Imagery from US transportation agencies is progressively flowing into Mapillary, offering a new form of government open data for organizations such as Kaart to integrate into map editing workflows. Alongside individual, community, and corporate contributors to Mapillary, this new government imagery offers an increasingly regular rate of refresh, often at an annual interval. New imagery every year at scale means better data, more often.
New data builds the map, but the most important long-term efforts of OpenStreetMap go toward maintaining that data to keep it relevant and useful. Like physical infrastructure, the OpenStreetMap database is an asset that can age and decay, losing its value with passing weeks. Some data may be timeless, but in general everything is at risk of changing, expiring, or growing.
What agencies are contributing comprehensive roadway imagery? Who is leveraging this to keep maps usable? What are some examples of map data that needs fixing, updating, and validation? What tools can be used to maintain the map? What risks do we face when map data is vague, outdated, or wrong? Mapillary and Kaart team up to answers these questions and show map maintenance in action using government roadway imagery.
