Location based services

Abstract

Location Based Services (LBS) will have a major impact on the cartographic community because of the increased demands for map accuracy. For automotive applications (route finding and in-car navigation), 50 metre accuracy has become the norm. However, for pedestrian use - especially in an urban environment - spatial accuracy in the order of 5 metres is / will be required. In addition, there is a growing demand for "content" which is the word now being used to describe all the non-geographical detail associated with location including house numbers, details of one-way streets, postal districts, rising bollards and similar. The collection, representation and maintenance of both the spatial and non-spatial components of data for LBS applications are becoming a major new activities for producers of geographic data for the new economy. Also, the cartographic industry has an important role to play in defining the standards for data collection, data capture, data storage and representation.