In a groundbreaking development poised to redefine urban planning and government service delivery in Nigeria, the Office of the Surveyor General of the Federation (OSGOF) has partnered with US-based company PLACE to launch a pioneering Drone Imagery Acquisition and 3D City View project in key parts of Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory. This state-of-the-art initiative aims to capture high-resolution aerial data that will offer unparalleled insights into building footprints, road networks, and property boundaries, ensuring more accurate planning and efficient infrastructure management.
Surveyor General Abduganiyu A. Adebomehin, who hosted the PLACE team at his Abuja office, expressed his excitement over the project, describing it as a first-of-its-kind endeavor in Africa. He emphasized that the PLACE aerial data boasts an impressive ground sample distance (GSD) of around 5 centimeters—significantly superior to the typical 40-50 centimeters offered by conventional commercial satellite imagery used by tech giants like Google and Apple. This remarkable increase in resolution is expected to prove invaluable for analyzing land use, economic activity, and population distribution across the rapidly evolving urban landscape.
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Beyond collecting precise aerial imagery, the project will also gather anonymized street-level data, allowing for the creation of detailed and verifiable street maps. Adebomehin urged his team to work relentlessly on this initiative while exploring innovative ways to empower other organizations. He highlighted the plan to build machine learning models that can automatically detect and classify road surface types, thereby streamlining urban infrastructure assessments.
Frank Pichel, the team leader at PLACE, voiced strong optimism about the far-reaching benefits of the project. He stated that the combination of advanced drone imagery and a dynamic 3D city view will unlock immense potential for business innovation, improve government service delivery, and drive efficiency across multiple sectors of the national economy. “Everything from monitoring urban change to expanding road networks will be possible. The only limit is our imagination,” he added. As this revolutionary project unfolds, experts and officials alike are buzzing with anticipation over its transformative impact on Abuja and beyond.
