The organisation types and geographic locations of our survey respondents closely mirrors what we see from our email list demographics and our
web site statistics. Visitors to airbornelasermapping.com are predominantly involved with commercial organisations (77%) operating in North
America (66%). We have been aware of this situation for some time. Since the commercial North American market is growing rapidly and two of
our three volunteers are based in North America, it makes senses our coverage is biased towards these groups. Regional differences in internet
adoption, access and availability may also skew these numbers. However, based on the above, we are clearly not reaching the global airborne
laser mapping community as effectively as we could be. We will try and expand our coverage and reach during 2000 to encourage more involvement
from regions outside North America and academic/government sectors of the airborne laser industry. And if anybody from these sectors wants to
help contribute to the site, you know where to reach us.
When we asked respondents for details of how their organisation accessed lidar technology we found that the majority either own a commercial
or proprietary instrument (47%) or use a third-party service provider (23%). Very few (10%) use government instruments or off-the-shelf data
while nearly 1 in 5 (18%) still have no access to the technology. We would anticipate the percentage of people using off-the-shelf data will
increase as more data sets are made available or placed in the public domain. Interestingly, given the high capital costs of acquiring an instrument,
less than 2% of respondents had access to a system via a leasing or rental arrangement. This probably indicates that the business development
side of the industry still needs to mature in order to reduce the financial barriers to entry that are preventing more people from accessing
the technology. When we look at the actual instruments that organisations have access to, we see a breakdown very similar to those reported
elsewhere. There is an approximately even split between commercial off-the-shelf systems (Optech, Azimuth, TopEye (39%)) and custom systems
(40%) with Optech having ~65% of the off-the-shelf market. It should be noted that we included early Azimuth AeroScan systems or subsystems
(EarthData, EagleScan etc.) in the Other category.
When we asked how individual respondents were personally involved with airborne lidar technology we discovered that the majority are involved
in either data processing (47%) or instrument operations (23%). Very few identified themselves a strictly end-users of lidar data (2%) while
nobody indicated they were involved in purchasing lidar data (0%). This is a concern since we would like the scope of airbornelasermapping.com
to be attractive and educational for the end-user community as well as the instrument operators and data processors. Any suggestions on how
to accomplish this and reach this end-user audience are more than welcome!
Not surprising given the involvement of our respondents detailed above, the most important issue to be addressed was identified as availability
and access to better software tools for working with lidar data sets (38%) followed closely by independent calibration and verification of an
instrument's accuracy (24%). Oddly, given the numerous conversations and discussions we have overheard at workshops and conferences that complained
about the high cost of lidar data, very few respondents chose high data costs (5%) as a critical issue. Perhaps indicating our respondents are
much more involved in collecting and working with the lidar data as opposed to purchasing it. The remaining issues; standard processes, improved
instrument performance and lower instrument costs were at about the same level of criticality according to our respondents. We have to agree
with both of the top two choices as critical issues for our community to address in the next 12 months, perhaps even choosing independent instrument
calibration over software issues. For our part, we hope to be working with groups such as the USGS to help plan the best way to address the
instrument calibration issues and we will be planning an airbornelasermapping.com spotlight on software tools related to lidar data sometime
during the spring.
What can we say ..... TerraPoint's web site was our pre-survey favourite anyway and despite some rather transparent attempts at ballot-stuffing
(just how many email accounts can one person have these days? :-0) it was also the clear choice of our survey respondents, even those who don't
work for TerraPoint. Congratulations to TerraPoint and if you haven't done so already, be sure to visit their
web site. And for EarthData, the UKEA
and the USGS, just like the Oscars --- it's an
honour just to be nominated. :-)
Comments:
We were also pleased that many people took the time not only to fill-out the survey questionnaire, but to also provide additional comments and
feedback that were very informative. Some of these insights were provided in great detail and we appreciate the time people took to write them.
We felt it would be appropriate to include a sample comment here:
I see two major issues ..... first an aggressive marketing effort to convince or
prove the reliability and accuracy of lidar to small to medium sized surveying and engineering firms and, second, for the lidar data suppliers
to converge on a reasonable pricing scheme for lidar services. ..... However, getting lidar services from the service providers, from my experience,
is casting a dark shadow on lidar in the eyes of the average firm looking to use it. ..... This situation does not engender confidence nor predictability
in the costs of a lidar project. Granted the lidar technique is nascent, but the average survey/engineering production shop still prefers photogrammetry
and is skeptical about lidar. Lidar proponents must educate and convince such users that lidar is a viable and reliable tool for certain applications.
Pricing of lidar projects MUST stabilise or we loose the ability to provide reasonable estimates to potential clients.
Kevin Kelly - The Keith Companies
Thanks to all the people who took the time to complete the survey. We hope the above snapshot will add some value to the on-going development
and adoption of airborne laser mapping and help guide us as we continue to build this community. Until next year's survey, remember .... Promote
the Technology, Educate the End-User, Create a Community!
Results compiled by: Martin Flood
January 10th, 2000
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