations for

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Left: 3D GIS analysis results showing calculation and observer points.

Below: Visibility of entire fireworks spectacular. Very good visibility is shown in white and very poor or no visibility is shown black.

the economic impact study, but also informed CoS on potential ways to maximise the benefits associated with the fireworks spectacular. Whether it was the identification of under-utilised locations, communicating with the community about vantage points or fine-tuning the fireworks spectacular, it all depended on the data being easily understood.

Spectacular results The results were astounding. A tabular file that breaks down visibility from each property parcel to each of the five fireworks staging locations formed the result.

The values provided represented the visibility from each property, with a value of one representing complete visibility of a given firework. In addition to individual return for each firework for a given property parcel, a total was also provided representing the overall visibility of all fireworks from that location. The viewing properties were also grouped by suburb.

The visibility threshold suggested by the City of Sydney that represented citizen viewing amenity was that they needed to be able to see 3/4 of the fireworks. ■

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feature

Train systems go CHARLES PAUKA

A

new railway line in Melbourne’s west is challenging engineers, surveyors and builders as they seek to build Melbourne’s first new major rail line in 80 years.

Regional Rail Link is Australia’s largest public transport infrastructure project and will expand Victoria’s rail network to remove major bottlenecks. This will be done by untangling metropolitan and regional tracks as they travel through Melbourne’s west, into the heart of Melbourne.

Dedicated regional tracks will be built from West Werribee Junction to Deer Park, then along the existing rail corridor from Sunshine to Southern Cross Station.

When completed, passengers on the Geelong, Bendigo and Ballarat lines will have a streamlined journey through the metropolitan system from Sunshine into the centre of Melbourne.

Regional Rail Link includes the construction of new train stations at Wyndham Vale and Tarneit and West Footscray, while Sunshine, Tottenham, Footscray, and Southern Cross Stations will be upgraded.

Regional Rail Link is also laying the foundations for future expansions to the train network. As a result, the new rail link will enable additional rail infrastructure to be completed: • Melbourne Metro; • Avalon Airport Rail Link; and • Rail revival feasibility study – Geelong, Ballarat, Bendigo.

These projects are currently at various states of planning and feasibility studies and will proceed subject to the outcome of the studies and funding commitments by the Australian and Victorian Governments.

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Exposure to climate change Future scenarios for urban growth Risk and consequences of bushfires Demand for infrastructure and facilities

Delivering the rail line The newly established Regional Rail Link Authority manages the delivery of the Regional Rail Link project. Due to the size and complicated nature of the scope of works, the project is being managed in partnership with Metro Trains Melbourne and V/Line. Design and construction activities are being completed by six separate project teams.

The Rail Systems Project Team is responsible for delivering the project’s signalling, train control and communications technology. The project team contracted C.R Kennedy Survey Solutions to provide the surveying instruments needed to precisely record the equipment delivered as part of its scope of works.

C.R Kennedy provided the equipment as well as support and guidance about the products, enabling the Rail Systems Team to meet its contractual requirement to record the exact location of each piece of equipment it installed.

The equipment and software used on the project are the Leica GG03 Smart Antenna, Zeno 5 and Zeno Field, and Zeno Office.

Regional Rail Link’s rail systems project engineer, communications, Elias Bou-Obeid said the challenges presented by the complex engineering task were overcome without problems.

“As part of Rail Systems’ requirements for the RRL Project, all newly installed assets and modified assets are to be accompanied by GPS/GIS co-ordinates. The Leica Zeno 5 is being used to gain mark out, confirm and record the location of assets installed in the rail corridor. The project is still running and the surveying has been ongoing since April 2013.

“Challenges included training of staff and initial start-up of the database, however, once all the initial issues were ironed out and setup, the equipment was fast and easy to use and very suitable,” Mr Bou-Obeid said.

The new line is jointly funded by the Victorian and Australian Governments, with the Commonwealth contributing $3.225 billion. The project is due for completion in 2016. ■

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feature

For profit or not-for-profit – transferrable spatial skills ANTHONY MCCLAREN

F

or as long as I’ve been a surveyor, I’ve wanted to use that skill on a global level to help people less fortunate than myself. I heard about an organisation called Engineering Ministries International (eMi) from a friend of mine who had just returned from a short trip overseas, where he was the lead surveyor on a project in Kazakhstan. It was exactly the sort of work I’d always dreamed of doing. eMi is an organisation made up of volunteer design professionals who work in some of the poorest countries in the world to design/update/expand facilities such as orphanages, schools, clean water projects and hospitals to directly impact the people living in these developing countries. Teams are brought together

26 position February/March 2014

from around the world and include architects, engineers, construction managers and surveyors who donate their time and travel costs to lend their skills to these projects and create designs that will best serve the needs of their ‘clients’.

Even though I had known about eMi for some time, it would be a number of years before I would volunteer my services to one of their teams. A hospital development project in the central highlands of Guatemala was the project team I joined in August 2013.

Guatemala is the most populated country in Central America, boasting a population of 13,276,517 across an area of 108,890 km2. Estimates say that as much as 50% of the Guatemalan population is 15 years of age or younger.

Until the arrival of Spanish settlers in the early 1500s, the indigenous Mayan people lived throughout Guatemala, Belize, Honduras and El Salvador. In more recent history, Guatemala has had its own internal struggles. In the mid 1900s, civil war and genocide had a massive impact on Guatemala, and it wasn’t until 1996 that a peace deal was brokered between the guerrilla fighters and the government.

In the late 1970s, government plans for a hydro-electric dam in the central highlands displaced many peasant farmers throughout the department of Baja Verapaz, and the land they were being compensated with wasn’t of the same quality as they’d previously owned. This area suffered some of the highest casualties of the civil war.

The project goal was slightly different to most eMi projects, in that we were charged with the responsibility of master-planning the future development of the facility.

The hospital, the Centro Medico Cristiano, La Señorita Elena, is in the department of Baja Verapaz in the town of Cubulco, some 150km by road north from the capital, Guatemala City. Since it’s the only hospital in the region, it serves the health needs of over 60,000 Guatemalans, and as such, the facility needs to stay up-to-date to continue to provide its critical service.

Our team consisted of eight volunteers including: two architects and two architectural draftsmen; a structural engineer; and myself as the surveyor; plus two postgraduate engineering interns from eMi. After touring the facility and the various properties owned by the organisation that operates the hospital (AMG Guatemala), we set about making our plans to achieve our goal in the allotted five-day timeline. As the team’s surveyor, my primary objective was to conduct a All photos by Anthony McClaren.

topographic survey on the main hospital site and road frontages. These would be delivered back to the architects to design a new, 3-storey building that would house a new outpatient exam, physiotherapy, admin offices, staff housing and a new emergency entrance.

I was pleased to be able to bring a state-of-the-art robotic total station with me. Coming from Melbourne in Australia to Guatemala is no short trip at the best of times, but carrying 45 kg of luggage with me including a total station, survey tripod and all the ancillary bits and pieces made transiting airports in the USA a lot more interesting! I’m grateful to the Trimble distributor for Eastern and Central Australia, UPG (www.upgsolutions.com), for their donation of a robotic S6 total station with TSC3 controller to me to take on this trip. Having the flexibility of a robotic instrument made working on the ground in Guatemala run a lot more smoothly. I didn’t need (much) technical assistance, and I could work a lot faster than I would have, had I been using older or unfamiliar equipment. Not only that, but it seemed to provide the local Guatemalans with an entertainment factor; seeing a 190 cm tall white guy walking around their streets with a strange instrument following his every move, got more than a passing glace from most. For the record, I was told to say “ingeniero topografía” to the locals as a rough translation for “surveyor”.

One of the major health concerns that the Centro Medico Cristiano, La Señorita Elena has is around health and nutritional education for the young people whom it serves. Up to 30% of the population of Guatemala does not even finish primary school, and as much as 32% of the population – even higher in rural areas such as Cubulco – is illiterate. Combine this with the previously mentioned population age statistics, and there is a situation where a problem seemingly as simple as health and nutrition education becomes a rolling generational issue.

The hospital already has a nutrition program for young mothers and children, but with this issue being a key focus, its plan is to further develop this part of the service to provide a complete pre-natal and ante-natal program.

Surveys of the existing conditions in properties to the north of the main hospital site that included locating boundary corners (as best as was practical) were required. The development of these sites will house a new nutrition centre and enable the hospital to begin a relationship with young families that includes everything from pre-natal OB/GYN services to birthing and ante-natal follow up, then nutrition and health education of young mothers and children.

To say the grounds in these properties were unkempt may be understating the term – any surveyor understands this joy and this surveyor also learned of the firebreathing ants of Guatemala.

Agriculture is one of the major sources of income in rural Guatemala – particularly farming corn. Maize is part of the fabric of Guatemalan culture and agriculture, even a dairy farmer will farm some corn; it makes up part of their identity. www.spatialsource.com.au 27

feature show them some of the designs we’d come up with for their hospital. A follow-up team from eMi will be visiting Cubulco again in February 2014 for further planning and design. Construction/redevelopment of the hospital will be staged, beginning with the redeveloped health and nutrition centre and the demolition of some of the older buildings to make way for new buildings.

It was a rewarding experience to use my surveying skills and knowledge to work in an eMi team and help an organisation that is working to help others. I couldn’t have done it without the philanthropic support of the Institution of Surveyors Victoria, which granted me funds to cover my significant excess baggage expenses.

Updating of the Centro Medico Cristiano, La Señorita Elena will do more for the community of Cubulco than just allow them to source better health care. The new facility will attract doctors to make the journey from the city to work in the rural region. It will provide jobs, not only for educated medical professionals, but for gar-

As such, AMG has developed an agricultural training centre at an airfield site just outside of the Cubulco township, where they train young men in both crop and dairy farming.

Methods have remained somewhat traditional over the generations, but the AMG training centre is teaching new processes and procedures (using the land at the airfield site), which allows young famers with limited land to use it to its full potential. This, in turn, maximises that farmer’s crop, which maximises his profit, which affords him and his family the best opportunity to buy their own land and begin their own farm.

The airfield hasn’t been used for its intended purpose in over two years, and most of the 20 hectares is covered in corn crop. The site is a blank canvas for AMG, but their future plans are to develop the agriculture training centre further and also to potentially sell off the area where the runway is along the northern boundary of the property. A nursing training school may also be built at this site to complement the hospital in town.

Prioritising the survey of this site to include major title boundaries (one boundary was a river), the location of the hangar and runway and some other significant features meant I could maximise my time there while still achieving the goal for this site. We may not see construction begin at the airfield for some years, but, thanks to this topographic plan, AMG now has the ability to plan.

28 position February/March 2014

For a team that was brought together from all over the world, our eMi team worked quickly and efficiently together, achieving our goals for the week. We ended the week with a community meeting for the people of Cubulco to explain to them what we had been doing and to

deners, janitors, security guards – people from the local community will benefit far more greatly than just being patched up.

We may not know for some time yet the economic impact of a new and updated hospital in Cubulco, but the impact on the people of the town will be immediate. ■

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32窶パosition窶ェebruary/March 2014

Beyond the GPS JON FAIRALL

CRCSI research into the potential of GNSS demonstrates why we need more than one navigation system based on satellites.

A

team from the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Research Centre at Curtin University has taken giant strides towards combining signals from the BeiDou and GPS GNSS. The work is part of a plan to use space technology to improve the delivery of positioning services.

The work, by Professor Peter Teunissen and co-workers, is being undertaken by the Cooperative Research Centre for Spatial Information (CRCSI). The project aims to develop improved techniques for precise point positioning based on GNSS. It builds on previous work by Prof Teunissen’s group at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands, on the integration of GPS and Galileo.

Prof Teunissen says the impact of the new satellites on the quality of the results is startling. “There are so many satellites, and they broadcast on so many frequencies, that we can afford to ignore many of the existing limitations of satellite positioning. Multi-path errors caused by the low elevation of satellites can be eliminated. The reliability of baselines can be increased. It also leads to better positioning in downtown and ‘super-pit’ type environments.

“It is even possible to do instantaneous processing – you ignore both preceding and following epochs – because the model is so strong.”

However, to obtain such results, you need to properly combine the data, he says. Much of the new work at Curtin has been in learning how to integrate the signals from the different GNSS when using mixed receivers. “Our results show that there are systematic inter-system biases between the different GNSS. We have shown how these biases can be calibrated, thus further increasing the strength of the combined GNSS model.”

In fact, Prof Teunissen’s work has shown that there are even systematic mixed-receiver biases between various parts of the BeiDou constellation itself.

Some of its satellites are in medium orbit,

some in geostationary orbit and others in inclined geostationary orbits. All of them yield slightly different results.

The Australian perspective Australian researchers are uniquely placed to make major contributions to GNSS. The continent is one of the few places on Earth where all the major GNSS constellations can be tracked. At the moment, the 14-strong BeiDou constellation is concentrated over China but, given the orbits of the satellites, there is a continuous presence over the Australian continent. BeiDou will not have a continuous presence over Europe or North America until 2020 or thereabouts.

“Australian researchers are uniquely placed to make major contributions to GNSS.” In a similar fashion, the Japanese Quasi Zenith Satellite System (QZSS) is concentrated along 140 E, more or less over the home islands of Japan and fortuitously, over eastern Australia. In the same way, the Indian GAGAN system will be restricted to the Indian Ocean region and also visible over the western regions of Australia.

Apart from the fact that Australia is blessed with an ideal location, there are powerful financial incentives to improve the accuracy of GNSS services. A report

by ACIL Allen Consulting in June 2013 for the Commonwealth Government looked at the improved productivity expected to flow to the Australian economy from precise positioning services. The report calculated that Australia’s GDP would benefit by $13.7 billion by 2020 across a range of industries. Surveying is by no means the only beneficiary. Transportation, mining and agriculture will also reap great benefits. www.spatialsource.com.au 33

feature As a result, it is no surprise that the CRCSI is interested in the development of techniques to improve the accuracy of positions derived from space. According to its website, its mission is “instantaneous GNSS/RNSS positioning, anywhere, any time, with the highest possible accuracy and the highest possible integrity.”

The techniques A persistent question about GNSS is: why is it better than GPS? After all, GPS is pretty good and with careful use, allows users to make measurements accurate to a few centimetres. Why should we be excited?

The answer is that GNSS will be so much better than GPS alone, that it will make many new applications possible. All these benefits flow from two facts: one is obvious, and one a little more subtle.

The obvious improvement is simple: more satellites. More satellites mean, in particular, more satellites high in the sky. For all the glories of GPS, with only 24 satellites in the constellation, most satellites, most of the time, are near the horizon. They are easily masked by surrounding buildings and the signals may bounce off any nearby surface to produce multi-path errors. That means that using GPS in urban canyons and in mine pits is problematic. Both of these are important and valuable application areas that have proved resistant to the most ingenious GPS augmentation techniques.

More satellites also means better satellite geometry. So-called ‘Dilution of Position’ is an important source of errors in GPS measurement. It happens when all the satellites cluster in one corner of the sky. With more satellites it is a lot less likely to occur.

The more subtle reason that GNSS is better than GPS is that more constellations means more frequencies, or more observations per satellite, and that, it turns out, will unlock a whole heap of new benefits for GNSS users.

The benefits To understand this, we need to step back a little. Unaided GPS is only accurate to metre-levels, and then only under optimum conditions. From the time GPS became a practical tool, land agencies have offered augmentation systems using the GPS carrier frequencies. With the use of some clever electronics in the receiver, it is quite possible to detect a difference in the phase of this carrier accurate to a few per cent of the wavelength. Given that the GPS’ L1 wavelength is 190.5 mm long, this makes it possible to build receivers with a theoretical accuracy of a few millimetres.

The key problem with carrier observation is ambiguity: a single sine wave, by

34 position February/March 2014

itself, tells you very little. It certainly does not lead to accurate distance measurement.

The key to unlocking the potential of carrier observations is by differencing: that is, comparing the phase differences between carriers generated by different satellites, between carriers from the same satellite on different frequencies or at different times.

The more observations you make on your GNSS receiver, the better the result.

This has proven to be a practical technique with GPS, but the field will be transformed by the advent of multiple constellations. GPS has 24 satellites. When all GNSS are in place, expect about 100. GPS broadcasts two or possibly three frequencies from the latest satellites. With all the constellations in place, there will be at least ten, and potentially more, frequencies.

The ionosphere This sudden jump in the numbers of frequencies available may also assist in solving another long-standing problem.

The ionosphere is a layer of charged particles 50 to 1,000 km up. It strongly interferes with electromagnetic radiation. We should be grateful. The ionosphere shields us from much of the sun’s hazardous radiation, so it makes life possible on Earth.

Still, it is a bit of a curse for users of satellite positioning, because it also interferes with the radiation from GNSS satellites.

This is not a minor problem. In fact, the unknown effect of the atmosphere on the signal is the single largest source of error in the entire process of calculating positions from satellites.

The problem is not so much that the ionosphere influences radio waves, but that the way it influences them changes from moment to moment. It’s not possible to design a navigation receiver so as to minimise the effect; things have to be adjusted on the fly.

Once again, however, frequency comes to our rescue. We have known for a while that the effect of the ionosphere is strongly dependent on frequency. At the moment, our main source of information is a two-frequency comparison from GPS. But GNSS will transform the field.

Prof Teunissen says the use of multiple constellations for this work is still in its infancy. However, he says the ability to probe the atmosphere in perhaps 20 directions at perhaps 10 frequencies – which should be practical by 2020 – will lead to very much more detailed insight into the state of the atmosphere.

This will translate into much longer baselines. Australia’s densest network today, in Victoria, has station spacing of about 70km. Teunissen says that distances of 100-150km should be quite possible with GNSS.

Commercialisation Of course, research is one thing; putting the work in a production environment is something quite different. The fact that the Curtin work is underwritten by the CRCSI helps. CRC are designed to link researchers with business people. In this instance, all the major equipment manufacturers, companies such as Leica, Septentrio, Trimble and Fugro, are involved.

So, too, are the major land agencies, such as Geoscience Australia and state instrumentalities, which will deploy the technology as they form new networks. It seems likely that some form of the Curtin work will underpin the Auscope project.

When it is completed, it will form a comprehensive national geodetic infrastructure that will support the needs of scientists working on geodetic frameworks and other demanding high-accuracy applications. About 100 new reference stations will be created across the country to augment the existing Australian Regional Geodetic Network stations.

However, if Auscope is to form part of a new national positioning infrastructure that can be used by working surveyors in a production environment, the distribution of its correction information to users in the field will be extremely important.

Current field workers use the mobile phone system. When this is not available, they are forced back on VHF radio, or onto post-processing the data.

It is in this context that other work supported by the CRC is especially interesting. Researchers at RMIT in Melbourne have been working with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, JAXA, to investigate the potential of the LEX L-band experimental service carried on the QZSS satellites to distribute the correction signal.

Since the LEX signal comes down to the receiver within the GNSS navigation frequency band, it would make it relatively straightforward to embed a LEX decoder in existing equipment. On the strength of the RMIT project results, it seems perfectly practical, but whether space distribution of the information ever eventuates is another question.

What is not in doubt is its value. ACIL Allen’s reports into the impact of precise positioning in various sectors say precise positioning could reduce costs by 15 per cent, especially in deep pits. Huge gains are also likely in rural industries, where precise positioning will underpin the modern farm. In fact, because of its ability to guide farm machinery, it may well be a foundation technology for the next food revolution.

Jon Fairall is the founder and former editor of Position magazine. ■

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Surveying for the World Land Speed Record GINA VELDE

Land Surveys is using the latest in high-accuracy survey equipment to find the perfect site for a World Land Speed Record attempt.

R

osco McGlashan’s life ambition is to become the fastest man on Earth.

For almost 50 years he has been working tirelessly towards this dream, which could soon be realised with the help of his dedicated team and the Aussie Invader 5R. This supersonic, 16 metrelong structure will be powered by a rocket motor, packing an almighty 62,000 lbs of thrust (some 200,000 horsepower).

The goal is to reach 1,000 miles per hour (1,600 kilometres per hour) to beat the current World Land Speed Record of 763 mph (1,223 km/h), achieved in 1997 by the British team in the Thrust SSC vehicle, driven by Andy Green.

Naturally there are other contenders to the land speed throne: the Brits aim to keep the top spot with a new car called the Bloodhound SSC, while the US and Canada have joined forces to build the North American Eagle. Rosco’s Aussie In-

36 position February/March 2014

vader 5R is the most powerful of the three and indeed the most powerful land speed record car ever built, travelling from 0 to 1,000 mph in 20 seconds!

Flat Earth So where does surveying come into it?

One of the most crucial aspects to achieving the World Land Speed Record is finding the ideal track for the Aussie Invader on which to run. For this, Rosco and his team have enlisted the help of Land Surveys, a national surveying company that normally specialises in the resources, infrastructure and construction sectors, but who could resist getting involved in a project as exciting as this one!

In addition to being a surveyor, Land Surveys’ managing director Peter Rullo is also an avid race car driver and jet boat pilot, so naturally he was keen to accept the challenge. “It would be wonderful for Australia to achieve the World Land Speed Record and take the accolade away from the Brits,” he said. “Land Surveys is happy to help Rosco and his team wherever we can to ensure they have the best track surface that will meet the tolerance requirements for the Aussie Invader 5R.”

To make the record attempt, the team needs a track 31 kilometres long and one kilometre wide. Although prepared to travel overseas for the ideal plot, Mike Annear from the Aussie Invader team spotted a huge clay pan in remote CentralWest Queensland during a flight and wondered if it would be up to the job.

Land Surveys UAS manager Darren Wilkinson helped to organise a reconnaissance trip in November last year so they could discover if the site was suitable.

“Surveying an area of this size using traditional surveying methods alone would have taken far too long,” he explained. “We approached precision systems specialists Position Partners to see if we could get its Topcon IP-S2 3D mobile mapping equipment out to the site, as it would enable us to survey a large area quickly and accurately.”

The Topcon IP-S2 combines terrestrial laser scanners, GNSS antennas, a Panasonic 360 degree camera, wheel encoders and an inertial measurement unit (IMU) to deliver accurate three-dimensional data for any linear mapping project. This vehicle-mounted system enables data and 360-degree imagery to be captured at normal road speeds, significantly reducing the time it takes to survey large areas.

To complete the survey, the Land Surveys team combined both traditional GPS-based surveying using rovers and the data captured by the Position Partners mobile mapping car, driven by company representative David Low. “Our work plays a very vital role in the World Land Speed Record attempt, because with a vehicle travelling at some 440 metres per second, every dip or bump in the surface could have a significant effect on the trajectory, speed and stability of the vehicle,” Mr Wilkinson added.

“It was therefore essential that we survey the track very accurately, so that we can build a precise model of the terrain for the engineers to work with.”

Rosco and the Land Surveys/Position Partners surveying team conducted an initial site reconnaissance on Day 1, circumnavigating the clay pan and examining the surface for the most suitable track.

The mobile survey, conducted on day two, consisted of three parallel runs, providing an overall swath of approximately 300 metres. Base stations were established with GPS along the proposed track and the logged data used to generate an accurate model. As an independent check, Land Surveys deployed a Leica GS15 on a second vehicle to log data.

www.spatialsource.com.au 37

feature “The speed of acquisition and accuracy of results from the mobile mapping survey were impressive, given the flat, featureless terrain that is the Bilpa Morea Claypan,” Mr Wilkinson said. “The 31km track has an RL difference of two metres from one end to the other, and the IP-S2 data clearly captured the characteristics of the clay pan, in terms of micro-relief, texture, and, where it existed, vegetation.”

Due to the remoteness of the location, organising the project logistics proved to be far more challenging than actually executing the survey. Having support for the survey work allowed Land Surveys to concentrate on coordinating the other supporting groups, which included land holders and service providers in the district, Shire of Diamantina, Tourism and Events Queensland, Skytrans and Channel 7.

With an accurate data set of the current surface completed, the next stage will be to determine the tolerance levels of the Aussie Invader 5R using computer 3D modelling software. Then the earthworks requirements will be calculated and a final design created, which will be loaded onto Topcon machine control systems to

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38 position February/March 2014

accurately grade the terrain and meet the required tolerance levels.

Upon the earthworks completion, Land Surveys will conduct an as-built survey of the track to ensure the Aussie Invader team is fully equipped with relevant and accurate data of the site.

Mr McGlashan is very grateful for all the help that went into the recent track recce.

“When we arrived at the site I had great expectations (probably unrealistic) to see a lake bed that was all ready to go,” he said.

“Although my hopes were downgraded somewhat by the stone areas and some dead Spinifex here and there, the great news is that thanks to Peter Rullo of Land Surveys and David Low of Position Partners, we now have a viable site to make our world record attempt.”

The team is now engaged in getting approval from the local shire and land leaseholders. Once local support has been gained, the team can start work in earnest to source support for the track preparation.

“A land speed record attempt of this magnitude is an enormous undertaking,” Mr McGlashan explained. “It requires meticulous attention to detail and the help of so many people and companies for their expertise, support, financial backing and will to succeed. As my main man Pete Taylor keeps reminding me, ‘if it was easy, everyone would be doing it!’, so we just keep on keeping on in pursuit of this crazy and exciting dream.”

More information about the Aussie Invader land speed world record attempt can be found at www.aussieinvader.com. ■

Complete the picture with print + online solutions

February/March 2014 – No. 69

The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information

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Putting GoGet on the map

Users gain access to the vehicles using a swipe card.

SIMON CHESTER

T

he idea of a car-sharing service in Australia started in the Sydney suburb of Newtown in 2002. The narrow streets of the popular suburb are notoriously difficult to find parking on, as residents and visitors alike battle it out for a very limited number of spots.

This got Bruce Jeffreys and Nic Lowe thinking: all of these cars are sitting idle and taking up space, why can’t we reduce the number of cars by sharing vehicles between multiple users?

“Nic and I were looking at Newtown – there were cars parked everywhere, and residents wanted something done about it,” said Bruce.

They weren’t the first people in the world to think of this – successful car sharing services already existed in Germany and the US, but nothing in Australia.

“We saw the model working in other parts of the world and thought, ‘what about Sydney? Let’s give it a go!’”

So the two of them borrowed a new car and set up a stall at the annual Newtown Festival under the name ‘Newtown CarShare’. After polling residents’ interest, and extensive research of car sharing in other countries, Nic and Bruce founded CarShare Australia, which – after a few years of strong growth across Australia – was later renamed GoGet.

Sharing as the future Despite the individual’s right to own their own vehicle, the act itself is actually rather selfish, as it needlessly consumes resources – materials, fuel, space. As society moves towards a resource-scarce economy, this need for fairer distribution – i.e. sharing – of resources will only become greater.

However, we’re not quite there yet, and GoGet first needed to convince customers that its service offered benefits greater than the convenience of having a car parked where you left it, out the front of your house.

For instance, with GoGet, you don’t have to worry about cleaning, servicing, registering or maintaining a car, and you can pick the type of car best suited to your needs – hatchback, wagon, convertible, ute, van etc.

– on any given day. Despite these benefits, most people still think that the current carownership model is more convenient.

“We needed to develop a new group of users that would accept that the car isn’t out the front of the house, but that it’s at a shared point. In order for our service to be enticing to potential users, we needed to make these shared points – we call them pods – easily accessible.

“The spatial challenge was massive – we had to build a network that had the known, dedicated points of a public transport system, but the distribution and ease of access of a private car,” said Bruce. “We looked at this problem at a very fine-grained level – even having a pod located up the top of a hill would impose a barrier.”

The markers indicate a ‘pod’ where GoGet cars are parked, with the website showing live availability.

Green markers are of cars available to book right now, and the red are cars with a current booking.

40 position February/March 2014

The website allows a user to enter an address, and view the available cars nearby.

The solution to this problem was two pronged: GoGet needed to develop systems for the spatial analysis of potential pod locations; and they had to get councils on board to provide dedicated space for the pods.

Designing spatial tools The location of a pod needed to take into account several key factors, including proximity to members, ease of access, and

24-hour non-ticketed availability. Of course, spatial analysis is the logical way to locate the best places for pods, but GoGet took a slightly different path than members of the spatial community would expect.

“We designed all of our systems inhouse, including those that did the spatial analysis,” said Bruce. “We have a purposewritten booking system and a back-end management system that we fully developed ourselves.

“We don’t have what you’d call a GIS system, but we do lots of crunching of spreadsheets, and then integrate those with Google Maps. Essentially, we do GIS in a manual way.

“We successfully designed a pod analytics tool that looks for the best place to locate a new pod against a range of key measures.”

It probably seems unusual to members of the spatial community that GoGet opted to design its own spatial tools, rather than use those already available.

“From a business standpoint, it’s critical that you don’t waste money on features that would be ‘nice’ but don’t really need,” said Bruce. “If we’d bought a GIS system five years ago, we wouldn’t’ have known what we needed in that system, so most of what we’d paid for may not have been used.

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feature

“One huge advantage is that we own and develop our own systems, so we’re not dependent on external vendors – we can take new directions very quickly, and not be limited by what the vendors can supply.”

Involving council Developing suitable spatial tools was only one problem facing GoGet: it also needed permanent places to park the cars.

“One massive hurdle was that we couldn’t get any place to park our cars for, say, the first four years,” said Bruce.

“Initially, we found some free, undedicated parking spots. The next spot was provided by Cafe Church in [the nearby suburb of] Glebe, which has since become our offices.”

However, GoGet really needed to get those in charge of on-street parking – the local councils – to provide dedicated spaces.

“All around the world, councils are providing car-share bays – there’s 4,000 in London, for example – it’s not unique to Australia. But first, we needed to develop a track record with council to show that we weren’t just going to disappear, before they would dedicate parking spaces to us.”

“It was a big challenge, but once councils realised how effective it was at reducing car ownership – and the need for multiple spots for multiple residents – they were, more often than not, happy to work with us.”

GoGet now has over 18 council partners across Australia.

“There was a lot of work with local government to refine how to locate the pods,” said Bruce. “In the early days, a

42 position February/March 2014

traffic engineer might have found what they thought was a suitable spot, but it wasn’t so great for GoGet, and vice versa.

“There was a lot of work put in to make sure that the process works smoothly and that there’s minimal disruption to both parties, as well as the community. We put in a lot of work with council to smooth out the policies, and to find best practice.”

From residential to business While GoGet initially targeted the residential market, it’s now growing rapidly in the business market, too.

“The core car-share concept that we created at GoGet has since been discovered to work really well with business applications, such as acting as a replacement for fleet management,” said Bruce. “Instead of needing someone in-house as a fleet manager, GoGet takes care of all the work for them.

“As such, we’ve seen tremendous growth with our commercial partners, for example at the Australian Technology Park in Redfern, and the Optus Campus at Macquarie Park, or even installing vans at Ikea stores. As these partners have become more common, our pod requirements have morphed into a new set of locations with a new set of spatial characteristics.”

GoGet’s initial focus on growing the residential network has now shifted, and requires much more integration with organisations and even property developments.

“One area that is really going gangbusters is integrating GoGet into new multi-storey residential developments,” said Bruce. “These types of residences often come with access to a pool or a gym,

but now the ‘welcome packs’ also contain access to a car.

“There is lots of government policy concerning developments around public transport accessible sites, and we’ve had some spectacular success in reducing the number of cars needed in areas.

“For instance, there’s a street in [Melbourne’s] South Yarra where the entire street is multi-story developments, so we’ve installed Pods in four of the buildings. The pods installed in developments are accessible by everyone, too – not just residents.”

Changing perceptions The benefits of joining a car-sharing service are now becoming clear to more and more people, and, as the service continues to gain popularity, other players have entered the market, including GreenShareCar and rental giant Hertz.

“We have serious competition now, as it’s slowly becoming a mainstream way for people to get around. To be honest, it’s exciting, as it’s no longer a crazy idea that a couple of people thought up in Newtown.

“We still have long way to go, though: there are 4 million private cars in Sydney, so there are a lot of cars to get rid of yet – this is just the beginning.”

Nic Lowe, who co-founded and helped design the systems for GoGet, will be delivering a presentation at the GeoNext Conference in Sydney on 26 February 2014, which discusses how the spatial systems at GoGet grew in tandem with their needs. For more information visit GeoNext.com.au. ■

new products

Aerial image processing software Earth observation videos

Pix4Dmapper generates high-end, surveygrade accurate orthomosaics, DSM and point clouds from aerial and oblique imagery using any camera and lens, ranging from lightweight compact cameras used on UAV (including GoPro, multi-spectral cameras and fisheye lens) to SLR and large photogrammetric sensors carried by aircraft – including multi-band images.

The software features a fully automatic, intuitive workflow that still gives users full control over all tie points, calibration, and results.

The rayCloud, included in Pix4Dmapper, combines the 3D point cloud with the original images for easy viewing as well as accurate semantic annotation and project improvement.

With this, users can assess, edit, interpret and improve results directly in the software.

Pix4Dmapper now is available both as a onetime-charge licence and on a monthly or yearly subscription basis.

For more information visit http://pix4d.com.

Skybox Imaging has released highresolution, high-definition videos of Earth. The videos were taken

by SkySat-1, the first of Skybox’s planned constellation of 24 satellites.

SkySat-1 captures up to 90-seconds of panchromatic video clips at 30 frames per second. The resolution is high enough to view objects like shipping containers, while maintaining a level of clarity that does not determine human activity.

SkySat-1 also captures highquality colour imagery and is capable of sub-metre native colour and near-infrared imagery.

Interestingly, SkySat-1 was built and launched for more than an order of magnitude less cost than traditional sub-meter imaging satellites, according to Tom Ingersoll, CEO of Skybox.

SkySat-2, an identical version of SkySat-1, is scheduled to launch in early 2014.

A demonstration video, showcasing high-resolution views of Tokyo, Bangkok, Baltimore, Las Vegas, and Aleppo, Syria is available on YouTube at http://bit. ly/1bbh5xk.

For more information visit www.skyboximaging.com.

Online 3D visualisations Agency9 has updated its web-based 3D visualisation services to include support for textured 3D city models created by TerraSolid’s LiDAR and image processing packages.

TerraSolid users can now import data to Agency9’s web services directly from the TerraSolid tools, publishing large data sets and city models as geoportals and other GIS applications.

Agency9’s cloud service for urban planning, CityPlanner, allows organisations to provide their employees with instant access the 3D spatial data; access to easy-to-use tools for 3D visualisation and creation of interactive project illustrations; share projects in teams and to stakeholders; and publish externally for communication or dialogue.

CityPlanner is a web-based service for 3D visualisation of projects within urban development, infrastructure and energy. It provides 3D web planning tools for widespread access and collaboration.

For more information visit http://cityplanneronline.com.

Desktop GIS software SuperGIS Desktop 3.2 by Supergeo Technologies integrates abundant GIS tools, helping GIS users from various domains develop a professional platform to effectively geoprocess and analyse, display, edit, manage, and query spatial data.

The latest desktop GIS software supports ‘Multiple Map Frames’ and ‘Feature Guided Pages’ to print and display detailed regional data of each feature on the map for increasing the output of designed maps. In addition, Land Parcel Editor also enables cadastral map administrators to easily edit and manage cadastral data in special formats.

SuperGIS Desktop 3.2 focuses on improving map analysis, data editing and management. For example, Multiple Map Frames helps users effectively and simultaneously process and

analyse spatial data in different extents. The Georeferencing Tool and OGC Add-on allow users to manipulate GIS tools more intuitively.

For more information visit www.supergeotek.com/ productpage_SG3.aspx. A free trial is available at www. supergeotek.com/download_6_desktop.aspx. www.spatialsource.com.au 43

#Locate14 The Locate14 Conference and Exhibition is the premier spatial industry event for Australia and New Zealand with key industry associations, companies and leaders supporting the consolidation of three national events.

SPEAKERS

PROGRAM The 7 topic streams of the Conference showcase the growth in not only the spatial industry but also the advances that are now used across a wide range of industry.

1. Locating the Digital Economy Location information is a fundamental part of our daily lives and is inextricably linked to the digital economy. Advances in mobile and cloud-based technologies are enabling location independence by connecting the digital world to physical location; connecting people to services regardless of where they are located. Changes to how government delivers services and industry does business will be especially significant in healthcare, insurance, agriculture and transport.

2. Innovative Technologies Advances in technology continue to create economic and social benefits to the industry and community. The introduction of a new idea, method, technology, process or application to overcome technical challenges and deliver outstanding outcomes is the focus of this stream.

3. Spatial (Smart) Cities A Smart City by definition is driven by the location and the interrelationship of people, services and transport. The movement is made more efficient between home and office while creating green, energy efficient buildings and linking people to information resources utilising an underlying spatial information framework.

4. Defence and National Security For its national security, Australia draws primarily on its defence, intelligence, diplomatic, development, law enforcement and border security capabilities. Threats to national security involve not only conventional adversaries, but also terrorists, cartels and cyber criminals. Utilising the most contemporary methods to resolve the challenges Australia faces today and into the future will be the focus of this stream.

Brought to you by:

5. Think Spatially (Spatial for a Non-Spatial World) Governments and the private sector now see the value of spatial information as a corporate resource. The “where” factor is driving business outcomes and in turn influencing business value.

This stream will highlight the use of spatial information in non-traditional applications including: retail, insurance, banking, asset management, transport and not-for-profit.

6. The Changing Landscape of Surveying Surveying has certainly changed over the past decade and certainly promises to be an environment of continued review, change and renewal in the future. With the latest information on legislation briefs to new and exciting developments in the profession, this stream will pose the questions: What next? Where next? What will the role of surveyor look like in the future?

7. Research@Locate (Academic Research) brought to you by ASIERA Research@Locate is the conference stream organised by academia for academia. This stream aims to become the premier academic meeting event in the Australasian region. Research@Locate has been organised by the Australasian Spatial Information Education and Research Association - ASIERA (www.asiera.org.au) and provides a transparent full-paper peer review process, with carefully selected presentations and papers, and with its own annual, open-access proceedings with ISSN. Such a stream within Locate14 provides a unique opportunity for engagement between industry and academia.

Research@ #Locate14

Brought to you by:

MC Peter Woodgate Chief Executive Officer, Cooperative Research Centre for Spatial Information

Keynote Speakers: Glenn Appleyard Chairman, PSMA Australia Limited

Drew Clarke PSM Secretary of the Commonwealth Department of Communications

Chris Tucker Founder and CEO of Mapstory, USA

Topic Speaker: Locating the Digital Economy: Denise McKenzie, McKenzie Executive Director, Communications and Outreach for Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) U.K.

Conference Closing Speaker: Rachael Robertson, Robertson former Antarctic expedition leader, Chief Ranger and leader with 20 years of ‘extreme’ leadership experience.

Supported by:

SIBA

RegisteR now

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7–9 April 2014

The premier Australian & New Zealand spatial event of the year

Canberra, Australia

Locate14 Conference and Exhibition combines the spatial@gov Conference, the Surveying & Spatial Sciences Conference (SSSC) and the Asia- Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards (APSEA). the Locate14 Conference will be held at the National Convention Centre Canberra from 8-9 April with the Exhibition Open Day on 7 April from 10.30am – 4.00pm.

INCORPORATING APSEA

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The industry’s night of nights – recognising excellence, innovation and contribution The Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards (APSEA) recognise the innovation and activities of the industry and an event all the spatial and surveying industry look forward to. Every year, members of the spatial sciences community make significant contributions that impact across many sectors of society. APSEA is an excellent opportunity to recognise and reward these contributions. Hosted jointly by SSSI and SIBA, in conjunction with the Locate14 Conference, the Awards showcase the technical diversity and innovation evident across the spatial industry. It is also a special night to recognise the achievements and service contributions of professionals within the industry.

WHY ATTEND: • Connect with industry leaders and colleagues • Be introduced to the advances in the industry • Excellent networking opportunity • Learn from leading researchers in the spatial industry • Showcase your work Sponsors

To enter, find the postcard in this edition of Position Magazine (or download from www.locateconference.com) and follow the instructions below.

How to enter: 1. Decide on which Conference topic stream best represents your workplace or job site 2. Write that stream name on the front of this postcard 3. Take a photo of you/your team holding this postcard 4. Upload to Twitter or Facebook using the hashtag #locate14 (If you aren’t on social media, you can email your photo to media@locateconference.com) 4. All entries will go in the draw to win one full conference registration (including APSEA Dinner ticket) to the Locate14 Conference. Prize is valued at $1,240.

5. Entries close Friday 21 March 2014 For full terms and conditions see www.locateconference.com

Start posting your photos on Twitter and let the competition begin!

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Registrations are now open with discounts for early registrants.

REGISTRATION FEES Early Registration - Full (by 28 February 2014)

$990

Day Registration

$770

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All prices are in Australian Dollars - AUD - and include Australian Good & Services Tax

Full registration includes: entry to Exhibition Open Day, Welcome Reception ticket, all Conference sessions and catering (morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea).

Delegates can also purchase tickets to the Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards (APSEA) Dinner at a discounted rate of $140 per ticket. Non-delegate APSEA dinner tickets can be purchased for $175 per ticket.

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sssi news

CEO Report – Roger Buckley SSSI Board of Directors 2013-2014 President – John Trinder Past President – Gary Maguire Treasurer – Jonathan Saxon Director – Bernard O’Sullivan Director – Gypsy Bhalla Director – Chis McAlister Director – Chris Pettit Director – Danielle Beaudreau Company Secretary – James Curnow Company Secretary/CEO – Roger Buckley

Consultative Council for 2013-2014 President – John Trinder Past President – Gary Maguire Treasurer – Jonathan Saxon NT Rep – Renee Bartolo QLD Rep – Chris McAlister WA Rep – Kerry Smyth NSW Rep – Greg Goodman NZ Rep – Chris Weir VIC Rep – Chris Pettit SA Rep – Gary Maguire TAS Rep – Darren Llewellyn ACT Rep – Gypsy Bhalla RS&P Rep – Craig Smith HC Rep – Simon Ironside SIC Rep – Penny Baldock LS Rep – Phil Pozzi EMS Rep – Bernard O’Sullivan YP Rep – Danielle Beaudreau Company Secretary – James Curnow CEO/Company Secretary – Roger Buckley

46 position February/March 2014

With the festive season behind us and the business of 2014 in full swing, I would like to remind members of SSSI that we are starting to get some momentum up on the development of a new suite of members benefits that will add value to your membership. In the past we have supported the NBSA Benefits Scheme, and the launch of the new scheme should see members being able to take advantage of good savings on a range of items.

I am pleased to announce that membership renewal numbers are at an all-time high, as 92% of members renewed their membership for 2013/2014. This is a fantastic way to start the year, to see our members continue their strong support for SSSI. In addition, new members are continuing to join SSSI and it is very exciting to see the steady growth in membership.

The institute is passionate and actively determined to develop professional excellence for all its members this year and into the future.

During December, close to 500 members took part in the 2013 SSSI Membership Survey. The survey allowed members to rate their membership experiences, and to provide suggestions on what membership benefits they would like to see this year. The overall results demonstrated that the majority of members had a positive experience with their membership and rate their membership highly.

The comments that were provided will allow the SSSI national office, regional and commission chairs to develop events that are more tailored to what you as members would like to see in the future. The results from the survey indicated that members would like to see an increase in online CPD opportunities. I would like to announce that over the coming months, a new online

CPD program will be launched that will allow members to gain CPD points via watching and completing online video modules. This new program is in line with our Strategy 2015, which will allow members to continue their professional development and education.

Over the course of 2014 there will be numerous huge events, which include the inaugural Locate14 Conference that will be held in Canberra, in April. This new conference will be the top Australian spatial industry event that will become the central meeting point for industry leaders from a wide range of backgrounds. In addition, the annual Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards (APSEA) will be held at Locate 14 and will recognise achievements and excellence to individuals and organisations engaged within the spatial industry. I encourage all members to attend these event as it will be a great way to network and learn from industry leaders within your field. For more information on the conference visit www.locateconference.com.

On a final note, the board recently approved part-time student memberships with effect from 1 March 2014. This will provide parttime students an entry into SSSI. This model will also include the introduction of a ‘buddy system’ for students, which will be a continuation of the mentoring program.

I look forward to seeing many of you at Locate14 and to be at the Gala APSEA Awards to be held at Parliament House, Canberra, on 8 April 2014. In closing, please look at the events in the calendar to see what events the institute is running this year and I encourage you attend as many as possible.

Roger Buckley CEO

SSSI sustaining partners

SSSI Commission Chairs for 2013-2014 Remote Sensing & Photogrammetry Commission Chair Craig Smith chair.rspc@sssi.org.au Land Surveying Commission Chair Phil Pozzi chair.lsc@sssi.org.au Hydrography Commission Chair Simon Ironside chair.hc@sssi.org.au

Recent activities of the Spatial Information and Cartography Commission 2014 is already shaping up to be an exciting year for the Spatial Information and Cartography Commission. Following on from the great leadership that Penny Baldock provided for the commission over the last two years, I have some big shoes to fill. Penny and the commission committee members have gratefully allowed me to slowly take over the role of chair due to my work commitments, but now it’s full steam ahead.

The committee and I have been reviewing our activities from the last couple of years, as well as ideas for the future to help shape our direction and purpose for years ahead. The SSSI’s strategy has been our guide to ensure that we are aligned with the principles and objectives of the institute as a whole.

Certification and Continuing Professional Development (CPD) are the two main focus areas for the commission.

Encouraging professionals to become certified, as GISP-AP, will continue to be a major focus for the commission.

The certification program provides a benchmark for GIS professionals, using a rigorous system of peer review and expert panel evaluation to assess applicants with regard to academic qualifications, experience and CPD. Endorsed by SIBA last year, GISP-AP certification is being requested by more employers and becoming a highly favoured requirement in tender documents. Hopefully 2014 will see us reach the milestone of 100 certified professionals.

Lifelong learning is a passion of mine and I see the emphasis placed on CPD by the institute as a very positive way to encourage this. In this regard, the commission is aiming to add another workshop to its existing repertoire (which consists of the Project Management Workshop and Cartography

and Map Design Workshop), and work closely with the MSIA to provide some great seminars and events to members of both organisations. We are also aiming to provide video learning content and webinars to allow a wider audience to experience our events and earn CPD points, so keep an eye out for event notifications as the year progresses.

We shall also be continuing to strengthen our relationship with URISA, with our organisations working more closely together to provide events and virtual educational content to members.

Additionally, preparations have already begun to host the URISA president Allen Ibaugh at the Queensland Surveying and Spatial Conference in October. Where possible, we will also be working with other groups involved in spatial information and cartography, helping to share knowledge and network.

As always, the committee is here to serve our members, so if you have specific ideas or suggestions for activities that you would like to see occur, please get in touch with myself or your local committee member. Or if you would like to help contribute your time and skills, we are always on the lookout for assistance either formally on the committee, or informally for specific events. Come and join us and help make 2014 a great year.

Spatial Information & Cartography Commission Chair Penny Baldock chair.sicc@sssi.org.au Engineering & Mining Surveying Commission Chair Bernard O’Sullivan Chair.emsc@sssi.org.au

SSSI Regional Chairs 2013-4 New South Wales Regional Chair Gaby Van Wyk chair.nsw@sssi.org.au ACT Regional Chair Gypsy Bhalla chair.act@sssi.org.au Northern Territory Regional Chair Garry West chair.nt@sssi.org.au New Zealand Regional Chair Chris Weir chair.nz@sssi.org.au Victoria Regional Chair Chris Pettit chair.vic@sssi.org.au Queensland Regional Chair Chris McAlister chair.qld@sssi.org.au South Australia Regional Chair Gary Maguire chair.sa@sssi.org.au Western Australia Regional Chair Kerry Smyth reo.wa@sssi.org.au Tasmania: Regional Chair Darren Llewellyn chair.tas@sssi.org.au SSSI Head Office 27-29 Napier Cl, Deakin, ACT 2600 (PO Box 307) Phone: +61 2 6282 2282 Email: support@sssi.org.au

Jessica Davies Co-Chair Spatial Information and Cartography Commission www.spatialsource.com.au 47

sssi news Get involved with your local commission Within the SSSI Engineering and Mining Surveying Commission some regions have run interest groups, allowing likeminded professionals to meet and discuss the general pros and cons and issues that are facing our industry. This was my first introduction to the institute, as a regular attendee to the Engineering Surveyors Interest Group (ESIG) meetings.

In my home state of Western Australia, I’m proud to say we have a strong interest in attending these meetings and a great group of dedicated individuals that turns up for our bimonthly meetings, even if just to eat pizza. These meetings make a world of difference to the institute’s ability to run events, offer CPD (especially with interesting and relevant topics), and communicate with the Consultative Council and board of SSSI, and, conversely back down to members, with a personal touch.

I would like to suggest there should be more interest in group activity throughout the regions, at least within my commission

and want to try to establish an interest group for every region. For bigger regions we could possibly even run subregional meetings. They can be at the local park, at your regional SSSI office, down the pub… who cares. Give it a try and you may be able to raise an issue that drives you batty, communicate it to your commission and get something done about it. Most of all, you are given a chance to network with others that work in your industry.

If anyone is interested in starting or joining a regional interest group, contact me at Chair.emsc@sssi.org.au In other exciting news, we have now added, on the Engineering and Mining Surveying Commission web page, the ‘Certified ESP-AP Surveyors’ listing. For more information please follow the following link: http://www.sssi.org.au/details/ pages/370.html Bernard O’Sullivan Chair EMSC

Recent activities of the Young Professionals Group It’s that time of year again when we begin to ramp up Young Professional events across the country for what is shaping up to be a fast and furious 2014. The regional committees are working hard to bring you a great line-up of fun and exciting events this year, and if 2013 is anything to go by, then you’re all in for a real treat. To find out what is happening in your state, be sure to check the events calendar on the SSSI website for more details.

For Young Professionals entering into the industry for the first time, it cannot be emphasised strongly enough how important it is to look inwards at one’s self every once in a while and review where we have been, what we have achieved, and what direction we want our career to be heading into the future. In late 2013, the SSSI Young Professionals’ patron Helen Owens presented a webinar on career progression and provided some insightful and thoughtprovoking advice on what everyday actions we could take to advance our careers.

An important aspect of any career, according to Ms Owens, is the relationships

48 position February/March 2014

and professional networks that we form whilst on the job. The old adage ‘It’s not what you know, but who you know’ rings true with most business exchanges. Building a professional network takes time, effort, and the ability for you to engage with others and step outside your comfort zone. Part of this process is having the skills to listen to what others are saying, and to try and get an understanding from their perspective.

Getting involved with your regional Young Professionals committee is always a good place to start building your professional network. Being part of a larger group of like-minded individuals, and assisting with the organisation of events will provide opportunities to meet new people and explore new possibilities. To get more involved with your regional Young Professionals committee, or to find out more information, e-mail the national YP chair Danielle Beaudreau at chair.yp@sssi.org.au who will be more than happy to put you in touch with your regional YP representatives.

SSSI sustaining partners

Spatially Enabled Statistics Statistics New Zealand has a new mapping tool to enable data visualisation in a geographic format.

StatsMaps delivers a range of population variables, at local and regional scales, for three previous census years, 2001, 2006 and 2013. Users can choose an area on the map, see its data, and select a variable to display a coloured overlay of all the areas of the country.

StatsMaps has the added bonus of being shareable through social media channels or embedded on external web sites. A mobile version of the site has been specially designed for use on smart phones and tablets.

The move is part of a key Statistics New Zealand strategy to spatially display statistical data. Data from census or household surveys are related to a location and aggregated into small communities in order to protect the privacy of respondents. Up until now, the aggregated data has been released in non-spatial data tables.

“There’s more to come,” according to Statistics New Zealand’s geospatial manager Rochelle Morgan.

“Throughout 2014, we plan to release many if not all of the key census variables from the latest census. StatsMaps will be where most users can see the data we release. Our web feeds will also give developers access to mash-able services to use on their own web sites and applications,” said Rochelle.

StatsMaps uses web services map layers and incorporates a feed of Eagle Technology’s community base map.

The web map feeds are published from Statistics New Zealand’s ESRI server platform and can be used by any websites that can incorporate standardised OGC data services.

The StatsMaps site (http://www. stats.govt.nz/statsmaps/home.aspx) also features viewers for Statistics New

Zealand’s geographic boundaries, allowing users to visualise the relationships between official statistical boundaries and observe changes to these over time.

For Rochelle, this is the beginning of the journey to spatially enable Statistics New Zealand.

“This will be achieved by integrating geography into the entire business process from collection to dissemination,” said Rochelle.

Users can select a census variable to display a coloured overlay and select an area (in highlighted in blue) to see its data.

Desktop users can also compare values between the last three census years – 2001, 2006 and 2013.

www.spatialsource.com.au 49

sssi news Remote Sensing and Photogrammetry – ARSPC Conference

The 17th Australian Remote Sensing and Photogrammetry Conference (ARSPC) will be held at the Cairns Convention Centre from 7–10 October 2014 in conjunction with the SSSI Queensland Surveying and Spatial Conference 2014 (QCON14). This biennial conference is the major event for remote sensing and photogrammetry in Australasia, which draws large crowds.

The 2012 conference held in Melbourne was part of the 22 Congress of the International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (ISPRS).

The 17th ARSPC topics include the following: • UAV applications.

• Fire mapping & management.

• SAR/radar/InSAR processing and applications.

• Image processing techniques including object based image analysis.

• Detecting and monitoring environmental change of land, coasts, and wetlands.

• Landsat archive - time series image analyses, geological/Earth science applications.

• Photogrammetry.

• LiDAR. • Integrated LiDAR and optical image applications - emergency management/hazard mapping.

• Vegetation mapping.

The 17th Australian Remote Sensing and Photogrammetry Conference and QCON14 Program Committee can be found at http://bit.ly/15HV9IU.

7–9 April 2014

National Convention Centre Canberra, Australia

#Locate14 Locate14 will be the central meeting point of industry, government and academia in one of the fastest growing industries in Australia.

This new event has industry-wide support: Brought to you by:

SIBA Supported by:

The premier Australian & New Zealand spatial event of the year Topic streams include: • Locating the Digital Economy • Innovative Technologies • Spatial (Smart) Cities • National Security • Think Spatially (Spatial for a Non-Spatial World) • The Changing Landscape of Surveying • Research@Locate (Academic Research)

Research@ #Locate14

Brought to you by:

• Connect with industry leaders and colleagues • Be introduced to the advances in the industry • Excellent networking opportunity • Learn from leading researchers in the spatial industry • Showcase your work

SigN uP to the enewSLeTTeR FoR uPDAteS

Locate14 Conference and Exhibition combines three previous national events – the spatial@gov Conference, the Surveying & Spatial Sciences Conference (SSSC) and the Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards (APSEA) – to form a single premier Australian and New Zealand industry event that is not to be missed.

Speakers include: Drew Clarke PSM Chair ANZLIC & Secretary, Department of Communications Rachael Robertson former Antarctic Davis Station Expedition Leader Denise McKenzie Executive Director Marketing & Communications, OGC (U.K.)

RegiSTRATionS NoW oPeN 50 position February/March 2014

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Why attend:

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Contact: Locate14 Conference c/- Absolute Event s & Marketing E: locate14@absoluteevents.com.au T: +61 7 3848 0089

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The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information

February/March 2014 – No. 69

The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information

NEW EXECUTIVE DIRECTION

Doing spatial your own way

Volunteer surveyors

Surveying for speed

Helping the poorest countries

Surveyors aid in the land speed record

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