As a result of the pandemic, the Tecta America Zero Company needed a solution for viewing and assessing project sites that was effective and efficient. After the COVID-19 pandemic closed businesses and restricted access to viewing projects onsite, the Tecta America Zero Company’s recognized that its remote viewing capabilities became more important than ever.
US Capitol, Image courtesy of Nearmap
Tecta America Zero Company had been managing roofing projects across the U.S. for years, using aerial imagery for greater accuracy. When Covid-19 shifted everything, they were in the right place at the right time. The company could provide accurate assessment of roofing projects to keeping employees safe during COVID and decrease travel costs, by using Nearmap’s content that made it possible for Tecta America Zero Company to work smarter and safer.
A neighborhood in Salt Lake City, Utah, Image courtesy of Nearmap
Tecta has an indepth understanding of communities and resources that are only available to a large roofing company. Nearmap aerial imagery is used for roofing installation and replacement projects, new construction, and repairs across the country. Further, Nearmap provides the Tecta America Zero Company instant access to up-to-date and historical aerial imagery and geospatial intelligence.
Nearmap is unique in its capture of aerial imagery, focusing on currency, consistency, coverage, and accessibility. Nearmap’s wide-scale capture program is regularly updated (up to three times annually). The company delivers imagery at a consistent sub 3” GSD, and its automated photogrammetry pipeline ensures that color, stitching, and clarity are seamless. Nearmap offers expansive coverage across 1,750 urban areas across the U.S., including 80.1% of the population. Imagery is published within days of capture and Nearmap customers like the Tecta America Zero Company have 24/7 access to aerial content through a web app, API, or third-party integration. Customers report Nearmap is much more accurate than Google Earth.
Recently in the news we have seen a lot of satellite imagery depicting fires and hurricanes and their resultant damage, as well as satellite imagery of wartorn areas of the world such as Afghanistan. Of course this type of imagery is not new, but new ways of being able to display and gain greater understanding of a situation are invaluable to those tasked with analyzing such data.
Greenbelt, Maryland’s Orbit Logic’s SpyMeSat mobile app now includes an augmented reality (AR) interface that provides better awareness of overflying imaging satellites. The AR view overlays the orbit and position of satellites that can image your location, providing a better understanding of satellite viewing geometry and potential obstructions; e.g., to know if an image taken by that satellite of your position would be obscured by a tree or a building. The AR interface also displays relevant information about the satellite and its capabilities, that includes the timing and dynamic geometry of the pass as well as the resolution achievable by satellite sensors. (more…)
In the plenary session held on Monday at the Virtual Esri User Conference 2021, Esri President Jack Dangermond spoke of focusing on creating a more sustainable environment for our planet. Users of Esri software and services come from 130 countries and different fields.
Laura McNulty, National Government Sciences Manager from Esri manages Esri the National Health, Government and Sciences Team, that supports NTIA, FDC, and many other science and health based federal agencies.
On January 4, 2018, which coincided with a perigean spring high tide (Perigean tides occur when the moon is either new or full and closest to Earth), a single storm moved ice onto an area of salt marsh in Massachusetts from nearby creeks and bays, carrying the equivalent of more than 15 years’ worth of sediment onto the marshes. Also, prior to the event, there was a prolonged cold snap that lasted for more than a week when temperatures never climbed above 32 degrees.
Recent years have seen increase in hurricanes and subsequent flood damage to property throughout the U.S. due to climate change. CoreLogic® a leading global property information, analytics and data-enabled solutions provider, this week released its 2021 Hurricane Report, providing analysis of single- and multifamily residences along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts and revealing nearly 8 million homes with more than $1.9 trillion in combined reconstruction cost value (RCV) are at risk of storm surge. This year’s report also examines hurricane wind and reveals more than 31 million homes with nearly $8.5 trillion in combined RCV have moderate or extreme risk exposure to hurricane winds.
While Bentley Systems has had an Academic Program for some time, it has been reawakened, according to Katriona Lord-Levins, chief success officer at Bentley. “It has been brought into the times we’re in, and to meet the needs that we have to create a talent pipelines for our customers and ourselves,” said Lord-Levins. “Not only do we want to help students develop their engineering skills that will help them in the real world, but we also want to get people excited about the possibilities of the future.”
Amritha Narayanan, Pix4Dcatch Product Manager, provided information on the new ViDoc RTK rover from Pix4D, an industry leader in photogrammetry. The company is announcing the commercialization and worldwide exclusive distribution of the viDoc RTK rover, enabling ground-based RTK-grade 3D scanning with iOS mobile phones and tablets through the Pix4Dcatch app.
Conceived by vigram GmbH., a German company led by professional surveyors, the viDoc RTK rover is designed for accuracy and works with Pix4Dcatch for image acquisition. The hand-held RTK rover is a replacement for more expensive ground surveying equipment but is no less accurate in its mission to to achieve 3D, actionable results. Users can couple the viDoc RTK rover to Pix4Dcatch via Bluetooth and connect to any NTRIP service of their choice. They can walk around their area of interest to acquire high-precision positional data for individual images.
This solution brings together the power of RTK accuracy with the combination of LiDAR and photogrammetry. It can be used with the following support devices: iPad Pro 11 2020, iPhone 12 Pro and iPhone 12 Pro Max equipped with LiDAR sensors.
Digital twins can play a role providing accurate, reliable data – fit-for-purpose and useful across the water infrastructure lifecycle. Gregg Herrin, vice president, water infrastructure at Bentley Systems discussed the Dodge Data Analytics Water Report.in a briefing with GISCafe Voice.
“The report is about 30 pages long and does highlight the range of maturity that we see across water utilities,” said Herrin. “many are a lot farther along in their journey of going digital. We see a lot that emphasizes the different silos that exist within those utilities as well. Whether those are departmental silos of different parts of the organization, not interacting or not getting as much value as they could from each other, or data silos where the systems that are being used aren’t as connected as they could be, to provide the types of insight that could be shared.”
In the report, Herrin said throughout the report there is an emphasis on the fact that there are technical challenges, but then there also are people challenges. The challenges are primarily about getting departments to work together more closely. There are challenges even around, people aging out of their company. Aging infrastructure gets worse over time. Aging staff provide a whole different set of challenges, but also some opportunities. There is a need for utilities to be able to bring their technologies together in a way that’s more open and more flexible so that they can get the things that are more insightful across those different departmental silos.