Position 101 June-July 2019

June/July 2019 – No. 101

The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information

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inside Storm warning Challenges for industry and educators

Coming of age Growing pains in the RPA industry

GDA2020 Web Mercator dilemma

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contents

June/July 2019 No.101

22

24 features

34 28 #Locate19: a new era The defining elements of #Locate19, marking a new chapter of transformation in spatial.

14 Q&A with Nathan Dart We speak with Nathan Dart, community engagement coordinator for Medecins Sans Frontieres Australia, about a local mapping initiative helping to improve humanitarian interventions.

18 Storm warning For all the dynamism and innovation of the surveying and spatial industries, turbulence seems imminent as educators and industry grapple with circumstances in the Australian market.

22 Mapping the needs The open source map technologies and volunteer movement playing an essential role in humanitarian emergency response.

24 Drones come of age Jon Fairall on shifting dynamics and regulatory catch-up in the Australian RPA market.

32 GDA2020 and the web Mercator dilemma Michael Giudici on GDA2020 and international efforts to tackle the ‘web Mercator dilemma’.

34 Putting geospatial science on the school map The inaugural geospatial information competition locates school-age spatial talent.

regulars 4 7 8 36 38

Upfront, calendar Editorial News New products SSSI www.spatialsource.com.au  3

upfront

Upcoming Events 11 June: NAVIG8 Nearmap customer summit, Melbourne, VIC https://navig8.nearmap.com 13 June: NAVIG8 Nearmap customer summit, Sydney, NSW https://navig8.nearmap.com 14 June: Vivid Sydney Mapping Experience, Sydney, NSW https://sssi.org.au/events-awards/ events/cartography-and-all-that-jazz

Hacking Oceania

T

he creation of a synthetic superintelligence and the fear of a technologically omnipotent surveillance state are two concepts that have long fascinated some of the strongest and most imaginative thinkers of the 20th century.

From the iconic ministries and slogans of The Party in Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty Four to the cyberpunk meditations of William Gibson and Philip K. Dick, the imagery of class inequality and social disorder under authoritarian forces supercharged by technology are indelible and increasingly familiar ideas.

Among New Zealand’s many achievements in technology adoption and forward-thinking policy positions (Autonomous flying taxi trials anointed by the PM! Internet speeds commensurate with the rest of the developed world!), Aotearoa is a world leader in the use of algorithms by government.

This topic area has been the focus of a report released in late May, conducted by the Artificial Intelligence and Law in New Zealand Project (AILNZP) at the University of Otago, and funded by the New Zealand Law Foundation.

The researchers have recommended that New Zealand establish an independent regulatory body to oversee government use of algorithms and artificial intelligence, based on concerning outcomes internationally.

An algorithm was used in US detention centres without ever having been tested for accuracy. Another algorithm, COMPAS (Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions) was found to have overstated risks of black prisoners reoffending relative to their white counterparts.

Professor James Maclaurin, a coauthor on the paper said that while AI

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can enhance the accuracy, efficiency and fairness of decisions, there are concerns around bias, accuracy, transparency and control, a position echoed by his coauthor, Associate Professor Ali Knott.

“You can’t check or correct a decision if you can’t see how it was made,” he said.

“But in some overseas cases, that’s been impossible, because the companies who design the algorithms won’t reveal how they work.”

“There’s also a danger that other, innocent-looking factors — postcode for instance — can serve as proxies for things like race,” he said.

The report recommends that the New Zealand government continue its practice of developing its AI products in-house, as Orwellian as that might sound – as this eliminates issues around proprietary code bases. But the authors warn against establishing regulatory placebos – such as the fanciful claim that having ‘a human in the loop’ might overcome accuracy and bias problems.

“Even with the best of intentions, problems can sneak back in if we’re not careful,” said co-author Associate Professor Colin Gavaghan.

“There’s good evidence that humans tend to become over trusting and uncritical of automated systems – especially when those systems get it right most of the time. There’s a real danger that adding a human ‘in the loop’ will just offer false reassurance.”

Beyond an independent oversight body, the report recommends that predictive algorithms used by government need to feature in a public register, be publicly inspectable and be supplemented with explanation systems that allow people to understand how they reach their decisions – with regular assessments of accuracy whose findings are also publicly assessable. n

16 June: Fraser Coast Drones & Innovation Showcase, Brisbane, QLD www.fcdrones.com.au 14 August: AIMS 2018 national conference, Sydney, NSW www.aimsconference.com.au 15 August: 15th South East Asia Survey Congress, Darwin, NT https://seasc2019darwin.com.au 14 September: Roads and Traffic Expo, Melbourne, VIC, www.terrapinn.com/roadsandtrafficexpo 25 September: SSSI NSW/ACT Region Conference, Goulburn NSW https://sssi.org.au/sssi-community/ regions/new-south-wales/nsw-actconference-2019 28 October: Commercial UAV Expo AMERICAS, Los Angeles, USA www.expouav.com

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PARTNER NETWORK

The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information

Publisher Simon Cooper Editor Daniel Bishton dbishton@intermedia.com.au National Advertising Manager Jon Tkach jon@intermedia.com.au Graphic Designer Alyssa Coundouris Prepress Tony Willson Circulation/Subscriptions Chris Blacklock Production Jacqui Cooper Subscribe Position is available via subscription only.

A 12 month subscription (6 issues) is AUD$76.00. To subscribe visit www.intermedia.com.au, phone 1 800 651 422 or email: subscriptions@intermedia.com.au.

Website 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: dbishton@intermedia.com.au Advertising inquiries should be sent to: jon@intermedia.com.au Ph: +61 2 8586 6128 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 Disruption and damnation

T

hese are most certainly turbulent times. Politics at home and abroad convulse with regressive impulses and increasing polarisation, in defiance of as powerful and strident calls as possible from the scientific community for revolutionary change to thwart projected ecological and human catastrophe.

Economic forces are changing shape in response to these developments, and reacting to a new phase of hardball trade dynamics following in the wake of this global spasm towards authoritarianism, with the full ramifications of these strongly worded positions yet to be revealed.

In our corner of the economy, strong forces are also at work. Effects from broader political events and economic trends filter down, affecting work conditions, business confidence, housing demand, infrastructure investment and higher education. We begin to examine some of the forces contributing to a turbulent forecast for surveying and spatial on page 18, and suspect that this is a story that we’ll continue to cover as it evolves.

The monstrous week of #Locate19 came and went since our landmark 100th edition, with some genuinely disruptive programming decisions and initiatives that seem to signal a turning point in acceptance and genuine progress on change agendas that have been discussed for years – see page 28 for some of the insights from a jam-packed few days in Melbourne.

Jon Fairall looks back at the rapid-fire development of drones and the current state of the market, illuminating the latest in the debate around industry need and regulation in the process (page 24).

Zooming out of our sector and first world problems a little, we showcase an Australian initiative helping to change the game for GIS and humanitarian interventions in crisis and disaster zones, see our interview with Nathan Dart of Medicins Sans Frontieres Australia on page 14 and case study of MSF’s Cyclone Idai response on page 22.

We look at an international effort to resolve the ‘web Mercator dilemma’ and how that fits in the the GDA2020 datum on page 32, and review the promise of primary school geospatial ingenuity revealed by the first Geospatial Information Competition, whose winners were awarded at the regional Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards gala, the high point of #Locate19. See page 34 for the report from the organisers on this new initiative to draw bright young things into the geospatial fold.

I hope you enjoy the 101st issue of Position.

Daniel Bishton EDITOR

August/September 2019 – Issue #102

NEXT ISSUE

• 3D modelling & BIM – the new dimension in infrastructure • Mining & Offshore – geoinformation for geological exploration • 3D capture, processing and modelling – multi-modal data acquisition and processing • Hydrography and bathymetry – surveying and sounding the distant depths Ad booking deadline 19/07/2019 Ad material deadline 24/07/2019 Publication date 8/8/2019

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news

Building regional pathways: SEASC 2019 The full line-up for the 15th South East Survey Congress reveals a pleasingly balanced schedule of activities, workshops and heavyweight technical sessions — all the makings of a spectacular, stimulating week in the Top End. Ahead of the congress proper, the tours kick off on Tuesday August 13 with day programs taking advantage of the unique surrounds — a barramundi fishing charter, tours of the incomparable Kakadu and Litchfield national parks and the Tiwi islands.

These options are also available to delegates on Wednesday August 14, while conference co-hosts

the ASEAN Federation of Surveying and Geomatics (ASEAN Flag) hold their Executive Committee Pre-Council and Council Meetings, the UN GGIM Asia Pacific and FIG meeting and the invitation-only first ASEAN Master’s Golf Day run concurrently.

On Thursday the congress program kicks off in earnest, leading with the SSSI Young Professionals day. The full-day program includes lightning talks, hands-on workshops for early career geospatial specialists, a live drone mapping demonstration and a closing panel discussion with the chairs of ASEAN YPs and SSSI aimed at

building permanent, regional professional links.

Roshni Sharma, chair of the National Young Professionals for SSSI, said that the YP Day at SEASC2019 is an incredible opportunity for young professionals to harness their leadership potential and form networks that will forge the way forward for their careers.

"The program features internationally-relevant content that isn't available anywhere else and inspirational speakers from Australia and across the AsiaPacific," she said.

"It takes a deep dive into the core issues that young professionals will need to solve to make positive changes

for the planet's future on all scales, and hones in on key opportunities that will create success for the global geospatial and surveying industry. The SEASC2019 YP Day will set the scene for young professionals activities and initiatives for future conferences nationally and internationally, and is a keystone in the journey for leaders of tomorrow."

Workshops on cadastre modernisation and datum transformation will run alongside the YP Day. The congress reaches full flight on Friday, with plenary sessions and four concurrent breakout tracks: 'UAVs, drones and remote sensing', 'Positioning, navigation and datums', 'Cadastre and land administration systems' and 'Hydrography'. These are joined by sessions on 'Geospatial Information and Land Management', 'Surveying in the Built Environment' and 'SDI Innovations and Digitising Work Flows' in the afternoon.

The program continues full steam ahead on Saturday and Sunday, with new streams 'Land Boundary Surveying', 'Subsurface and Engineering Surveying', 'Disaster Management' and 'New Technologies and Techniques'.

Space Activities Act: industry input needed The Australian Space Agency (ASA) has called for input on the Space Activities Amendment (Launches and Returns) Act 2018, which intends to establish a draft regulatory framework for Australian space activities.

The 2018 amendments update the 1998 Space Activities Act, with the aim of bringing into law a regulatory system that reflects the reality on the ground and in orbit in 2019.

Following the establishment of a national space agency and the rapid development of the Australian space sector and space-reliant industries, the amendment:

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-- includes licensing arrangements for launches from aircraft in flight; -- streamlines the approval process for launches and returns; -- balances safety and risk of potential damage with

the national interest in a changing environment; -- adjusts insurance requirements to appropriate risk levels and international norms; -- reduces barriers to participation for small

Australian space industry companies; -- increases non-compliance penalties to reflect the seriousness of damage to people and property; -- introduces safeguards for high power rocket activities -- The amended act passed both houses of parliament in August 2018, and now needs to be fleshed out with rules to support it.

The agency is seeking written views on three sets of rules, and is accepting submissions until June 14.

Find out more and make your voice heard at: https://consult. industry.gov.au/space/spacelaunches-and-returns-act2018-draft-rules

Clarita Solutions ink deal to bring con terra solutions to Australia

Gruntify adds utility with new basemap integrations

Clarita Solutions have joined forces with con terra to bring the German-based GIS integrator’s advanced GIS monitoring and security tools to Australia.

The new partnership will allow Clarita Solutions to become the exclusive sales partner for con terra’s service. monitor and security.monitor products. The company will also be responsible for sales, training and ongoing support in Australia. con terra products security.manager and service.

Queensland-based GIS People's flagship geospatial analysis platform Gruntify now features new basemap integrations.

GIS People has added three new basemap integrations to its do-it-all workflow management platform, increasing the tool's utility across a range of applications.

MetroMap's high resolution urban imagery is now available as a basemap for users to build their apps upon, featuring detailed city maps with a long series of historic captures available.

Planet's daily captures of Earth create a highly up-to-date basemap for

monitor, are known to strengthen Esri’s ArcGIS Enterprise functionality.

Security.manager recognises individual users, which allows administrators to identify what contents of a published GIS service can be seen or used by each user, which results in saving of time and effort. Service.monitor provides GIS Administrators with an analytics and monitoring platform for understanding the usage trends and reliability of geospatial apps and services.

users with time-critical accuracy requirements.

OpenWeatherMap now also have basemaps available in Gruntify that include global forecasts, current weather status and historical data.

The new maps join existing basemaps from Esri, Tom Tom, OpenStreetMap, HERE and MapBox.

Australian researchers confirm silicon's quantum promise

Major apps bury location tracking in terms and conditions A new study by online security experts VPNmentor has investigated various privacy and data protection policies of some of the most popular sites and applications, to discover how they’re really tracking their users’ every move.

18 of the 21 services in the study track their user’s current location at all times while using the app.

Applications like Tinder keep on following the user’s location, even when the app isn't being used, while Facebook and Instagram track the user’s location as well as details of their residence, and most commonly visited locations.

One of the major discoveries reports that dating apps like Match.com, Tinder, OKCupid, Plentyoffish, etc. pass on data shared with one

service with all the others.

Beyond this, all these online dating services have access to the user’s private messages to potential suitors.

Internet security expert Gaya Polat, from VPNmentor, said, "The amount of data held online about users should make them wary about how "their" details are used. While the majority of this data usage is benign or necessary for services to function, knowing which companies hold which data about you is the only way to track your privacy, and how secure you really are.

“We recommend always reading the privacy policy to ensure you know what you’re agreeing to by signing up – but we hope this project will give something of an insight into what it all entails.”

Researchers at UNSW have measured the accuracy of two-cubit calculations in silicon for the first time, with their results suggesting a strong future for the element in the development of quantum computation.

Publishing their results today in Nature, the team said that their measurement of two-cubit logic operations in silicon will enable scaling up to a fullscale quantum processor.

“All quantum computations can be made up of one-qubit operations

and two-qubit operations – they’re the central building blocks of quantum computing,” said Professor Andrew Dzurak, who led the team of engineers.

“Once you've got those, you can perform any computation you want – but the accuracy of both operations needs to be very high.”

The research team said that their results demonstrate silicon's potential for scaling up to the large number of cubits required for universal quantum computing.

www.spatialsource.com.au 9

news Excellence shines at 2019 regional APSEA gala Industry leaders, up-and-comers and changemakers alike were recognised for their effort and ingenuity at the 2019 AsiaPacific Spatial Excellence Awards during the #Locate19 conference in Melbourne.

Opening the night's proceeding at a packed Sovereign Room at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, president of SSSI Dr. Zaffar MohamedGhouse issued a mantra to the assembled crowd, imploring us all to "create a positive impact on the world using geospatial technologies."

It was a fitting sentiment for a tour-deforce of creative and judicious application of geospatial technologies and surveying nous that followed, targeted at issues from food security in the Pacific islands to the thorniest of engineering challenges.

The first of a long list of accolades was the SSSI undergraduate student award, won by Scott Johnson of Queensland.

Scott's project rigorously tested the precision and accuracy of multiple GNSS partnerships in a manner that accurately reflected field collection methods, impressing the judges with a pioneering approach and high technical competency.

Julian Thom of New Zealand was highly commended in this category for his entry, which challenged the origins, accuracy and purpose of old doctrines about property rights, highlighting field techniques to reduce risks and improve vector performance in the cadastral system.

The SSSI postgraduate of the year award was also awarded to a pioneering research project in the anlaysis of GNSS applications in Australia, won by Dr. Safoora Zaminpardaz of Western Australia.

Dr. Sofanit Girma Araya was highly commended in the postgraduate category for the exceptional research quality shown in her thesis, which presented and tested a methodology for spatial modelling of soil PAWC (Plant Available Water Holding Capacity), using multi-temporal remote sensing vegetation index data.

The SSSI Education development award was handed to Dr. Jonathon Osborn of Tasmania, for over three

Dr. Stuart Minchin receiving the SSSI president's award.

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decades of outstanding service as an educator, with Dr. Mohsen Kalantari highly commended.

Next up were the awards for the inaugural Geospatial Information Competition, for which there had been over 20 entries since its establishment in 2018.

First place was won by Lizzie Peabody and Micah Edwards at Nowra christian college, for their story map ‘Using spatial technology to optimise nest box placement’, and second place went to Bede and Tom, in year 9 at Barker college in Sydney for their video ‘Solving homelessness in NSW using geospatial technologies’.

Deanna Hutchinson, CEO of SIBA|GITA, took the stage to present the Excellence award to AECOM, accepted by Antoine Burdett. Graeme Allan, Operations Manager of Dial Before You Dig presented the annual DBYD award to Telstra for their responding to a new set of criteria developed by DBYD to test the rigour of their underground asset management.

Next up was the SIBA|GITA for environment and sustainability award, claimed by Ethos Envrionmental from New Zealand for their project 'Beyond Glenfern Sanctuary'.

The SIBA|GITA award for innovation and commercialisation was claimed

by Decipher & NGIS Australia, for their Decipher platform for farmers and agronomists, and Pacific Flying Labs received the 2019 SIBA|GITA People and community award for their Technology and Tradition project in the Pacific Islands.

Dr. Safoora Zaminpardaz receives the SSSI postgraduate of the year award.

A high standard of food, wine and professional achievement assured that attendees enjoyed their evening.

Nick Brown, young professional of the year.

The prestigious SSSI young professional of the year award for the 2019 APSEAs went to Nick Brown, who now leads a team in the national geodesy program for Geoscience Australia.

Elaine McAlister of New Zealand was recognised by SSSI as the professional of the year for 2019. Judges noted her role in leading the development of first commercial national road centreline of New Zealand and was instrumental in the GIS capability project, which formed the building block to establish the future geospatial direction for the NZTA, as well as establishing the Women in Spatial group (NZIS).

Dr. Kathryn Salm of New Zealand took out the SSSI women's leadership award,in her current role as the New Zealand Geospatial Leader for Aurecon in New Zealand, where she is part of a team that plays an integral role in the Christchurch rebuild program.

The SIBA |GITA award for technical excellence went to Bennett + Bennett surveyors for their work on the Sundale bridge expansion project on the Gold Coast.

The award for spatial enablement, recognising projects transformed by the application of spatial technology went to Monitum, the monitoring arm of Land Solution Australia, for their Herston quarter project, and Dr. Zaffar Mohamed-Ghouse returned to the stage to present the SSSI professional eminence award to Gary Johnston of Geoscience Australia.

Zaffar then presented the SSSI president's award to another of Geoscience Australia's outstanding earth sciences team — Dr. Stuart Minchin.

The most prestigious accolade of the night, the JK Barrie Award, was awarded to Decipher and NGIS Australia for their Decipher project.

And thus a stellar evening of recognition for the heroes of the regional geospatial industry concluded.

Image by Alistair White.

Aussie researchers crack El Niño’s code

CSIRO maps WA’s Eastern goldfields to uncover deposits

A team of Australian researchers have produced a 400-year record of El Niño that shows dramatic changes in the phenomena, utilising a specialised method of analysis that uses cores drilled from coral reefs.

The paper published in Nature Geoscience shows the nature of these phenomena, which are a driver of extreme weather events across the globe, has changed over time and suggests that the strength

The Minerals Research Institute of Western Australia (MRIWA), CSIRO and industry partners will conduct a decade-long research project to map key territories of the Eastern goldfields in Western Australia.

MRIWA research portfolio manager, Anil Subramanya, said that a deeper insight into mineral systems can assist gold

of Eastern Pacific El Niños was likely to increase in future.

“We are seeing more El Niños forming in the central Pacific Ocean in recent decades, which is unusual across the past 400 years,” said lead author, Dr. Mandy Freund.

“There are even some early hints that the much stronger Eastern Pacific El Niños, like those that occurred in 1997/98 and 2015/16 may be growing in intensity,” she said.

miners in planning their exploration campaigns.

"CSIRO found that certain indicator minerals give you an idea of the conditions in which the deposits were formed. This helps exploration companies find gold deposits, determine how big they are and see what else might be found in the ground that they hold," says Dr. Subramanya.

www.spatialsource.com.au 11

news Climate report: ‘A line in the sand for humanity’ In a historic publication, a scientific paper representing a process of over 500 biodiversity experts, approved by 134 countries warns that the systems supporting life on Earth will collapse without 'transformational change'.

The report published by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) is the first intergovernmental publication of its kind. It was based on the systematic review of around 15,000 governmental and scientific

sources, giving a detailed portrayal of the relationship between economic pathways and impact on nature.

The findings are bleak.

It claims life on Earth is in a state of unprecedented decline, with the extinction of almost one million species without transformational systemic change — an outcome with dire ramifications for humans and every other species.

"This report must represent a line in the sand for humanity," said Deakin University Associate Professor Euan Ritchie.

Maxar, Toyota, NTT Data announce HD map partnership Toyota's autonomous vehicle development arm, space technology firm Maxar and IT service provider NTT DATA have announced a partnership to develop high definition maps for use by autonomous vehicles.

Toyota Research InstituteAdvanced Development (TRI-AD) announced that the three firms would collaborate to develop a proof-of-concept automated, high definition map using Maxar's high resolution satellite imagery.

Current autonomous vehicle prototypes rely heavily on vehicle-mounted real time sensors to stay aware

of their surroundings, which are typically cross referenced with GNSS services or a high definition map to validate their inputs. Analysis by TRI-AD indicates that less than one

percent of global road networks are covered by HD maps.

This project is designed to speed development of TRIAD's Automated Mapping Platform concept (AMP) and

'help realise the scalability of autonomous driving', according to materials released by TRI-AD. Mandali Khalesi, Vice President Automated Driving at TRI-AD said that the project would leverage Maxar's GBDX optical sat ellite imagery platform, and NTT DATA's artificial intelligence based imagery processing algorithmns.

"Recent advances in electronics and aerospace engineering are leading to higher resolutions and more frequent updates of global imagery from spacebased assets."

POSITION’S NEWS ORIGINATES FROM Australia and New Zealand’s only site for surveying and spatial news.

Subscribe now for your FREE weekly newsletter at www.spatialsource.com.au 12 position June/July 2019

Maxar to recoup losses from WorldView-4 Digital Globes’ parent company Maxar will receive $US183 million for the loss of its flagship imaging satellite WorldView-4.

Insurance companies have accepted Maxar Technologies' claim for the loss after a failure of WorldView-4’s control movement gyroscope system rendered it inoperable in January.

The satellite's loss was a devastating blow for the company, already carrying a $US 3 billion debt load,

which unified brands DigitalGlobe, SSL and Radiant Solutions under the Maxar brands in February.

A statement released by Maxar indicates that they anticipate payment within 30 days, and it will reinvest the funds into 'pre-existing capital priorities', including completion of its WorldView Legion constellation of small satellites, which was originally commissioned to replace the three oldest satellites in its constellation.

C.R. Kennedy bags contract for utility locator systems C.R. Kennedy Survey has won a contract for the supply and maintenance of more than fifty leading-edge utility locating systems for Comdain Infrastructure.

C.R. Kennedy says VivaxMetrotech’s vLoc3 Pro advanced utility locator will help Comdain execute its utility identification work with utmost accuracy and reliability while abiding by the latest requirements stipulated by asset owners

and Dial-Before-You-Dig (DBYD) Australia.

The vLoc3-Pro utility locator brings innovative tools to the table for locating buried utilities and prevents damage while gathering information for analysis. The system is also capable to log outcomes and communicates the details through its cloud-based mobile application VMMAP, which allows customers to monitor fieldwork, remotely and in real-time.

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To learn more contact: Paul Dean CalcsPlus Pty Ltd Master Distributor HP Calculators South Pacific Region +613 9429 0222 pdean@calcsplus.com.au www.calcsplus.com.au

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www.spatialsource.com.au 13

feature

Q&A with

Nathan Dart A

s we go about our day-to-day in one of the most economically developed environments in the world, we’ve become reliant on datarich, real time maps in the palms of our hands. But not-for-profit organisations responding to humanitarian crises in developing countries typically have no such luxury. In attempting to prevent loss of life and alleviate suffering in natural disaster sites or conflict zones, first responders and GIS professionals, working on donated funding, sometimes need to refer to hand-drawn maps of areas that, to Western eyes, may have few distinguishing features to start with.

Even with access to satellite imagery – how might one tell a thatched-roof hut containing fresh water and medical supplies from one housing a large family?

A project gaining traction in Australia called Missing Maps aims to give people the chance to contribute to this effort without spending a cent – and without the need for GIS skills. Nathan Dart, Community Engagement Coordinator for Médecins Sans Frontières Australia, sits down with Position to talk us through the initiative.

Position: Could you describe the objectives of the Missing Maps events?

ND: Missing Maps is an open, collaborative project in which anyone

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can help map areas of the world where humanitarian organisations are trying to meet the needs of vulnerable people.

Many of the places where humanitarian organisations like Medecins Sans Frontieres work are literally 'missing' from any map. The detail on maps isn’t sufficient or current. This means we can’t make timely decisions in response to disasters and access to vulnerable populations. That’s where the Missing Maps project comes in to help.

Missing Maps events – known as ‘Mapathons’ - are held all around the world by volunteers to trace satellite imagery in OpenStreetMap. Maps are then validated by experienced mappers, and in the field by community volunteers to add details and other necessary data.

Then we can use these maps to respond to disasters and disease outbreaks, organise vaccination campaigns, and work out how to access remote areas.

Position: Are the mapathons typically in response to major incidents?

ND: The most urgent Mapathons are in response to emergencies such as natural disasters and disease outbreaks. However, Missing Maps is organised to respond to all types of humanitarian needs including chronic issues or protracted conflicts to make sure we can provide care to all people in need.

Position: How are locations and tasks determined?

ND: The mapping tasks are prioritised and organised through HOT (Humanitarian Open Street Maps Team) using the online platform HOTOSM (www.hotosm.org).

HOT is a collaboration of a number of humanitarian organisations, including Medecins Sans Frontieres and the Red Cross, and is coordinated internationally to ensure that the most important global mapping needs are met. Mapping projects are ordered in terms of priority so volunteer mappers around the world can easily determine what projects to use for their events.

Position: Are the desired outcomes typically health-related?

ND: Ultimately, the desired outcomes are health related but you’d be surprised how many maps you need to achieve health outcomes! We need detailed and current maps to: • Respond to conflict, natural disasters and disease outbreaks, and determine the population's size, access points, and possible limitations to providing relief efforts. During a conflict or natural disaster, things can literally change overnight • Provide population data for vaccination campaigns • Provide basic medical care in remote places • Support community health development • Reach and care for populations on the move

They are very social events. The best Mapathons involve music and beer... At the end, everyone feels really good about coming together and making a tangible impact to international humanitarian work.

Position: Who are your target attendees? Who would you like to be attracting in future?

Position: Are any other Australian groups participating in this? If so, do their events have a different focus?

ND: There are a handful of Australian groups participating in Missing Maps, but we definitely need more! That’s why we want to tell more people about this great international initiative. Currently Medecins Sans Frontieres Australia are working with universities and Engineers Without Borders in Australia and New Zealand to support the coordination of Missing Maps events.

Position: What skills (if any) are required, and is training provided?

ND: Holding a Mapathon is easy. You just need to decide on project task and then invite all your friends! Depending on the skills of the people involved, some quick training on using the HOTOSM platform is helpful, as well as how to recognise roads, buildings and waterways on satellite imagery and digitally trace over those images.

The skill level required is not high, but the most important thing for new mappers is to understand what they are looking at on the image. This can be the most daunting part of the task and what

Missing Maps events – known as ‘Mapathons’ - are held all around the world by volunteers to trace satellite imagery in OpenStreetMap. new mappers most worry about. Knowing what something looks like on a satellite image comes with experience.

The tasks are also allocated difficulty levels, beginner to advanced, within the HOTOSM platform and sometimes the mapping task for an event is determined by the skill level of the group that is mapping. It is not that difficult to pick up.

Position: How does a typical night unfold?

ND: A typical mapathon night involves lots of eating pizza whilst mapping. The events start with training and support for anyone new to mapping, and then there may be a talk from afield worker from a humanitarian organisation to explain the use of maps in the field and why they are so important. Then everyone focuses for the rest of the evening on mapping as much of the project as they can.

ND: MSF Australia would love as many people to map as humanly possible.

At the moment we are mainly working with universities. But we also support community groups that approach us who want to hold a Missing Maps event.

Essentially the point is that anyone can map and we would love to see more groups around Australia holding mapathons. However, we are really interested in approaching expert GIS and OpenStreetMap mappers in the future to help us support Missing Maps around Australia and New Zealand and to get involved with this great event. We need more expertise to support the growth of Missing Maps in Australia.

Position: How can our readers get involved and lend their expertise?

ND: We would love to hear from the readers of Position magazine, we would ask that if any readers would like to start their own Missing Maps events or would like to support the Missing Maps events organised by MSF Australia, then they can contact Nathan Dart, Community Engagement Coordinator, at nathan.dart@sydney.msf.org Position: Many thanks, Nathan.

A case study for MSF’s GIS-driven relief work in the wake of Cyclone Idai can be found on page 22. n www.spatialsource.com.au 15

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HL Surveyors have been using MAGNET software since the late 80s and first purchased Topcon robotic total stations, about seven years ago from Position Partners. About two years ago, PHL Surveyors decided to fully integrate its system by purchasing the Topcon GNSS equipment.

PHL Surveyors is involved in many facets of surveying, including, rural boundary definition, rural and urban subdivision as well as large scale irrigation design work, planning and engineering works. Alan Longhurst is one of three directors at PHL Surveyors and operates the Bungendore branch.

“My role as a surveyor and planner is to take the projects in and distribute them to the staff. I do limited field work but I make sure that my staff is well equipped with the right technology and expertise,” said Mr Longhurst.

“One of the projects we’re working on at the present time is a 20km rural marking job where the boundaries have been very difficult to access, and the terrain is pretty steep. We’ve had to use a number of technologies including total stations, GNSS, AllDayRTK as well as kinematic methodology.

16 position June/July 2019

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Register at http://bit.ly/Magnet2019 “We’ve been very impressed with the way that the equipment has performed in this task and it’s made it so much easier for us rather than using traditional survey techniques.”

Why did PHL Surveyors choose to integrate Topcon technology with its MAGNET software?

PHL Surveyors had been using MAGNET software for many years before implementing the Topcon equipment, finding that working with Position Partners has made the process seamless.

“Since Topcon has taken on the role of developing MAGNET software, we’ve found that that’s worked seamlessly with the use of GNSS and robotic total stations, where in the past we’ve had to use other third party software and swap it through different applications,” said Mr Longhurst.

PHL Surveyors chose a combination of Topcon total stations, GNSS and MAGNET, to enable an integrated process both in the office and in the field after having had the opportunity to test the workflow in the field.

“We chose this equipment following some site visits from Position Partners and some field testing. We found that the order of accuracy that we can achieve and the cost effectiveness to gather that is really impressive using the Topcon equipment,” said Mr Longhurst.

“In order to get this working well we needed to integrate the whole thing so we’ve gathered together all the Position Partners and Topcon technologies for GNSS, total stations and software and now we can operate much more effectively in the office, transferring data to and from equipment, to and from field parties and we feel quite content with where we are,” he added.

PHL Surveyors Director Alan Longhurst says he values the office visits from Position Partners staff members like David Banks.

The integration of software and equipment PHL Surveyors has used MAGNET software, in one form or another, since the late ‘80s from its early origins in CivilCAD format. One thing that has kept PHL Surveyors using MAGNET software is the support received from Position Partners.

“Whenever you use software or equipment like this there is always issues and the key to having a good software base is the support that you get when things go awry or when there are questions to be asked and answered.

We’re very happy with the way Position Partners are supporting us in the use of this software and we see no reason to change,” said Mr Longhurst.

“The use of MAGNET software is critical to the way we operate our practice and without it we couldn’t achieve the outcomes we need to satisfy our client’s needs,” said Mr Longhurst.

Benefits of implementing the Topcon technology and MAGNET software solution Following the acquisition of their first robotic total station, Mr Longhurst and his team were impressed with the increased efficiency with which they could work. This only improved when PHL Surveyors integrated the Topcon GNSS equipment.

“We’ve found from when we first purchased the robotic total stations right through to now where we’ve got the GNSS equipment and MAGNET software in a harmonious situation that we’ve achieved great efficiencies by being able to upload and download data to the one system without using a third party product,” said Mr Longhurst.

Position Partners’ David Banks.

“The use of MAGNET software is critical to the way we operate our practice and without it we couldn’t achieve the outcomes we need to satisfy our client’s needs.”

– PHL Surveyors’ Alan Longhurst.

“We can now send and receive data between the office and field parties almost instantaneously and it allows us to put out a really good product, accurately and quickly.

“We can achieve outcomes, such as the boundary marking that we’ve just done, in a tenth of the time with a tremendous order of accuracy.”

The importance of service and support during purchasing and implementation The support and service offered by a provider is equally as important as the capabilities of the devices to Mr Longhurst when making technology purchasing decisions.

“It’s very important to us to have a local support team, although the support is readily available over the telephone, you can’t beat the visits to the office by the representative, such as David Banks, or the visits that we have into the local Fyshwick office,” said Mr Longhurst.

“I think’s it’s very important rather than have a multi-national company that’s remote to have this constant support and back up.”

Mr Longhurst and his team frequently contact the service and support team at Position Partners to discuss their usage of the technology, any issues that they may have overlooked or equipment problems that may have occurred.

“We usually do that by phone and receive a response back almost straight away. At other times, the representatives have come to our office and run through issues with us here.” said Mr Longhurst.

“Over the years that we’ve been operating, we feel that the most critical component of an operating system is to have adequate support. Something's always going to go wrong, something's always going to need updating, some advice is always going to be sought.”

When asked what advice he had to give to other companies considering making this kind of purchasing decision, Mr Longhurst replied: “We made a decision to integrate Topcon technology and MAGNET software a few years ago and I think that’s really been a step forward for our business. I would recommend any others might really consider harmonising that aspect, it makes life so much easier and time efficient.”

About PHL Surveyors PHL Surveyors has been operating for over 100 years in Griffith, in the Riverina and for the last 12 years in Bungendore. PHL Surveyors is a surveying-based company that also does civil design work and planning. PHL Surveyors currently has about 20 staff, including four registered surveyors, three trainees and one graduate.

Information provided by Position Partners. n www.spatialsource.com.au 17

feature

Storm warning Despite the growing dynamism of surveying and geospatial disciplines, economic forecasts warn of turbulence ahead.

DANIEL BISHTON

L

ocation is everywhere now. We know this because we use it daily in the palms of our hands, and we’ve watched and participated in the integration of spatial data into traditional workflows and reporting processes as it has pitched up over the past decade.

With rapid uptake of 3- and 4D modelling in new professional disciplines and ongoing technological transformation of surveying, it seems reasonable to expect a bright future and future growth, along with a demand for infrastructure and housing that, despite a well-telegraphed dip on the horizon, is projected to maintain a steady rise over the long term.

But the numbers tell a different story.

Australia is currently experiencing a serious shortfall of surveyors and spatial professionals, and according to a recent report commissioned by Consulting Surveyors National, will continue to do so for the next five years, with a provisional return to surplus projected by 2024.

At the same time, course offerings for surveying and spatial education have been shrinking and are being consolidated, despite an uptick in enrolments for surveying courses, which are now increasing after a decade of effort in a dedicated campaign. In the case of surveying, an ageing workforce requires a

18 position June/July 2019

legion of bright young things to replenish it, and currently the pipeline of graduates to industry is of insufficient capacity.

Understanding the bottleneck A range of forces are acting on the industry and its embattled educators, subtly different yet interlinked for surveying and spatial pathways. Broad dynamics common to the tertiary sector have seen universities falling over themselves to attract international students, altering criteria for staff and curricula as institutions seek to realign their performance indicators with international metrics over domestic ones, with impacts on both attracting appropriate staff and their prospects post-tenure. Objectives of educational institutions and commercial actors are not aligned, adding complexity to the challenge of creating synergistic partnerships between academia and the private sector, SMEs and large firms alike.

TAFE is becoming a less-trodden pathway into a surveying career, with a full undergraduate degree required to become a licensed surveyor in all Australian jurisdictions – and complex requirements that differ subtly by state.

Adam Burke, geospatial manager for

NSW at Position Partners, said that TAFE students have historically been very well regarded in the industry, typically considered to come prepared with solid practical experience. Burke’s view is that the current shortfall for registered surveyors could be aided with some streamlining of the route to registration.

“There’s a current need for registered surveyors, and I think we could attack that two ways. Firstly, the pathway to registration is not easy, and it’s very bureaucratic,” he said.

Burke suggests that closer coordination between TAFE providers and universities offering surveying degrees could help to facilitate a more accessible pathway to university from TAFE. “There’s a big disconnect between TAFE and universities, that I think could be made easier. That probably means universities acknowledging their TAFE qualification, and some TAFE course content may need to have the bar lifted a little,” he said.

“I think that's one angle to increase the number of people from TAFE to university, which then means you get more people going for registration.”

Burke sees streamlining of administrative processes on the demand side as a means to freeing up capacity of registered surveyors. If some of the

A campaign aimed at introducing surveying to primary school children will be a new tool utilised by the Surveying Task Force NSW.

processes that registered land surveyors find themselves doing day-to-day as the only qualified personnel were more automated, it may assist the projected shortfall of registered surveyors over the next five years – an area that digital cadastre projects and gateways to automating local government processes around plans could assist.

Burke isn’t the only one who sees reform as part of a solution to securing a dynamic, and healthy future for surveying. Efforts to secure industry’s future inform the Surveying & Spatial Sciences Institute’s strategic agenda, and SSSI CEO Peter sees a bottleneck that’s out of step with industry needs in 2019.

Olah said that many industry leaders are TAFE graduates, whom have historically composed a large portion of the surveying field force.

“It's very easy to see in the current context that there may be kids who are technically very proficient but not academic, who now don't have a pathway to a technical profession where they could really excel,” he said.

“That's sad because that was a good pathway for those people but it was also a very good pathway for the professional and the industry.”

“I suspect this is not simply a question of universities versus industry but also different levels of influence within the university hierarchies, where surveying and spatial are not understood in terms of global value and global market.”

Balancing act Olah envisages a streamlined process to free up the accreditation and licensing process, and help standardise it across the states and territories – the existing, convoluted pathways to accreditation and licensing reflecting a very different set of circumstances within the industry and the economy as a whole.

“It’s a system that was vitally important when you have one source of proof – of spatial data, and it was only surveyors, and you also had an oversupply of people wanting to be surveyors. So you've got a protectionist system, bluntly – for a profession that on pure numbers is in decline. Now that doesn't make sense.

That's a strategic misfit.”

“Ultimately what is happening is that the market is filling that gap by getting that same data from various parts of the spatial stream, which is good – except that the spatial stream has no regulation around it at all,” he said.

Olah believes that the explosion of spatial data sources, processing tools and providers, coupled with the demographic changes and supply issues affecting surveying, call for a re-think of the

licensing regime for surveyors – and a balancing of the regulatory environment that would help to shore up the playing field for geospatial service providers at the same time.

“In some areas especially, professional high end spatial businesses are being hurt because they're being outcompeted on price by cowboys with very few qualifications or quality systems, if any.”

“I see the future for the industry surveying and spatial as one based around a very flexible, very outcome-based certification process – I think that's where the two streams of surveying and spatial could meet. But there's a lot of work to do to get to that and you'll see increasingly in terms of our [SSSI’s] strategic projects – that’s where a lot of our effort will go.”

Pressure from all sides Where does this all leave the universities?

Among other factors, decades of funding erosion have left revenue cavities that have been bogged up with the a privatisation process, and the lowest hanging fruit seems to be international fee-paying students, who can be can be charged

double or treble the fees of Australian students. Almost all Australian tertiary institutions are now voraciously pursuing international students to fill their coffers, which has proven to be a highly lucrative endeavour for the institutions overall, with some hidden drawbacks for individual courses and educators – as well as the students themselves.

These golden streams of international revenue do not seem to have trickled down to surveying courses yet. A paper from UNSW surveying educators Dr. Craig Roberts and Dr. Bruce Harvey presented at the recent Association of Public Authority Surveyors conference in April argues that these forces have impacted their courses in two significant ways.

Currently the practical components of the program at UNSW are sufficient with around 30 practical exercises of various complexity across the whole program. However, the pivot towards international league tables has altered internal criteria for future staff hires, resulting in a more research-focused set – which thins the playing field for surveying applicants, inherently a practically focused discipline. This trend threatens to reduce the ability of new space to develop, organise and facilitate a program of practical course components that meet educational outcomes and crystallise theory for students, providing a crucial theatre for exposure to field work. Concurrently the logistics and organisation of practical exercises – transport, maintenance of equipment and survey marks and the campus geodetic network – are becoming an increasing burden on staff both professional and academic. www.spatialsource.com.au 19

feature

Crossovers between 3D games and model construction may be a valuable angle to attract students into spatial disciplines.

Olah sees this as a missed opportunity for both a more insightful dialogue between industry and academia, and of revenue generation for the universities.

“It's pretty clear there's significant skills gaps that exist now and those skills gaps are projected to get bigger. So that talks in general terms to a pipeline that is meeting the needs of the industry – not just domestically, given that those skills gaps exist in any number of markets quite near to Australia.”

“I suspect this is not simply a question of universities versus industry but also different levels of influence within the university hierarchies, where surveying and spatial are not understood in terms of global value and global market. Now at a domestic level, I don't think the industry has done a good job of influencing that and we're working internally, but also with our sister organisations to try to bridge that gap in terms of understanding.”

Industry organises There are success stories in this space, though – the result of long-term, dedicated efforts from a range of passionate industry bodies, educators and surveying professionals. The highly successful ‘Life Without Limits’ campaign originated to raise awareness and drive enrolments for cadastral surveyors, and has been doing so with increasing velocity as it has rolled out across the country. Since its initial launch in 2008, the campaign has been responsible for an increase in new enrolments reported at a number of the key tertiary institutions across the country. Plans to expand and consolidate distribution of the campaign’s core message are underway, while a very new campaign, Geospatial Science, has recently launched to raise the profile of the broader career pathways in spatial (see page 34).

20 position June/July 2019

Another committed initiative, SSSI’s Young Professionals program is going from strength to strength with increasingly greater representation at key industry conferences, and deepening engagement with industry. The YPs program seeks to bring the needs of students and early career spatial practitioners into focus, while highlighting what young professionals can bring organisationally to long-established firms and practices, while further developing their ongoing mentoring program.

Unifying around a future vision Beyond communicating the existence of these pathways, it’s clear that bridges need to be built within the various streams of the industry as well.

Professor Sisi Zlatanova is one of the Research Cluster staff in the Geospatial Research Innovation and Development department, at the School of the Built Environment at UNSW. Ms Zlatanova moved to Sydney for the position in the last year from Delft University in the Netherlands, where she says surveying is a more of a trade-based discipline than in the Australian contex, with surveyors typically employed on staff of engineering construction firms.

Ms Zlatanova sees the hard conceptual partitioning of surveying practice from the spectra of other spatial disciplines in Australia as a limitation on its appeal to young people, and a misrepresentation of where the profession is heading.

“Surveying is really about measurement,” she said. “But if you stop there without bringing in the next components – processing the data in an automated way, putting that data into a digital environment – a digital twin, a digital map, providing some analysis of the environment. If all these components aren’t together, they might fall apart and disappear.”

In her field of advanced spatial modelling and analytics with a focus on developing standards and protocols in the 3D space, Ms Zlatanova has a different take on the differing needs of academia and industry. Anticipating an ease of collaboration due to the relatively small size of the market in Australia, she has found the comparative lack of commercial R&D capacity in Australia has complicated the process of finding synergistic goals for industry partnerships with academic research programs focused on product development. She said that many meetings and discussions around large projects aimed at developing geospatial products in collaboration with even high powered industry partners have ended the same way.

“Every time, we get to the same point in the conversation, which is: ‘but releasing funds for research is very difficult for us because we don't have a research unit here in Australia’,” she said.

Other discussions in this area with startups and SMEs have faltered due to concerns around restrictions on IP of products developed in a university environment, she said.

The net result of this process is a vicious cycle that seems a perverse complement to the dynamics impacting procurement of appropriately qualified and motivated academics for surveying.

Australian students within these research programs find themselves in positions overseas due to the comparatively fewer spatial research and product development roles, and the research programs offered here tend to attract PhDs candidates from overseas – India, China, Malaysia primarily, who return to their home markets once their studies are complete.

While Australia’s high end manufacturing and R&D sector is small, it is developing rapidly and has been bolstered by the new Australian Space Agency and concentration of spaceadjacent enterprise in South Australia.

It seems that this could represent an opportunity for helping to promote spatial technologies and careers with engaging and forward-looking representations of current and future applications. Handson drone mapping exercises, crossover with 3D game engines, sensor-driven sustainable future cities, autonomous vehicles and the world of nanosatellites – these are all themes that seem ripe for leverage to deepen engagement with young minds and inform curricula design while these technologies and local industries develop.

While there may be dark clouds on the horizon, the time for sowing the seeds of future growth seems nigh. n

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Mapping the needs: the open source map technologies and volunteer movement playing an essential role in humanitarian emergency response

Just after Cyclone Idai made landfall in southern Africa, international medical organisation Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) sent four experts in Geographical Information Systems (GIS) to the region and mobilised thousands of volunteers around the world to produce high-quality maps of the worst-hit areas to help emergency teams mount an effective response.

NATHAN DART

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C

yclone Idai hit Mozambique and Zimbabwe in mid-March, flooding vast swathes of land, leaving hundreds of thousands of people homeless and destroying buildings, crops and infrastructure.

MSF responded to the natural disaster by sending emergency teams and medical supplies to southern Africa.

Simultaneously, the not-for-profit organisation deployed four GIS experts – one of whom was already in Zimbabwe – to support the teams by providing detailed, multilayered maps of the region, in its largest GIS response since the 2014 West Africa Ebola epidemic.

GIS services can combine multiple layers of information on a single map, helping responders to understand the scale of the emergency, plan logistics, improve epidemiological surveillance and coordinate with other organisations.

“With such a large-scale natural disaster, the needs are most acute at the onset of the crisis,” says Audrey LessardFontaine, head of MSF’s GIS Unit. “At the onset, the situation is changing continuously – whether that’s road access, water levels or damage assessment. We need that information to plan how we are going to reach the affected population.”

MSF teams are increasingly aware of the importance of GIS in helping them plan operations and support decisionmaking in emergencies, and are requesting more operational support than ever before.

“It is now almost a reflex for the teams in an emergency setting to ask for GIS support for epidemiology response by mapping out cases to see where patients come from,” says Lessard-Fontaine. “They also need GIS support for water and sanitation assessments, to map out where the water points and latrines are.”

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“It is now almost a reflex for the teams in an emergency setting to ask for GIS support for epidemiology response by mapping out cases to see where patients come from.”

A key element of the GIS response is base maps, which show buildings, waterways and road networks in the area.

GIS experts need these base maps to provide high-quality analyses of the affected areas for use by MSF’s logisticians and epidemiologists.

Surprisingly, such base maps do not exist for many of the regions where MSF works, which are often remote, disasterprone or home to some of the world’s most vulnerable people. The lack of maps presented a major challenge – until a simple solution was found, known as the Missing Maps project. With the help of OpenStreetMap – a crowdsourced map – thousands of volunteers worldwide digitise satellite imagery and create maps of the most vulnerable areas of the world for use by aid organisations.

The Missing Maps project was set up in 2014 by a number of humanitarian organisations, including MSF. When Cylone Idai struck, its volunteers were quick to swing into action.

Already they have mapped more than 200,000 buildings and nearly 17,000 km of roads in the affected areas.

Zimbabwe is one country for which few detailed base maps exist. MSF GIS officer Last Prosper Mufoya provides GIS support for MSF operations in Zimbabwe. When the cyclone hit, Mufoya immediately activated the Missing Maps community to create maps of the worst-hit area, Chimanimani. “Chimanimani was totally cut off from the rest of the world, as all roads leading to it were damaged and most bridges were washed away,” says Mufoya.

Using satellite imagery, the volunteers focused on capturing roads, buildings and water drainage systems, since very little of this data was available on OpenStreetMap. “Volunteers from all corners of the Missing Maps community, including our Zimbabwean chapter, worked tirelessly to contribute data on the tasks,” says Mufoya.

The base maps of Mozambique, Zimbabwe and also Malawi - which experienced dramatic flooding caused by the weather systems associated with the cyclone - produced by the volunteers have been distributed widely to all organisations involved in the emergency efforts, helping them to gain a clear picture of the situation on the ground and to plan a quick and effective response.

Nathan Dart is the community engagement coordinator at Medecins Sans Frontieres Australia. n

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feature

DRONES COME OF AGE JON FAIRALL

T

wenty years ago, the micro-miniaturisation of electronics transformed the world of model aeroplanes and the modern unmanned aerial vehicle was born. As with all new technologies, they were hyped beyond their initial capability, and then reviled below it, until experience bought some sort of maturity to the debate.

Golden streams Twenty years ago, they were toys. Today, investors take the drone market very seriously indeed. Worldwide, almost $3.2 billion has been thrown at the technology since 2008. In 2018 alone, $702 million was invested in the top 159 investment deals, according to the Drone Investment Report of 2018, produced by DroneII, a company that gathers financial intelligence on the drone market.

Early this year, a Perth legal firm, Bennett + Co, released a report predicting the industry will be worth $11 billion annually by 2026. An oft-quoted report by PWC estimates the total market value at $127 billion.

This river of cash is founded on the belief that drones can make money, a lot of money, for end users. Increasingly, evidence from industry backs this up. Applications are maturing in a number of industry verticals where cost savings are commonplace. As a result, more than 7,000 Australians are now registered drone pilots. Some of them are surveyors, and many of them are satisfying a need once fulfilled by surveyors.

Signs of market maturity are everywhere. Many firms producing aircraft and control systems are well beyond their start-up phase – they are scaling-up to be major influencers in a number of well-defined market segments. In the 2016-2018 period, DroneII tracked 70 mergers and acquisitions. Some of the firms involved are household names: Boeing, Facebook, and Amazon spring to mind.

But they do not have the market to themselves. The biggest names in the survey and geospatial industry, such as Leica, Autodesk, Trimble and Bentley are also handing over cash to drone developers as if their lives depended on it – either developing their own drone technology or buying it from start-ups.

Moving the bench mark Mark Hickey, the general manager of CR Kennedy in Queensland said drones have been adopted by the survey industry for a variety of reasons. “Modern drones are reliable and generate a consistent product for customers,” he said.

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It’s become well understood that RPAs can have a dramatic difference to the cost of doing business in certain industries.

Andrew Chapman, the director of operations at Australian UAV, says he makes three arguments to his clients: “The value proposition is firstly, better data, the second factor is safety and finally, cost savings.”

He says that, depending on the exact nature of the site, costs can be one tenth to one hundredth the cost of using traditional methods. This is obviously significant, but it may not be the most important consideration. In some instances, drone surveying is much safer. “No site manager wants surveyors ducking and weaving through heavy machinery on a busy site,” he said. “The temptation is to shut the operation down while the survey occurs. Drones avoid this.”

A concept evolved Drone technology seems to have come out of nowhere, but in fact, the capability of current drones is the result of decades of steady development. There have been unmanned aerial vehicles almost as long as there have been aeroplanes. Indeed, in World War II, the Nazis in Germany turned one into perhaps the most fearsome weapon of the war, the Vergeitungswaffe 1 (V1) or ‘buzz bomb’. Buzz bombs were controlled by a pendulum, a gyroscope and an odometer driven by a vane anemometer.

Surprisingly perhaps, they were reasonably accurate, typically blowing up within 10 kilometres of their target after a trip of about 500 kilometres.

Modern versions are far more sophisticated. Drones have benefitted from a smorgasbord of technologies that have been developed during the last 20 years. Batteries store more charge and weigh less. Electronics consume less power.

Guidance systems are smaller and more capable, sensing technologies have diversified and improved.

One of the most important of these new technologies is MEMS, or Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems. MEMS are miniaturised (micrometre scale) mechanical and electromechanical elements – such as gyros and compasses – that are fabricated using the same techniques that are used in silicon chips. They underpin the attitude control system in the drone itself, but they also have powerful implications for some sorts of sensors.

Payloads of a different kind

“Customers often ask for better. My response is to ask them whether they really need the accuracy, or whether they are prepared to trade of some accuracy for the other advantages of using drones for surveys.”

MEMS also underpin the latest developments in droneborn LIDAR. LIDARs are inherently more challenging to operate in a UAV platform than optical sensors because they are active instruments, requiring more power than passive sensors. They also depend on delicate and sensitive moving parts that need to be well-engineered. Traditionally, the result is a big, heavy box.

Glenne Blyth, the managing director of LIDAR manufacturer Riegl’s Australian operation, says that traditionally, two types of laser survey equipment were on offer: airborne or terrestrial, each with clearly defined advantages and disadvantages. “Airborne surveys are expensive; terrestrial surveys limited by their line-of-sight,” he said. But new devices that can be carried by UAVs are redefining the market.

The result is a solution that is intermediate – somewhere between traditional airborne scanning and terrestrial solutions. The mobilisation cost is similar to that of a terrestrial survey but the scope of the survey is much improved. Blyth said that a set of batteries will enable Riegl’s turnkey solution to fly for about 20 minutes, capturing roughly 40 hectares at 40 points per square metre from 80 metres above the ground. “It’s then possible to land, change the batteries and fly an adjacent plot of land which can later be stitched together in the post-processing phase. This can of course be repeated to build a larger topographic survey if the project demands it,” he said.

Look beyond the order One mark of the maturity of the modern drone business is that practitioners are prepared to discuss its limitations.

There is little doubt that, if you want millimetre-level results today, terrestrial survey methods are presently the only viable solution. “Typical drone cameras are not metrical,” said Thomas Kersten at HafenCity University in Hamburg.

“Drone payloads are limited and they cannot carry stable but heavy devices. This is why light, non-professional consumer cameras are generally used. Yet, even with those comparatively inexpensive cameras, it is possible to attain results that are more than sufficient for the needs of the construction industry.”

Andrew Chapman says that you get what you pay for.

“We guarantee our results at the centimetre level,” he says.

“Customers often ask for better. My response is to ask them whether they really need the accuracy, or whether they are prepared to trade some of that accuracy for the other advantages of using drones for surveys.” www.spatialsource.com.au 25

feature “Customers are beating down the door demanding longer range surveys. Their ardour cools when we explain that CASA demands $3,000 for every application and it’s not refundable if they refuse.”

Nevertheless, it seems the quest for greater accuracy is still being vigorously pursued – the above expectation may soon be a thing of the past. A significant portion of the error budget in drone surveys is the accuracy of ground control points. A new generation of light and low-cost receivers is changing the numbers dramatically.

Fernado Urzedo at Mangomapping says the latest GNSS RTK receivers are disrupting long-held access assumptions of surveying gear, where centimetre accuracy was only possible with a $30,000 device that relird on a Windows CE controller.

“RPAS pilots simply didn’t have access to them, given the prohibitive prices. New receivers are an order of magnitude cheaper and can reach sub-centimetre survey accuracy. They are easy to use, come with free controller software that runs on mobile devices and create a whole new ecosystem that benefits RPAS surveying.”

Capability held in check In Austalia, one of the biggest brakes on the drones’ applications for industry is regulatory – CASA’s restriction of Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) operation. There are clear and present safety concerns motivating this stance, but clearly, many operations that could be undertaken by drone demand BVLOS. To that extent at least, there is pressure from the drone industry to relax the rules.

At AUAV, Andrew Chapman said: “Customers are beating down the door demanding longer range surveys. Their ardour cools when we explain that CASA demands $3,000 for every application and it’s not refundable if they refuse.”

CASA is attempting to square the circle using regulation by exemption. CASA’s concession to this capability is the operational category of EVLOS (Extended Visual Line of Sight), which until recently had only been granted on case-by-case applications. EVLOS is defined as a controller-aircraft distance of not more than 80 percent of the manufacturer’s control link performance and under no circumstances more than 1,500 metres from the controller. It is permissible to hand over control of the aircraft to another operator in order to maintain line of site control. Alternatively, an observer can be used to monitor both the aircraft and the airspace around it. While the regulations encourage pilots to use First Person View systems (in which the operator views output from the drone’s camera in real-time) it explicitly states that FPV cannot be substituted for a human observer.

As of 9 April, CASA introduced a new set of rules for EVLOS, the main import of which is that CASA is now prepared to give ongoing flight approval under certain circumstances, and with

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evidence of documented procedures for such operations.

This goes some way towards addressing industry’s concerns, but it still makes corridor surveys down long lengths of powerlines or roads extremely limited relative to the aircrafts’ capability.

Allowing unrestricted BVLOS operations could necessitate an agreement on the design and implementation of a drone traffic management system. Telstra Labs in Melbourne and Thales have been working on a solution, which uses a mix of 4G and 5G technology to monitor all kinds of vehicles in low-altitude airspace.

“We see a future where a drone operator might be able to simply plan and prepare a flight through an app on a phone and where authorities have the ability to dynamically open and close airspace – using temporary flight restrictions if necessary”, said Andrew Scott, head of Technology at Telstra Labs.

Telstra’s prototype air traffic control platform is called Low Altitude Airspace Management. LAAM can be applied to both manned and unmanned vehicles, so as to allow them to work together safely. It is designed to provide automated drone flight approvals, amongst other features. The platform can also provide near-real-time notifications, which is helpful in managing dynamic, high-traffic situations. In situations where a drone pilot needs to change course to make room for a helicopter or low flying aircraft, near-realtime notifications enable the instructions to be relayed to the drone efficiently and safely.

It is fair to say that while this development is still in its infancy, it may be the key to the next evolution of the technology. However, experienced practitioners are not holding their breath. Andrew Chapman notes that rules change in the aviation community at a glacial pace. “We may have to wait twenty years for BVLOS,” he said.

Jon Fairall is the founding editor of Position. n

Locate19

A new era begins at Locate19 Now that the dust has settled on #Locate19, we look at some of the significant moments and defining trends of an event that suggested a new era for the Australian geospatial industry.

DANIEL BISHTON

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lways a gargantuan event in scale, programmatic scope and agenda-setting for the industry, it was a particularly big Locate this year. A record-breaking attendance of over 900 delegates, a packed exhibition hall and a few strategically-curated curveballs in the program helped to make this a memorable and significant iteration of the Locate series.

A clear-eyed view of the world in 2019 Engaging in a more provocative, unvarnished way with global challenges and opportunities in 2019 was a defining element of this year's Locate.

One of the most memorable and striking of these curveballs was the passionate, arresting plenary from Plan International's Edie Bannerman.

Her emotionally charged speech underscored the reality faced by millions of women worldwide, forcing the audience to confront whether a society can truly consider itself 'free' if half of its population doesn't feel that they can move through the spaces they inhabit without fear of harassment or violence.

A challenging gauntlet thrown down in the post#MeToo era was not the only first at #Locate19. In fact, a high level of emotional engagement could be considered a hallmark of this year's event, according to SIBA|GITA CEO Deanna Hutchinson.

Hutchinson said that in her experience in the industry and its history of discussing new agendas, there was something distinct in the air at the meetings and panels of #Locate19.

"There was such a raw response to things that were going on. My history in organisational change has taught me to watch the mood and then see when it's moving — and I feel that I saw people going on that emotional journey of realising — 'Oh, this is what it looks like what we start talking to people who aren't ourselves' — a little bit uncomfortable but at the same time exciting," she said.

Hutchinson said that a constant of friction driven by change underpinned many of the summits and discussions at #Locate19, regardless of the focus — whether welcoming views from outside the industry on a scale previously unknown, accepting and integrating a disruptive technology or embarking on a pioneering collaboration.

"That's the conflict I'm describing — it's that hopping from one foot to the other between excitement and terror," she said.

"Starting to realise what it means to embrace and actually do something that you've been saying for many years needs to be done. So, we took that first step to the realisation that we're there — we're getting there and we now understand what it needs to be."

A robust conversation on opportunities for geospatial in achieving the SDGs was strategically reframed and pitched to the assembled crowd at the closing plenaries on language that silenced chuckles and had people taking notes — another

1

2 well-curated theme that forced delegates to engage with global realities along channels not often trammelled, and presented in terms of a wide-open opportunity for solutions providers.

Diversity2 Edie Bannerman

1. C losing plenary panel discussion on geospatial’s role in sustainability and resilience.

2. F rontierSI’s Eva Rodriguez.

The initiatives around fostering diversity in the geospatial industry were numerous, highly developed and well integrated with other activities and agendas at #Locate19.

Reflecting on the scaled-up activities, which included a DELWP SIBA|GITA breakfast, dedicated booth in the exhibition hall and dynamic interactive session at The Hub, Hutchinson said this particular conversation reflected a level of unseen maturity and acceptance.

The agenda was multi-pronged, targeting executive leadership, providing networking and support opportunities for women in spatial, and a conscious broadening of the conversation beyond gender equality to introduce the concept of 'neurodiversity', demonstrating the value of diverse perspectives more generally.

"Phil Duthie at the diversity breakfast described it as 'moving beyond inclusion to belonging' – and this is how I think the diversity piece plugged in in a different way," Hutchinson said. www.spatialsource.com.au 29

Locate19 "I didn't feel that there was anybody in the conference walking around saying: 'this diversity conversation is about unseating people and somebody else taking over.' No, I didn't get that feeling at all. I got the feeling that people were saying 'this is about all of us and we need to look after our own.' And in embracing some of these 'outsiders' (shall we say), it's actually going to be good for us in the long run. I don't think anybody is suggesting that these were not conversations we should be having. Previously people were uncomfortable about it — that's another shift I saw."

The unusual suspects Escaping a geospatial echo chamber by engaging outsiders is an agenda that's been discussed for decades — but was approached in a new and strategic manner at #Locate19. Beyond a dynamic interactive session in The Hub on this evergreen topic (now reframed as neurodiversity), some of the plenary speakers represented industry 'outsiders' that leveraged the time with their captive audiences in new ways.

Closing his presentation, Barry Sandison, CEO of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, addressed the regional geospatial community directly: "Tell me something I didn't know. That's the challenge I leave you with."

His heavyweight speech concisely packaged the challenge of his role, describing the scale and fidelity of data required for the Institute to present the best possible information to government to support decision making with concise personal

New and emerging technologies – 3D, BIM, and Digital Twins to name a few – are seeing our industry professionals becoming closer to each other, and also to the end users of their amazing data.

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3 stories that illustrated the breadth of the AIHW's ambit. The opportunities for business to assist with the challenges were presented clear as day, 4. A packed GeoRabble session at The Hub. there on a platter for the assembled crowd.

In the second-to-last plenary on the final day, Chris Hewett, Head of Capability Development, Australian Geospatial-Intelligence Organisation, presented a similarly direct and robust invitation to industry to collaborate with Defence in developing their geospatial intelligence capabilities together, addressing perceived pitfalls in challenges in such a relationship and highlighting the benefits.

It's no coincidence that both Barry Sandison and Chris Hewett are both members of the 2026Agenda leadership group, representing new sectors for increased industry engagement, and were carefully chosen by the Locate committee to bring those conversations to the Locate audience — and Deanna Hutchinson they maximised their allotted presentation time to throw the doors to dialogue wide open.

Peter Olah, CEO of the Surveying and Spatial Sciences Institute, also observed new inputs in dialogue, and increasing synergies within previous divergent strands within the umbra of spatial sciences.

"Many people commented on the breadth of the Locate program this year. What fascinated me is that, whilst the conversation is bigger and broader, we are also starting to see a genuine convergence of interests across the surveying and spatial streams," he said.

"New and emerging technologies – 3D, BIM, and Digital Twins to name a few – are seeing our industry professionals becoming closer to each other, and also to the end users of their amazing 3. M aurits van der Vlugt, chair of the Locate board.

data. By increasingly “cutting out the middle man”, our industry professionals will become better known and more widely understood in the community. That is a fantastic thing for the future of our industry."

Getting real about the future The final leitmotif of this year's Locate was increased representation and rigorous discussions around the future of the industry — students and early-career spatial scientists. Foremost of this representation were activities coordinated

by SSSI's Young Professionals program — a spirited interactive discussion in The Hub, and the inaugural Young Professionals symposium.

The Hub discussion underscored the urgency of revitalising the industry with new entrants, given its top-heavy demographic, and attendant impacts to the workforce due to retirement over the next decade. The open-mindedness of a young workforce, and the ease which they can facilitate uptake and development of new technologies and techniques was highlighted, along with the need to strike a balance with the legacy institutions and standards that have taken previous generations so long to build.

The symposium discussed a yawning gap between academia's reach and industry needs, leaving students less than job-ready when finishing their degrees, translating into drop-outs and transfers to other careers, a phenomenon that affects women most. A need for greater dialogue between industry and educators was discussed, with a renewed focus on teaching soft professional skills Chris Hewett alongside technical ones, which paralleled a most interesting debate on the relationship between universities and 5. S teve Bennett during a lightning industry at the Space and Spatial Capability panel talk at GeoRabble. discussion. The outcomes of the symposium will 6. K ate Williams, Zaffar be written up into a white paper, to be published in Sadiq Mohamedthe coming weeks.

Ghouse, Glenn And so the curtains closed on #Locate19, a Cockerton and Bary Sandison during the vibrant, exhausting and milestone event, with opening plenaries. exciting implications for the future. To close, some 7. The exhibition hall comments from Maurits Van der Vlugt, Chair of bristled with new tech the Locate board. at market day.

"I am truly excited by how Locate19 went, 8. C anapes and cocktails the buzz it created, the record turn-out and ahead of the 2019 how people really engaged with the exhibit, the APSEA award gala. awesome keynotes, and last-but-not-least: ‘The Hub’ ThinkPlace did a great job with The Hub, turning the exhibition space into a hive of activity, giving delegates, speakers and exhibitors alike a place to interact, share ideas, and make new friends," he said.

"We are looking forward to expanding on this ‘festival’ concept for Locate20 in Brisbane next year, to further expand our horizon, increase our relevance and connect with the ‘unusual suspects’."

Daniel Bishton is the editor of Position. n

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feature

GDA2020 and overcoming the ‘Web Mercator Dilemma’ MICHAEL GIUDICI

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s the GDA2020 implementation has been progressing and technical transformation parameters developed and released, several legacy issues pertinent to the web mapping environment have emerged. The capacity and understanding by spatial data users to transform discrete data sets between datums has been increasing over the last two years, particularly as that relates to the desk top environment, and software houses have responded with upgrades and help notes to assist with such transformations.

However, a particular problem arises with transformations undertaken in the web mapping arena, , one that demands a concerted international effort to overcome. This article describes that problem and the steps that ICSM and others are taking to resolve it.

The dilemma’s history The so-called ‘Web Mercator Dilemma’ is the result of activities and decisions that date back to the late 1980s. At that time, the US Defence Mapping Agency identified the World Geodetic System 1984 (WGS84) as the single earth-centred geodetic system for use worldwide, for all Department of Defence mapping, charting, navigating and geodetic activities.

With the advent of web mapping, WGS84 became the default, or ‘hub’ or ‘pivot’ datum for these applications.

This means that transformation between datums often included transforming first to WGS84 and then to the target datum. This reduced the number of datum to datum parameters that had to be stored, but also resulted in the quality of transformations being limited by the quality of the transformation to WGS84. WGS84 is often described in

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Web Mercator, a variant of the Mercator Projection, and became the de facto standard for web mapping when it rose to prominence following Google Maps adopting it in 2005. It is used by virtually all major online map providers such as Google, Bing Maps, OpenStreetMap, Mapquest and ESRI. So this ‘hub’ datum has worked pretty well considering what it was designed for, up to now. However with the introduction of high precision, commodity positioning systems, and the massively increased uptake of web mapping applications, changes are now required.

In 1994 when GDA94 was established, WGS84 could be considered equivalent to GDA94. However, like GDA2020, GDA94 is a plate fixed datum, so it is fixed to the Australasian tectonic plate, and moves with that plate. WGS84 on the other hand, is an earth-centred reference frame and therefore changes over time in relation to plate fixed datums. So, the name ‘WGS84’ provides only part of the picture: the full and accurate description is ‘WGS84 (G1762)@2019.5’. In other words, the full definition string accounts for ‘G1762’, the GPS week when that variant of WGS84 was defined, and the time-stamp for the coordinates themselves..

(IOGP). The Geodesy subcommittee of the IOGP consists of specialists working in applied geodesy, surveying and cartography, and kept the name of the EPSG Registry to avoid confusion. The various parameters are assigned ‘codes’ or ‘identifiers’, and these are what are drawn upon by the software houses for their web mapping applications.

Since, as mentioned above, in 1994 ‘WGS84’ and, GDA94 were nominally equivalent, the EPSG transformation parameters between WGS84 and GDA94 was made Null. It still is. This has not been a major issue in the intervening years due to the purposes for which this system was however over time of course the plate fixed datum and the earth centred reference frame have diverged.

So, whilst software houses can correctly introduce the transformation parameters between the new GDA2020 and GDA94 for their desktop applications, once data is re-projected to a web environment, due to the Null parameter issue, data transformed from GDA2020 will not align with data transformed from GDA94. This has the potential to cause significant problems with display and analysis of datasets.

The dilemma thickens

ICSM has been working with the EPSG compilers to introduce ‘work arounds’ and additional metadata to alert users to this issue, however a more definitive solution that provides for rigorous transformations in the web mapping environment is now being pursued.

Since this issue is an international one, discussions about the best solution have been occurring in a number of countries.

Through the combined efforts of a group of European based specialists in spatial data management and development who work in the open source environment, the necessity of drastic improvements to the

The next part of the story concerns the European Petroleum Survey Group, or EPSG, which was set up in 1986 at about the time the Department of Defence adopted the WGS84 approach.

The EPSG defined and disseminated the EPSG geodetic parameter set which is a widely-used database of earth ellipsoids, geodetic datums, geographic and projected coordinate systems, units of measurement, aetc. The functions of this group became part of the Geodesy Subcommittee of the International Association of Oil and Gas Producers

Organising for a solution

handling of coordinate systems in the web and open source environments was realised, and a ‘Barnraising’ effort was organised to raise funds for the required works in May 2018. Twenty organisations responded to contribute $144,000 towards this work program, which exceeded the target funding of $125,000. Among the organisations contributing are ESRI ($30,000), Land Information New Zealand ($7,000) and Safe Software ($31,000) which demonstrates the international nature of the challenge, and the desire for a single robust solution and not a plethora of bespoke solutions separately developed by individual organisations. For a detailed discussion of the ‘Barnraising’ parameters, google ‘GDAL Coordinate System Barn Raising’.

In essence, the Barnraising project is aimed at bypassing the need to use WGS84 as a ‘hub’ or ‘pivot’ datum, and draws upon the new capabilities of the PROJ5 library for performing conversions between cartographic projections.

ICSM has been monitoring progress on this work and in early 2019 commissioned an Australian company, North Road Pty Ltd, to undertake a program of work aimed specifically at operationalising the international effort for the Oceania region. ICSM has also engaged Mercury Project Solutions to contribute to the work packages and project manage the program on ICSM’s behalf. The work packages will concentrate on improving the handling of all the transformation elements of QGIS, an open source GIS package, so that the benefits may flow to all software developers via the open source platforms. The work packages can be summarised as follows: 1. Engage and influence the maintainers of the OSgeo4W and QGIS installers to ensure users will automatically have the new transformation grids included in installs. Secondly to liaise with the GDAL Barnraising team to address Oceania needs with respect to EPSG transformation data bases, and change the QGIS user interface to warn users when grids are not available and present steps for remediation. This was successfully completed in March 2019.

2. Upgrade all QGIS code paths to completely respect the transformation context, including the datum transformation settings set by the user (and in the future the temporal components of GDA2020 transformations). The GDA2020 transformation is the first global use case that needs this functionality and may therefore contribute to global fixes.

Place code blocks to prevent future code changes that could ‘undo’ the correctly handled transformations, such that any

future features added to QGIS will work correctly with GDA2020 regardless of who develops them. This phase was completed in April 2019.)

3. Upgrade QGIS coordinate transformations to utilise the new PROJ5 API with a graceful fallback to the version 4 API wherever version 5 is not yet available. This will result in more accurate transformations avoiding the WGS84 ’Pivot’ and will be ready to support future time dependent coordinates and transformations.

Also, upgrade to PROG6 support from February 2019,with graceful fallbacks to earlier versions. This is underway as of May 2019.

4. Research into desktop GIS application handling of 4D coordinates and coordinate transformations and into the changes required to expose these to users. Who is doing what, looking at use cases, leading to a better understanding of where ICSM may target future investments towards standards and

Whilst software houses can correctly introduce transformation parameters between the new GDA2020 and GDA94 for their desktop applications, once data is reprojected to a web environment, data is not actually transformed.

policy. This will include a stocktake of current and expected future approaches, software and standards, and recommended options for ICSM. A joint North Road and Mercury Project Solutions proposal has been submitted to the ICSM in May 2019.

5. Document lessons learned, best practice and challenges for (Oceania) user and developer communities, specifically in the use of PROJ and GDAL. Share experiences with the community, produce a white paper or blogpost for the ICSM website and promote to the Oceania developer community through appropriate forums. This final stage ispost project, scheduled for mid to late 2019.

Readers who may be unfamiliar with some of the terminology used in this article will find a large amount of content and discussion on GitHub and the Barnraising websites. ICSM has produced a number of good resources for understanding the GDA2020 Datum and continues to develop fact sheets and communication products.

If there is one key take home message from this discussion, it is the phrase that ICSM has been emphasising since the early days of the datum modernisation project, and that is, ‘Know your data, know your datum!’

Michael Giudici was appointed Surveyor General of Tasmania in August 2013.He is the recent Chair of the Intergovernmental Committee on Surveying and Mapping (ICSM) and remains chair of the GDA2020 Implementation Working Group (GMIWG). n

www.spatialsource.com.au 33

feature Micah Edwards and Lizzie Peabody receive their prize during the 2019 Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards at Locate19.

Putting Geospatial Science

on the school map DAVID MASSINGHAM

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ithin the surveying and geospatial science community, it is well known that a skills shortage threatens the industry’s future while a demand for surveyors and geospatial professionals outweighs the supply.

It’s a long-term issue. While there are robust and positive efforts to move the needle on general awareness of geospatial science, the work is difficult, and the progress is steady but slower than desired.

The challenge, then, is to get young people enthused about everything geospatial.

Introducing the Geospatial Information Competition.

This is a competition aimed at school students studying geography, IT, science, maths and STEM subjects across the board. It challenges them to investigate and propose solutions to problems

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in their local area, using geospatial technology and GIS-derived techniques.

Launched by the Surveying & Geospatial Sciences Institute and Destination Geospatial in mid-2018, it’s already had its first success story – and it’s also about to return for a second year, giving young people another chance to learn about and use geospatial data.

What is the Geospatial Information Competition?

With geospatial data at the heart of so many of our new and emerging technologies – from Pokémon Go to Uber Eats – it is important to provide today’s students with the opportunity to not only learn about the theory, but also get stuck into the practical side of it.

The Geospatial Information Competition asks entrants to collect and use geospatial data in order to address an important issue in their local area.

The challenge is then to communicate a solution to that problem in a clear, engaging and compelling way.

In encouraging students to approach problems from a geospatial perspective, the competition helps demonstrate the importance of geospatial science in an increasingly complex and exciting world.

Equally as crucially, the competition gives teachers a way to seamlessly introduce geospatial and GIS concepts into the classroom; until recently, education professionals have often struggled to incorporate them, leaving students in the dark as to the field’s potential.

Teachers and students are supplied with geospatial science teaching and learning materials to ensure effective engagement with their classroom subjects.

For students, it is a chance to learn how geospatial data can be harnessed to solve problems – as well as a chance to play around with some pretty cool technology!

For teachers, this competition can be easily aligned with the geography, science, mathematics and technology curricula.

Lizzie Peabody with one of the sugar glider nest boxes for their award-winning entry.

Meet the 2018 winners Elizabeth Peabody and Micah Edwards of Nowra Christian School in New South Wales won with their entry, ‘Using geospatial technology to optimise nest box placement’.

For their winning entry, Micah and Elizabeth used geospatial information to determine the most advantageous locations to place nest boxes for their local sugar glider population. The data they pored over allowed them to give these gliders a better chance out in the wild.

Elizabeth explained the appeal the Geospatial Information Competition held for her: “We set out doing something just locally and it’s actually got to a national level where we can talk about something we’re passionate about to a whole group of people who are probably more interested than a lot of the people we know.

“I think it’s been really empowering to know that as kids – like, 13 years olds – we have a voice in our local and national environment.”

“We saw lots of very complicated technologies that geospatial scientists use to create maps and survey land areas and collect data about our world.”

In addition to receiving a $1,000 cash prize, Elizabeth and Micah attended the Locate19 Conference at the Melbourne Convention & Exhibition Centre on Tuesday April 9 where they were awarded their prize in front of an audience at the APSEA Gala Dinner, made up of some of the biggest names in the industry.

They also got the chance to talk to geospatial professionals about how the geospatial information revolution is changing the planet.

Micah explained, “We saw lots of very complicated technologies that geospatial scientists use to create maps and survey land areas and collect data about our world.”

Tom Abbott and Bede Taylor from Barker College also impressed the judging committee, netting themselves a runnersup prize of $500. Their entry addressed homelessness in NSW; drawing on various data sources, they created a video that used geospatial tools to display the extent

of homelessness in the state, in order to know where to most effectively direct support services. In particular, they took pains to identify locations that were severely lacking in support systems.

2019 competition soon to be announced After a successful first year, the 2019 Geospatial Information Competition is just around the corner.

Ultimately, the competition offers some unique teaching opportunities for the classroom, which is a powerful way to imbue students with an understanding, respect and appreciation for geospatial technology and processes. Leah Arthur, Micah and Elizabeth’s teacher, explains how she views the competition and its effect on her students.

“It was a fantastic way to show the kids the real-world applications of emerging technologies, and to really show them that the skill of synthesis that we push so hard in the classroom actually has a real-world application. We don’t just synthesise ideas for the sake of it; we actually synthesise ideas to get to the answer to a problem, to the solution.

“I think what I was most proud of was that these guys started with a goal but very little idea of how to get to the goal, and every time a challenge was put in front of them they just rose to the challenge. They didn’t necessarily know how to overcome the next hurdle but they just kept persevering until they found the answer – and they kept looking for the answer, they didn’t expect the answer to come to them.

“As a teacher, that’s pretty impressive.”

David Massingham is communications coordinator for Destination Spatial Queensland. Visit www.geospatialscience. com.au/competition/ to learn more about the 2018 winners, and for more information on the 2019 competition to come. You can also enquire further by emailing competition@geospatialscience.com.au. n www.spatialsource.com.au 35

new products

Topcon offers new real time reality capture for builders Delair’s open payload DT26 UAV takes flight French drone developer Delair has introduced a new model of its DT26 long-range UAV, which it says offers an easy-to-integrate architecture for adding user-specified sensors and other payloads to the platform.

The Delair DT26 open payload model features a removable container which can hold up to 3kg of extra payload and be connected to a power supply of up to 140W. It allows drone users to quickly add specialised sensors for specific imagery needs.

"The Delair DT26 is a production proven, long-range and highperformance UAV that now can be custom-configured for any number of use needs through its highly stable payload cabin," said Benjamin Michel, chief product officer at Delair.

Topcon Positioning Group has rolled out a new real-time reality capture solution for building construction verification — the GT-1000.

The new real-time verification solution includes a compact scanner integrated with a fully featured robotic total station.

Combined with ClearEdge3D Verity, the system is designed to offer a powerful instrument and new standard that Topcon says speeds up construction verification workflows from what traditionally took days to now only hours to complete.

“Topcon is excited to introduce technology to transform the building construction process, increase productivity and minimise mistakes, rework and cost overruns— shown for the first time to the North American market,” said Ray Kerwin, Trimble’s director of global product planning, ahead of showcasing the new technology at the Spar3D event in Southern California.

Image courtesy of Carlson.

Hemisphere releases next-gen OEM boards Hemisphere GNSS has announced its next-generation digital and RF ASIC platforms, and the release of three new positioning and heading OEM boards – the first products incorporating these technological advancements.

Hemisphere says the new Lyra II digital ASIC and Aquila wideband RF ASIC designs optimise performance and provide the ability to track and process more than 700 channels from all GNSS constellations.

Signals supported including GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, BeiDou, QZSS, SBAS and L-band signal support and tracking for AltBOC and BSACEBOC, BeiDou Phase 3, L5, and QZSS/LEX CLAS-D and CLAS-E.

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Carlson offers new lightweight GNSS receiver Carlson has launched the new lightweight NR3 surveying receiver that utilises all four constellations and provides triple-frequency tracking.

Carlson Software President and Founder Bruce Carlson introduced the Carlson NR3 at the company’s “Grow With Us” User Conference in May. Weighing in at just under two pounds, Carlson says the NR3 delivers highly reliable GNSS RTK for land surveying, GIS, and other data collection uses.

Able to be used as a base or rover, the NR3 utilises all four constellations – GPS, GLONASS, BeiDou, and Galileo – and provides triple-frequency tracking on GPS, GLONASS and Galileo. Incorporating multipath and ionospheric detection, the NR3 maintains accuracy and continued operation despite shocks, vibration, or other interference.

Produced by Septentrio with Carlson specifications, the Carlson NR3 has an integrated 4G LTE cellular modem, plus WiFi and Bluetooth for modern wireless capabilities. Carlson says the NR3 is made to perform exceptionally in locations with bad visibility or interference.

Trimble releases next-gen smartphone GIS data collector Trimble has introduced the TDC600 handheld, an all-inone smartphone and GNSS data collector for GIS and field inspection applications.

The company calls it a next-generation smartphone data collector, boasting an Android 8.0 operating system, bright sunlight-readable 6-inch display, 2.2 GHz processor, 4 GB memory and an enhanced capacity all-day battery.

“Our customers now have a powerful, comprehensive and cost-effective entry level system to collect and retrieve highly accurate GIS data virtually anywhere in the world," said Rachel Blair-Winkler, business area manager for Trimble Mapping & GIS.

Image courtesy of Emild.

Emlid disrupts with low-cost GNSS receiver

Image courtesy of Trimble.

Emlid’s Reach RS2 RTK GNSS receiver is now available in Australia, offering centimetre-precision and survey grade features at a fraction of the cost of some rivals.

Emlid’s new offering is a multiband L1/L2/L5 RTK GNSS receiver, which according to the company ‘determines a fixed solution in seconds and provides positional accuracy down to several millimetres’.

The Reach RS2 will be available for $3,400, including software and GST. Queensland-based Mangoesmapping is the exclusive distributor for Emlid in Australia.

Bentley unveils OpenSite Designer Bentley Systems has announced the availability of OpenSite Designer, its integrated application for civil site and land development workflows across conceptual, preliminary, and detailed design phases.

Bentley says OpenSite Designer advances BIM through comprehensive 3D site design, spanning reality modeling of site conditions from drone imagery and scans, geotechnical analysis, terrain

modeling, site layout and grading optimisation, stormwater drainage modeling and analysis, underground utilities modeling, detailed drawing production, and enlivened visualisations.

The company says OpenSite Designer enables rapid and iterative conceptual design, leveraging contextual information obtained through point clouds, reality meshes, GIS, and other sources to enhance understanding of existing site conditions.

3D model created with OpenSite Designer.

Image courtesy of Bentley Systems.

NextCore RN series takes flight Australian company Airsight announced its new NextCore RN Series, just a year after launching its first LiDAR unit built specifically for the DJI M600.

The new, aggressively priced, series has been designed with the same interface but allows UAV operators to select components based on their needs.

Utilising the Quanergy M8 LiDAR unit, the RN50 comes as a payload only option and allows operators who already have access to suitable GNSS data to use their existing base station equipment or RINEX subscriptions to process accurate LiDAR datasets. The RN series comes at effectively half the price of the previous version.

www.spatialsource.com.au 37

sssi

News and views from the Surveying and Spatial Sciences Institute

CEO’s Report

I

n April, SSSI undertook a detailed online survey of our members. This was the first of what will become an annual initiative to gauge the opinions, needs and perceptions of the professionals of Australia’s surveying and spatial sciences fields.

The SSSI Annual Member Survey 2019 drew 508 unique responses – a fantastic response rate providing high reliability and a low margin of error for the aggregated responses. This first survey featured 19 questions focused on four key areas: Demographic/General information

1. How long have you been a member of SSSI? 2. Please specify your main reason for becoming a member of SSSI. 3. What do you value most about your SSSI membership?

4. How could SSSI improve your membership experience?

SSSI Board – 2019

Events

TAS Director – Paul Digney

5. Do you attend SSSI Events?

6. On average, how many events do you attend each year?

7. What features draw you to SSSI events? (for those who attend events) 8. What prevents you from attending SSSI events? (for those who don’t attend events) 9. What would be the best time of day for you to attend events?

10. What kind of events would you be likely to attend? (select all that apply) 11. How can SSSI improve the events offered to members?

VIC Director – Richard Syme

Communications

President – Dr. Zaffar Sadiq Mohamed-Ghouse President-Elect – Paul Digney NSW Director – Wayne Patterson NT Director – Rob Sarib QLD Director – Lee Hellen SA Director – Franco Rea

WA Director – Kerry Smyth ACT Director – Vacant Hydrography Commission Director – Richard Cullen YP representative (Observer) – Roshni Sharma Company Secretary – Jonathan Saxon, Peter Olah

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12. Which SSSI publications and social media do you read on a regular basis?

13. What industry-related topics are you most interested in reading about?

feedback about the industry and about SSSI – what we do well, and what we should do better. This short column cannot convey all the insights provided by our members, but I’d like to mention a few significant areas of feedback: • Our members most value SSSI’s capacity to keep them updated on industry news, deliver networking and events, and provide professional development.

• More than 76% regularly attend SSSI events.

• Event attendees are most interested in professional development, networking opportunities, and exciting speakers and topics.

• For those who do not attend SSSI events, the main reason is that they are too busy.

• Respondents indicated a strong affinity for the full range of different events delivered by SSSI including CPD events, networking events, training events, workshops, conferences/forums, casual events, and online events/webinars.

• Our members’ preferred communication channels are Position magazine, the national GeoMessage, and regional newsletters.

• Fewer than 1% of respondents are unlikely to renew their SSSI membership.

• 46% of respondents are a member of another professional or industry organisation, in addition to SSSI. • Over 76% of respondents prefer to keep paying their membership fee annually.

These results have already informed the decision making of the SSSI Board and will continue to do so over the coming year. I look forward to highlighting more of our members’ feedback in future columns here.

Membership Information

14. How likely are you to renew your SSSI membership?

15. What are your reasons for your decision to renew or not renew your SSSI membership?

16. Are you a member of any other industry or professional associations?

17. Of which other industry or professional associations are you a member?

18. How would you prefer to pay your SSSI membership fees?

19. If you could tell the SSSI National Board anything, what would it be?

SSSI members provided a wealth of

SSSI CEO Peter Olah.

SSSI sustaining partners

Commission Chairs Engineering & Mining Surveying Chair Andrew Edwards chair.emsc@sssi.org.au Hydrography Commission Chair Richard Cullen chair.hc@sssi.org.au

President’s Report

Land Surveying Commission Chair Lindsay Perry chair.lsc@sssi.org.au

Dear Friends, I would like to take the opportunity to thank all SSSI Members and all involved in the Locate19 Conference, held in Melbourne on 8 – 10 April. I would particularly like to thank the Locate19 convenors Glenn Cockerton and Katherine Williams for their leadership in delivering a successful and quality event and raising the bar of the event to next level. I would also like to congratulate all of the nominees and winners from the Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence Awards (APSEA) dinner – it was so inspiring to celebrate the achievements of surveying and spatial professionals across our region. Please see our wrap up story from Locate19 for details of all the deserving winners.

Following on from the success of this event, SSSI’s next major conference is the South East Asia Survey Congress (SEASC), taking place in Darwin in August 15-19. I strongly encourage you and your network to consider attending this event – it promises to be a fantastic opportunity to collaborate and learn with colleagues from across Australia and ASEAN Countries.

The program has just been published and more details are available at www. seasc2019darwin.com.au.

Geospatial World Forum 2019

I wish to congratulate on behalf of SSSI, RMIT University in Melbourne for being recognised as the Geospatial Research Institute of the Year and Geospatial World Industry Award Winner, Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure, Government of South Australia for the project: Location SA: Geospatial Intelligence Capabilities and Extensive Geospatial Data Services to Government, Industry and the General Public. The Awards were presented at the Geospatial World Forum in Amsterdam held during 2-4 April.

FIG 2019 Hanoi

It was a great pleasure and honour to represent SSSI at the FIG General Assembly at Hanoi, Vietnam. The FIG

Remote Sensing & Photogrammetry Commission Chair Petra Helmholz chair.rspc@sssi.org.au SSSI President Dr Zaffar Sadiq Mohamed-Ghouse.

Work week was held 22-26 April 2019.

Congratulations to Dr Daniel Paez (NSW), Asso. Prof David Mitchell (SSSI VIC), Dr Mohsen Kalantari (SSSI VIC), Rob Sarib (SSSI NT) for their FIG leadership roles for the term of 2019-22. I am also pleased to note that Prof Allison Kealy (RMIT) et al received a Best Paper Award.

The USA bid for 2023 FIG working week at Orlando was successful. Peter Olah and I participated at the regional forum and President’s forum during FIG Working Week. It was nice to see Matt Higgins (Former FIG Vice President) in action at FIG meetings. Narelle Underwood, Surveyor General NSW represented SSSI at the Commission 7– Cadstre and Land Management. We also had the opportunity to meet and discuss collaboration with President of Surveying & Spatial New Zealand, Rebecca Strang. Prof Abbas Rajabifard along with Professor Kevin McDougall launched FIG Commission 3 publication on Volunteered Geographic Information.

Robyn McCutcheon (Former SSSI VIC Chair) has been leading Women in Spatial initiative at FIG. Sudarshan Karki from DNRM QLD and SSSI QLD Member presented a paper at FIG. In total there were 52 Australian delegates at FIG. It was a wonderful experience and we look forward to presenting our Australian Bid for FIG 2024 in Brisbane at Amsterdam FIG Work Week 2020.

Finally, I call on our experienced members and their peers to consider sharing your knowledge and guidance with our up and coming professionals by joining the 2019 SSSI YP Mentoring Program. This rewarding program is coordinated by our dedicated Young Professionals Group Chair, Roshni Sharma and her Committee.

Yours….

Spatial Information & Cartography Commission Chair Kerry Smyth chair.sicc@sssi.org.au

Regional Committee Chairs ACT Regional Chair Noel Ward chair.act@sssi.org.au NSW Regional Chair Gaby van Wyk (Interim Chair) chair.nsw@sssi.org.au NT Regional Chair Rob Sarib chair.nt@sssi.org.au QLD Regional Chair Paul Reed chair.qld@sssi.org.au SA Regional Chair Franco Rea chair.sa@sssi.org.au TAS Regional Chair Paul Digney chair.tas@sssi.org.au VIC Regional Chair Lindsay Perry chair.vic@sssi.org.au WA Regional Chair Lesley Arnold chair.wa@sssi.org.au SSSI National Office 27-29 Napier Cl, Deakin, ACT 2600 (PO Box 307) Phone: +61 2 6282 2282 Email: support@sssi.org.au

www.spatialsource.com.au 39

sssi Young Professionals Commission report Young Professionals engagement session at the Locate19 Hub

The SSSI Young Professionals also held the ‘Young Professionals’ engagement session at the Locate19 Hub, which was a fantastic initiative. We had a whole host of people of all ages and positions across the industry, and asked the key questions: • Why is succession planning important in the Australian geospatial/surveying industry?

• What do young professionals bring to the table - how can businesses harness the opportunities that young professionals provide?

• What legacy do you want to leave for the future of the industry? How can supporting young professionals bring this to life for you?

There was a lot of great input into these three questions, with it becoming apparent from the discussion that succession planning is about leadership, and that leadership can be done better on a range of scales across the industry.

We realised that young professionals are generally very keen to seek out guidance but often not sure about who to approach or how to ask for help, how to get involved in things, and sometimes unsure about whether they will be encouraged to be courageous and have initiative or will be seen as not focussing on their job. There is a lot of scope for young professionals to assist in the industry collaborating innovatively with tangential industries, and there is a lot of work to be done to bridge the gap between industry and academia.

To wrap it all together, the session launched the opening of applications for the SSSI National Young Professionals Mentoring Program 2019 - a free program open to anyone (members and non-members of SSSI) which runs from July to October 2019 and aims to This program aims to empower students entering the surveying and spatial sciences industry for early career success, build leadership in young professionals working in the industry and provide a platform to strengthen young professionals in the industry.

Young Professionals Symposium at Locate19

At the recent Locate19, the SSSI Young Professionals held the inaugural Young Professionals Symposium - a threehour session designed to engage with young professionals and young-at-heart professionals about:

40 position June/July 2019

• the opportunities that young professionals bring to the industry, • the challenges facing them, and • potential ways forward for YPs to strengthen the Australian geospatial industry now and moving into the future.

In this session, we discussed the demographics of the current spatial and surveying industry in terms of age dynamics as well as issues surrounding diversity and inclusion. We looked at the growing need for up-to-date technical information to be shared amongst industry but also reaching into academia to help make graduates more job-ready when they finish their tertiary studies. We also explored how soft skills can help to improve the professional effectiveness of people of all ages in our industry, but is of particular importance to young professionals who will generally be required to step up to leadership positions at an earlier age compared to those who have gone before them. While also asking why young professionals are important in the industry, we contemplated how young professionals are important.

A White Paper discussing the issues raised and potential solutions put forward during this session will be released in the coming months, and we look forward to hearing your feedback on it. Watch this space!

Young Professionals Day at SEASC2019 - a value-packed extravaganza!

SEASC 2019 will be hosting Young Professionals Day on Thursday 15 August 2019 - a jam-packed day specifically designed for the future leaders of the Surveying and Geospatial industry. The Opening Plenaries will focus on setting the scene for personal growth, followed by a series of Discovery Workshops themed on discovering the skills needed to manage innovation, unpacking the challenges that young professionals face and flipping these into opportunities, and diving deep into how next generation capability and skills can unite to strengthen the future of the industry globally. Interspaced amongst these we will have YP Live!

Sharp lightning talks from across the globe, a career development workshop on Delivering the Capability Boost You’ve Always Wanted by Amy Hetherington, and RPAS and drone field demonstrations. To wrap the day up we will have a closing plenary by the Superstar of STEM Narelle Underwood on Professional Development: Invest In Yourself and Get

Others to Invest In You, and finally a panel discussion on The Way Forward with Chairs of ASEAN YPs and SSSI YPs. The day will then conclude with Georabble and an Icebreaker open to all SEASC 2019 delegates at the Darwin Convention Centre, offering the chance for global networking opportunities for attendees.

Date: Thursday 15 August 2019 Time: 9:00am – 5:00pm Location: Darwin Convention Centre Find out more and register now at https://seasc2019darwin.com.au/yp-day

What’s your story? Geospatial Career Pathways Competition now open!

Clarity on career pathways in our industry can be "clear as mud" at the best of times, and for many young people thinking about their future, as well as many of us who are working in the industry, it’s not always apparent what options are available to us. To muddy the waters further, it is difficult to see beyond our own limited experiences to the diverse array of those lived by others.

The SEASC2019 Career Pathways Competition is open to people of all ages and in all countries - find out more and apply today at https://seasc2019darwin. com.au/. No matter if you are a primary school student or high school student inspired by a parent in the industry, an undergraduate or postgraduate student, someone who has entered the industry after working in another industry, someone who has been working in the industry for a short or a long time, or someone who is retired after a lifetime in the industry - we want to hear from you!

This competition offers a chance to tell your story via a short video, poster or web map. We strongly encourage you to apply, especially if you are a youngat-heart professional who would like to inspire students and young professionals to enter, stay in and improve our industry.

Entries close on Friday 9 August 2019, 11:59PM ACST. Roshni Sharma, Chair, SSSI National Young Professionals

SSSI sustaining partners

Hydrography Commission report Call for Volunteers HYDROGRAPHY COMMISSION MENTORING PROGRAM

The HCNC is introducing a mentoring program for surveyors wishing to work towards AHSCP certification. The program is aimed at providing an avenue for graduate surveyors to seek guidance from Level 1 surveyors about how best to develop their application and, gain insight to any other relevant knowledge or practical hydrographic surveying matters.

The HCNC wishes to develop a list of AHSCP Level 1 certified surveyors who would like to become mentors in the program, and we invite you to participate in developing your future staff and colleagues while also benefiting from advancing our profession.

The HCNC see several benefits to the program: • Provide a defined pathway for surveyors wishing to obtain certification, whilst being involved with the Institute and its activities.

• Provide opportunity for the mentored surveyor to gain advice about their application from a current, experienced and competent certified

surveyor working in the industry.

• Provides both the Mentor and protégé surveyor in obtaining CPD points towards their annual requirements.

• Generates an avenue to broaden the membership base of the Hydrography Commission by including and retaining Young Professionals.

• Strengthens the regional Hydrography Commission networking and seminar activities.

The HCNC envisage the Mentor will act in an informal and approachable manner – answer questions and provide advice, while working within a structured mentoring system. Surveyors who wish to take part in the program as a protégé will be assigned a Mentor initially depending on their region, however if the protégé has an interest in a specific field of hydrography (for example, nautical charting) the Mentor will have the option to refer the protégé to another Mentor in that sub-specialised field.

As a Mentor, you will be provided with relevant guidance material and reference lists to assist your protégé. Further details of the program will be available in due course. In the meantime, the HCNC request your participation in the

program as a Mentor, please contact the Hydrography Commission Chair via email (chair.hc@sssi.org.au) Mentoring Working Group on Behalf of SSSI Hydrography Commission National Committee Speaking of CPD points, it is that time of year again where members need to ensure that they have submitted all their CPD activities for the year. It is important to note that SSSI events do not get entered automatically and each member is responsible for submitting their activities.

Did you know that courses run by software/ hardware manufacturers are not deemed formal training unless the organisation is an RTO. Why not encourage them to become sustaining partners so that you can access CPD points for their events.

The Hydrography Commission has a list of tips for CPD which can be found at www.sssi.org.au

Spatial Information & Cartography Commission report national agenda and need your feedback and support. This round-up of professional profiles highlights the emerging trends in leadership development.

Focus on Diversity In autumn many celebrate graduations, awards and achievements. We often look ahead for new challenges and opportunities as the year unfolds. For some International Women’s Day can bring a focus on the challenges and opportunities that diversity offers us professionally. The Spatial Information and Cartography Commission has a particular interest in diversity leadership, being the commission with the widest range of gender, age and cultural diversity across SSSI. Logistically our activities are entwined with the WIS, YPs and support travel grants for cultural exchange.

The SI&C Commission is open to hear from you about diversity issues and seeks to influence at a National level access to leadership opportunities for all our professionals. We are here to influence the

Feature Profile – David Kelly GISP-AP Introducing David Kelly, Victoria’s representative on the SICC national committee and a committed Young Professional. David Kelly (GISP-AP) has worked in the spatial industry for 10 years and is a senior consultant in Spatial & Information Services at Jacobs. He works in multi-disciplinary teams, providing data and information management, analytics and project management, across a range of sectors at local to national scales. In particular, David has worked extensively in the asset management and natural resource management domains, including modelling risk of asset failure and analysis of vegetation cover over time.

David is passionate about delivering insight and actionable knowledge derived from rigorous data driven and evidencebased analysis, to assist organisations in facing their challenges.

Geospatial Scientist awarded Fellowship - Charity Mundava The Vera Thiess Fellowship for Women is awarded to women from developing countries to gain valuable experience and network with the International River Foundation and its partners. Its goal is to advance women’s participation in water and river management. One of two winners from 2018 is natural and geospatial scientist, Charity Mundava from Zimbabwe.

Charity is passionate about the sustainable management of our planet.

She works with WaterNSW as a spatial scientist in the water industry providing advice for projects relating to water quality and catchment management.

Previous to this role, Charity worked for Curtin University, Perth with the Photogrammetry unit and also the Remote Sensing Laboratory at the University of Zurich, Switzerland. Over the years, Charity has been the recipient of various awards, including research scholarships, travel grants, student citation awards and industry scholarships www.spatialsource.com.au 41

sssi URISA Exchange Program Teresa Townsend the Immediate Past President of URISA is our latest exchange delegate. She presented at Locate19 and lead a master class workshop in her area of expertise -Planning Resilient Communities. Her work is integrated across disciplines with a focus on community visioning, climate action plans, urban function and design, land use planning, smart cities, zeroemission vehicle (ZEV) infrastructure, urban greening to achieving equitable sustainable futures.

SSSI was privileged to share the benefit of her experience across of URISA priorities including strategic planning, members services, events, advocacy and certification.

SSSI President Zaffar, URISA Past President Teresa Townsend, SICC Chair Kerry Smyth.

for her excellence in the field of spatial sciences. SICC congratulates Charity on this achievement.

Fulbright Scholarship Awardees - 2019 The largest cohort of AustralianAmerican Fulbright Scholars in 70 years were announced during a ceremony at Parliament House, Canberra on Thursday 28 February, as the Fulbright Commission continues to expand its program of exchange scholarships.

Special congratulations to recipients in the spatial sciences field: Dr Renee Bartolo - Senior Scholar will be hosted by National UAS Project Office, United States Geological Survey Dr Sajeda Tuli - Postdoctoral Scholar will be hosted by Department of Geography and Geographic Information Science, University of Illinois For more details www.fulbright.org.au/ current-scholars

Homeward Bound Program – Returns Value I had the privilege to hear a presentation and talk with Mary-Ellen Feeny at the SSSI-WA International Womens Day Event at Perth’s new Optus Stadium.

The Homeward Bound program is a leadership program, framed in the context of equity, sustainability and science, set against the backdrop of Antarctica.

SSSI provided sponsorship towards Homeward Bound, which aims to empower a network of 1000 scientific women across the globe over 10 years with the leadership skills and knowledge to drive sustainable change.

42 position June/July 2019

In my view SSSI has received great ROI from this initiative. Mary-Ellen shared with me her engagement program as a STEM Ambassador over the last year; this included more than 40 presentations, podcast interviews, media release, news and blog articles. This benefited a target audience including, SSSI, Spatial Industry groups and the wider community. Who would have thought such a billing was possible?

#BalanceforBetter – Women in Spatial Event (NSW) Women in Spatial ran a fantastic event at Bankstown Paceway on February 22. The event was well attended, and included an engaging presentation by Mary-Ellen Feeney on Homeward Bound and women's leadership in STEMM; a panel discussion and workshop on gender equity in the spatial industry with Wanda Skerrett (Open Spatial), Rohan Bakker (SMEC) and Charity Mundava (WaterNSW), hosted by Raelene Forbes.

The top three issues coming out of the event were equity of pay, flexible work options for both women and men, and the lack of female role models, along with some tangible and achievable ways in which the Women in Spatial program can progress gender equity.

Spatial Information & Cartography Commission Networking at Locate19 The Locate Conference is always a great opportunity for Face to Face meetings and workshops. This year in Melbourne we held a collaboration workshop for members ideas; URISA-SSSI Exchange Alumni Delegates meet and greet and a social media brainstorming forum.

Planning Resilient Communities - Workshop The Workshop: Actionable Geospatial Data and Tools to Protect Our Climate Future was led by guest presenter: Teresa Townsend URISA Exchange Delegate, along with SICC Chair Kerry Smyth and SSSI President Dr Zaffar Sadiq Mohamed-Ghouse.

Attendees were delivered an interactive workshop designed to build skills through the lens of GIS and climate change and community resiliency. A diverse set of topics allowed participants to identify ways they can work with their local communities to provide leadership in identifying data, gaps, collection and analysis needs and tools as well as resiliency related targets and measures. SICC is planning to repeat in the future.

Events ICC Tokyo, Japan 15-20 July 2019 GIS-Pro 2019 New Orleans, Louisiana USA, 28 Sep – 2 Oct, 2019

Bookmark SICC Web Pages The Spatial Information and Cartography Commission welcomes any feedback, queries or suggestions, whether to do with applying for certification, upcoming events or the promotion and encouragement of the spatial industry. https://sssi.org.au/about-us/committees/ spatial-information-cartographycommission All communications to chair.sicc@sssi.org.au Kerry Smyth National Chair, Spatial Information & Cartography Commission

The Australasian magazine of surveying, mapping & geo-information

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Technologies addressed include satellite and aerial remote sensing, land and hydrographic surveying, satellite positioning systems, photogrammetry, mobile mapping and GIS. Position contains news, views and applications stories, as well as coverage of the latest technologies that interest professionals working with spatial information.

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