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In pursuit of a Global Roads

Open Access Data Set

(gROADS)

The CODATA Global Roads Data Development Working Group

Glenn Hyman (CIAT) & Tesfaye Korme (RCMRD)

for Alex de Sherbinin (CIESIN, Columbia University) & Olivier Cottray (iMMAP)

co-chairs of the CODATA-Roads Working Group

Outline

Background and update on the CODATA-

Roads initiative

The AGCommons Quick Wins project on

Ethiopia

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CODATA-Roads milestones

Workshop representing users and producers of roads data at CIESIN/Lamont Campus (October 2007)

CODATA working group formed out of subset of participants, subsequently adding two members (Jan 2008)

Becomes a Task Group of UN-GAID e-SDDC (UN Global Alliance on ICT for Development Open Access to and Application of Scientific Data in Developing Countries) (May 2008)

Listed as a deliverable of the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) 2009-2011 Work Plan (October 2008)

Listed as a milestone in the Interim United Nations Spatial Data Infrastructure Framework (November 2008)

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CODATA working group members

iMMAP, USA ocottray@immap.org

+33 6 37 78 19 82

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CODATA-Roads goal

To develop a global roads open access data set

(gROADS) that is:

1. globally consistent (UNSDI-T v.2)

2. spatially accurate (~50m positional accuracy)

3. topologically integrated

4. focused on roads between settlements (not streets)

5. up-to-date and with the possibility of frequent

updates

6. well documented

7. freely distributed (on attribution only basis)

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CODATA-Roads strategy

Two stages:

1. Establish the baseline data set by compiling

and cleaning best available data by country

(target: 2010)

2. Create a wiki mapping environment for regular

updates, or piggy-back on existing efforts

(e.g., OSM, GEO Grid’s WFS-T, ITHACA)

CODATA-Roads funded projects

NASA SERVIR-funded project to develop

a tool for semi-automated road extraction

using ASTER imagery, focused on

Ethiopian highlands

AGCommons “quick win” project to

develop roads data for Ethiopia using a

PDA tool (more details below)

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CODATA-Roads partners (1)

1. Center for International Earth Science Information Network

(CIESIN) (WG co-chair A. de Sherbinin) – data cataloging and

cleaning, coordination function for SERVIR project, AGCommons

2. Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT) (WG member

G. Hyman) – contributing Latin America roads data

3. Chinese Academy of Sciences, Institute for Remote Sensing

Applications (WG member J. Wang) – staff on secondment

4. GISCorps – providing volunteer GIS staff

5. Global Road Inventory Project (GRIP), Netherlands Environmental

Assessment Agency (PBL) – data and methods sharing

6. Global Spatial Data Infrastructure Association (GSDI) (WG member

H. Onsrud) – endorsed the network, advice on licensing

7. Information Management and Mine Action Programs (iMMAP) (WG

co-chair O. Cottray) – lead on AGCommons project

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CODATA-Roads partners (2)

8. National institute for Advance Industrial Science and Technology

(AIST), GEO Grid, and University of Tokyo (WG member K. Iwao) –

collaborating on SERVIR project, developing semi-automated road

feature extraction software and WFS-Transactional

9. OpenStreetMap (WG member S. Coast) – massive community of

data developers committed to open data

10. Regional Center for Mapping of Resources for Development

(RCMRD) (collaborating on SERVIR and AGCommons projects

11. Tracks4Africa (WG member J. Groenewald) – GPS tracks for

spatial validation of existing data, advice on AGCommons work

12. UNOSAT/SAFER project – developing RS-derived roads data for

one or more countries

13. World Food Programme – access to ITHACA, collaboration on

AGCommons project

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NASA-SERVIR project details

Developing roads data from ASTER imagery using a newly developed “shareware” tool – Global Road Mapping System

Data cleaning and development for East Africa

Google

Map

Aster

image

Aster

index

Seed points are inserted in:

1.Aster image

2.Google map image

Similar to RoadTracker Commercial software

See: www.youtube.com/watch?v=azq0ZIIr6hI

AGCommons project details

Output 1: A UNSDI-T compliant roads data set from GPS tracks, along

with agricultural features of interest

Output 2: Software for a PDA tool that includes all fields of the UNSDI-T

data model

Project borrows approach of successful iMMAP projects in South Sudan

and Liberia:

Incidental data collection: Engage third parties who are conducting

missions to hard-to-reach places to collect data as they drive

Active data collection: Conduct field campaigns to collect data for

regions that are missing

Incorporate data from third party sources where possible

RCMRD will collaborate on field campaigns disseminate the tool among

member countries in East Africa

CIESIN will conduct data cleaning and compilation

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List of features to be collected

Seasonal and rural roads

Sea and inland water ports, airports

Border crossing points

Local community/private storage depots/siloes

Market locations and structures

Local to national scale milling and processing locations (e.g. rice

mills, flour/sago mills, cotton ginneries, palm oil plants)

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PDA Tool

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Customisation of CyberTracker

www.cybertracker.org

Intuitive, visual tool with drop-down menus and radio

lists; very little training required

Want to learn more or help out?

Sign up for the ROADSDATA discussion

list (see www.groads.org) to exchange

information on data sets

Send us your data!

Participate in the CODATA workshop on

23 June 2009 hosted by CIESIN in New

York City

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For more information on the Global Roads

Data Working Group and the overall

strategy, visit:

http://www.codata.org/taskgroups/WGglobalroads

or

http://www.ciesin.columbia.edu/confluence/display/roads