High quality geocoding is a strategic requirement in today’s business. Esri is leading the charge with the ArcGIS World Geocoding. Organizations around the globe rely on geocoding and ArcGIS to spatially visualize data, perform analysis to make key decisions, and ultimately, gain a competitive edge. Learn how Esri's ArcGIS software offers a high-quality geocoding capability that you can use quickly, accurately, and securely use to map addresses around the world.

How to make key decisions with geocoding products

Several deployment patterns that fulfill business needs

Vineet Sharma, Product Marketing Manager, Data and Location Services, Esri

Robert Jensen, Product Manager, Data and Location Services, Esri

CIO/CTO, GIS Managers, GIS Analysts, Developers - GIS app developers and Non-GIS developers (only seeking to integrate location services in their apps)

Esri is the global market leader in GIS. It builds ArcGIS, the world’s most powerful mapping & spatial analytics software. ArcGIS software and apps combine mapping and data analytics to deliver location intelligence and meet digital transformation needs for organizations of all sizes.

Geospatial Webinars

Learn How to Make Quick and Accurate Decisions with ArcGIS World Geocoding

Discover how to use automated capabilities to optimize manual processes without the need for coding to bring a cutting-edge mapping experience to your business.

Learn how to combine your data with mapping and visualization tools.

Discover how each component can enhance and even automate your workflows.

Explore the ways in which each component can boost your productivity.

See a demo of the top no code/low code flows that you can implement today.

Power Your Productivity with ArcGIS for Microsoft 365

Are you ready to fly? In high-resolution imagery collection, UAVs are the latest standout. Join us as we discuss what it takes to collect and process top quality imagery. We’ll run through a sample flight checklist, discuss the importance of control points, and give advice on obtaining imagery while in flight. We’ll also share how we consume the imagery on Trimble devices and in LizardTech’s free GeoViewer application.

The keys to successful image collection with a UAV

The basics of processing and georeferencing aerial imagery including a comparison of software options

The end products you can create from aerial imagery, including orthorectified mosaics and DEMs

Robert Parker, Sales Engineer, LizardTech

Mitch Tweedy, Lead Tech Support, CompassTools

Getting Top Quality UAV Imagery - Best Practices for Image Processing and Collection

PenStreetMaps is a popular and well-known open source repository for address and GIS data. It may be tempting to want to use this free data to solve your business problems. In many cases, this data may be perfect for what you need; however, there are also many scenarios where a premium paid for a data set is required or preferred.

Join us as we focus on address-level data and geocoding and take a high level look at both data sets to explore the advantages and disadvantages of both options. We will also take a deeper dive into specific use cases, including:

A look at how the City of Burbank uses Premium address data to improve city services,

How a governmental agency like a county might use open source or premium address data,

Other possible business uses of both the open source and premium data sets that can cross industries from insurance, health care, to e-commerce.

Explore When to use OpenStreetMaps vs Premium Address Data

Designing and building smarter, more resilient infrastructure requires taking a broader view of the natural and built environment. The fusion of GIS (geographic information system) and BIM (building information modeling) enables stakeholders to put their projects, issues, and assets on a map, while gaining a deeper understanding of their interaction within the geographic context.

ArcGIS GeoBIM connects models, documents, and more in Autodesk Construction Cloud and BIM 360 with the power of GIS through an intuitive web-based experience. We will cover how GIS-BIM integration with ArcGIS GeoBIM help to improve collaboration and streamline communication from the planning and design phases, through to construction and maintenance. The presenters will also highlight the evolution of ArcGIS GeoBIM and potential capabilities with Autodesk.

Avoid costly and time-consuming file translation effort that impact successful projects

Put your project issues and component documentation on a map within the geographic context

Link GIS and BIM/CAD datasets for an intuitive way for teams and stakeholders to access up-to-date information

Unify processes to facilitate better communication of designs with key project stakeholders

Connect with future integrations between Autodesk and Esri

More about the product and associated workflows featured:

ArcGIS GeoBIM delivers an innovative, easy-to-use web-based experience for teams to explore and collaborate on building information modeling (BIM) projects and issues, using data from multiple systems in a geospatial context. Architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) teams can easily work with linked data from multiple systems in configurable web apps that simplify the communication and collaboration with teams and stakeholders.

Bridging GIS-BIM to Design, Build & Maintain Resilient Infrastructure

Access to detailed geographic information across Europe has taken a step toward simplification with the completion of the Open Maps For Europe 2 initiative, which has finalized a shared spatial resource spanning multiple countries.

The finished release makes it possible to view and use large-scale mapping information from ten European states within a single environment, removing the usual need to consult separate national systems. The material covers key spatial elements such as borders, transport routes, and surface water features, all aligned to a unified spatial framework.

Instead of stitching together maps maintained independently by different authorities, the project rebuilt the data into a common structure. Public records from land administration, cartographic, and cadastral bodies were processed through a centralized workflow designed to smooth inconsistencies where national datasets typically fail to align at borders. The result is a continuous geographic representation that can be accessed through one platform rather than multiple national portals.

This effort was carried out through collaboration among several European bodies responsible for official geographic information. EuroGeographics played a coordinating role, working alongside mapping and cadastral institutions from a number of EU member states, each contributing verified source material and technical expertise.

Project leaders say the approach demonstrates how cross-border geographic information can be made easier to use without forcing users to manage different formats, technical standards, or access points. By handling alignment and harmonization at the production stage, the system reduces the complexity normally associated with multinational spatial analysis.

The final output prioritizes three categories of information that consistently rank highest among public-sector and professional users: territorial administration, transport infrastructure, and inland water systems. These layers are intended to serve as a practical foundation for future Europe-wide spatial services, supporting policy implementation at the EU level and reflecting internationally recognized principles for core geospatial data.

Articles

Open Maps For Europe 2 Expands Coverage With Final High-Value Data Release

Are you ready to empower students? YouthMappers are college students making a difference with geospatial technology. Devastating 7.8 magnitude earthquake, followed by a 7.5 magnitude aftershock, struck southeast Turkiye and northwest Syria.  The consortium organizes a global community of learners, researchers, educators, and scholars to create and use open geographic data that directly address locally-defined development challenges worldwide. Students and their faculty advisors in the US and in developing nations are invited to learn more about YouthMappers, an international university consortium on Mapping for Resilience.

About the great work completed by the YouthMappers

Dr. Patricia Solis, YouthMappers and Arizona State University

Dr. Thomas Mueller, Professor, California University of Pennsylvania and Adjunct Professor, Northeastern University

A Beginner's Guide to GeoHumanitarian Mapping Organizations

Molded Part Design brings together a range of tools to accelerate the development of injection-molded parts and improve the manufacturability of your products.

High altitude waivers for larger mapping projects

Kyle Miller, Business Development, Censys Tech

NX | Tips & Tricks | Molded Part Designer

Are you looking for powerful and comprehensive GIS solutions? Something that may meet all your GIS needs, but costs relatively low?

 To make GIS software friendlier and easier to access, Supergeo, the leading GIS software provider, collects GIS users’ ideas around the world, and vote the 10 most useful features of SuperGIS Desktop for you. The key features cover 3D data view, geodatabase support, advanced GIS analyses, automatic process designer, etc. 

 Join us and see what are the most popular and useful GIS tools to support your geospatial tasks.

 In this webinar you will learn more about:

Advanced geodesy data observation in 3D view

No worries: GIS data compatibility and continuity

Easy data production and applicable solutions

Intelligent GIS design, management, and analysis

Danny Wang, Product Specialist, Supergeo Technologies

GIS companies, GIS professionals, Consultants, Municipal Corporations, Public Work Department, Development Authority, Institutions/Academia

Top 10 Features of SuperGIS Desktop 3.2

 GeoPackage is an open standard that provides mainstream application developers an easy mechanism for accessing geospatial data in a format that can be used directly by mobile devices such as smartphones.  GeoPackage is based on SQLite. This webinar will provide an overview of the applications and resources for developers who want to utilize the new standard.

 How GeoPackage lets application developers of lightweight mobile apps tap into a mix of powerful cloud-based location services  and data

How GeoPackage works in situations where Internet access is intermittent or disconnected entirely

How GeoPackage is useful for applications in mobile workforce data capture, providing information during an emergency event

How GeoPackage APIs increase cross-platform interoperability of apps and Web services in a mobile environment

 Officials involved with public safety, public works, transportation and disaster management know that limited network access or network failure compromise access to mission-critical map data. And when the network is not reliable, map data must be loaded and stored on mobile devices. Often, existing GIS and mapping applications rely on unique, proprietary and expensive map data solutions that don’t support sharing across organizations.  GeoPackage helps solve these problems.  Developers who are not geospatial experts can implement this standard to provide government agencies with inexpensive and innovative location information solutions.  The OGC GeoPackage standard can also help government IT managers save money and time by providing their stakeholders with improved capabilities for sharing geospatial data.

 Jeff Harrison, President, CEO and Founder, The Crbon Project

Government officials who specify requirements for location solutions, and the providers who develop those solutions

Learn about GeoPackage:  A New OGC Standard for Mobile App Development

Understanding how human and natural environments have changed in the past and predicting what will happen in the future is increasingly important for studying climate change, urban sprawl, deforestation, and more. To address these concerns, this webinar will show you how to use the ArcGIS framework to understand historical trends, see change, and predict future scenarios with a time-series collection of imagery.

How to understand historical trends, see change, and make predictions using time series data

Esri, the global market leader in geographic information system (GIS) software, location intelligence, and mapping, offers the most powerful geospatial cloud available, to help customers unlock the full potential of data to improve operational and business results. Founded in 1969, Esri software is deployed in more than 350,000 organizations including 90 of the Fortune 100 companies, all 50 state governments, more than half of all counties (large and small), and 87 of the Forbes Top 100 Colleges in the US, as well as all 15 Executive Departments of the US Government and dozens of independent agencies. With its pioneering commitment to geospatial information technology, Esri engineers the most advanced solutions for digital transformation, the Internet of Things (IoT), and advanced analytics.

Multidimensional Analysis: Trends, Prediction, and Change Detection

Raymond Camden from HERE Technologies will demonstrate how to use the web-based HERE XYZ Studio to build and design interactive maps. You'll see how to import map data, add it to a map, and then add custom styles. Finally, Raymond will show how you can share your maps with others.

Build a custom web map of National Parks using HERE XYZ, a location data management service

HERE, the Open Location Platform company, enables people, enterprises and cities to harness the power of location. By making sense of the world through the lens of location we empower our customers to achieve better outcomes - from helping a city manage its infrastructure or an enterprise optimize its assets to guiding drivers to their destination safely. To learn more about HERE, including our new generation of cloud-based location platform services

Building Awesome Maps with HERE XYZ Studio

How is the demographic landscape changing in your neighborhood? Join Esri’s Chief Demographer and Demographic Product Management team to learn how to perform quality data-based analysis for the communities that matter most to you. Discover how to recognize patterns and trends with the latest demographic data available on the market with an overview of trends, age, diversity, and housing affordability, including new data measures and indexes coming soon in Esri’s demographic updates.

How to perform quality data-based analysis and visualizations in the communities that matter most to you.

How to jumpstart your spatial analysis with ready-to-use demographic and business data for 135+ countries and 15,000+ variables.

How to recognize trends in your community and business with the latest demographic data available on the market.

Lucy Guerra, Product Manager, Demographics, Esri

Karisa Schroeder, Product Marketing, Demographics, Esri

GIS analysts, managers, professionals, specialists, and technicians,

Analyst Commercial real estate executives,

Explore Ready-to-use Demographic Data for Location Intelligence

Government agencies and commercial organizations must consistently do more with less, even when it comes to GIS. Boundless offers a way for these entities to see increased efficiencies in the way they create, edit, and share geospatial information across their organizations and with the public – without the limitations of named user logs or the frustration of unpredictable costs.

How to save on licensing costs, while extending access to anyone who needs it

How to achieve more flexibility and scalability in your GIS operations

How to quickly get your GIS to the cloud, without IT disruption 

All GIS leaders, practitioners, and users in commercial enterprises or Government agencies, and anyone interested in learning more about geospatial and location-based technology solutions based on real-world contributions from our guest panelists.

Boundless offers solutions that enable customers to create, publish, visualize, and share geospatial information across their organizations, without concerns about spiraling costs tied to licenses and number of users. Provide the access you need, right when it’s needed, with no costly roadblocks. 

Engage with Boundless to obtain an assessment of your infrastructure, and we will provide a complete migration path for your solution at no cost – Boundless will prepare a project plan, stand up the baseline cloud infrastructure, deliver a pathway for data migration and provide training and support to get you started. No other geospatial software company gets you to the cloud faster, at scale and with limitless user licenses - all at a lower total cost.

Learn How Boundless Enables Modern GIS for Complex Use Cases

Are you ready to empower students? YouthMappers are college students making a difference with geospatial technology. The consortium organizes a global community of learners, researchers, educators, and scholars to create and use open geographic data that directly address locally-defined development challenges worldwide. Students and their faculty advisors in the US and in developing nations are invited to learn more about YouthMappers, an international university consortium on Mapping for Resilience.

Learn How College Students Are Defining Humanitarian Mapping

In the rapidly changing world that is GIS, explore why careful attention to data sources and data quality is more important now than ever before. Issues such as citizen science and cloud services are changing how data can be accessed, used, and presented.

Join Dr. Joseph Kerski for a lively, informative, and practical session on why data quality still matters in your GIS work.

Explore Why Data Quality Matters

IT migration projects of any kind tend to be headache-inducing for the best of us. With various interconnected or competing systems, cloud and server-side technology, and custom apps and systems all needing to be smoothly ported over, it can become a challenging balancing act trying not to break anything. GIS is no exception.

Our friends at the City of Austin recently undertook a project to migrate their GIS to a new environment. They needed to move all of their GIS apps, workflows, and custom items to the new subdomain. Over the years they had created a large number of ArcGIS Online items with a variety of associated server URLs and license URLs. This made the migration difficult, as the URLs needed to be properly migrated and updated to avoid breaking anything.

After some trial and error, City staff discovered a powerful solution for their problem, which greatly simplified the process of finding and updating these URLs during the migration. They were so thrilled with the amount of time and effort saved that they've agreed to share their story with the DirectionsMag audience to help others who may be having similar challenges with ArcGIS Online item management.

How the City of Austin used VertiGIS Studio Item Manager to shave hundreds of hours off their GIS server migration project

How VertiGIS Studio Item Manager can be used to find (and easily replace) URLs for ArcGIS Online items you create

Some tips and tricks for using VertiGIS Studio Item Manager to efficiently manage your ArcGIS Online and Portal items

VertiGIS® is a leading GIS solution provider and software developer. Their focus is the development of software solutions and services that help utilities, land management, public sector, energy, telecommunications, and manufacturing customers build bridges between their business processes and location technology. VertiGIS is the maker of VertiGIS Studio®, which is used by thousands of customers to enhance the capabilities of the applications they build with Esri’s ArcGIS® and deliver a world-class experience to millions of end-users around the world.

Curious about how VertiGIS Studio Item Manager could help your organization make better use of ArcGIS Online? Great news! It is currently a completely free-to-use product! If you want to log in and give it a try: navigate to vertigisstudio and scroll down to find and launch Item Manager.

How the City of Austin Simplified their GIS Migration with Advanced ArcGIS Online Item Management

Have you looked at applying for specific waivers from the FAA? Join us and learn some of tips and tricks we use to get approvals and maximize ROI.

Tips & Tricks for Part 107 Waivers and Mapping

Unexpected damage to subsurface infrastructure is disruptive and often expensive. The good news? In most cases, it’s also preventable. In this webinar, we’ll look at the data on damage, its leading causes, and how combining GIS with new technologies can help reduce risk. See how streamlining workflows around 811 locate requests enables utility owners and operators the ability to empower locators in the field, manage seasonal influxes of tickets, and track damage prevention efforts.

The scale and impact of damages related to locating practices

How to handle different locating scenarios such as emergency requests, working with contractors, and complying with requirements for positive response or documentation

How managers, dispatchers and locators benefit from a GIS-centric ticket management solution

VertiGIS® is a leading GIS solution provider and software developer. Their focus is the development of software solutions and services that help utilities, land management, public sector, energy, telecommunications, and manufacturing customers build bridges between their business processes and location technology. VertiGIS is the maker of Geocortex®, which is used by thousands of customers to enhance the capabilities of the applications they build with Esri’s ArcGIS® and deliver a world-class experience to millions of end-users around the world.

Learn How to Streamline Locating Tasks and Prevent Damage to Subsurface Infrastructure with a GIS-Centric Approach

ArcGIS for Power BI is a custom data visualization tool built into Microsoft Power BI that brings mapping capabilities to your reports and dashboards. As of January 2021, ArcGIS for Power BI supports Publish to web and Embedded enabling you to share your Power BI reports—with Esri maps—within your organization. Not just that, ArcGIS for Power BI is now also available on Report Server. Now with any ArcGIS user type, you can view Power BI reports with privately shared ArcGIS content. To create maps within Power BI, you need a Creator or higher user type.

Learn how to easily bring maps created within your ArcGIS organization into Power BI.

Find how to use the new capabilities - embedded, publish to web and report server.

Get started – find everything you need to know about user types and licensing.

See a demo of the top 10 ArcGIS for Power BI tools that you can leverage today to map and analyze your data.

Make Beautiful and Accurate Maps within Microsoft Power BI with Esri’s ArcGIS for Power BI

Geospatial on a Budget 2: Converting coordinates

Geospatial on a Budget 3: The Magic of Maptitude

Geospatial on a Budget 5: The Force of Visualizing and Mapping Data

Geospatial on a Budget: When Cost Really is Total Cost

Geospatial on a Budget

Editor's Note: In a field that evolves as rapidly as geospatial information science and technologies, the idea of “getting a GIS job” may not be as straight-forward as it sounds. What are employers looking for, and how do you know that your training and education will get you there? Join Directions Magazine as we begin a short series of articles examining these topics.

Was there really ever a time when all you needed to know to get a GIS job was how to do a few software tasks and design a map or two, or is that as overly idealistic and unrealistic as the image of every 1950s household having an apple pie cooling on an open window sill?

If you did manage to get a job on that "lick, spit and promise," are you still in that position? What daily tasks are expected of you now that didn’t even exist 15 years ago?

New GIS degree and certificate programs continue to launch each year. Keeping curricula current, and instructors both confident and competent, is a perpetual challenge. There are also more numerous and diverse approaches to professional development than ever before. Is there validity in the Monday-morning-quarterback statement that what employers want, what degree programs provide, and what students actually learn are always out of synch?

In an effort to understand distinctions and requirements of GIS jobs, Jung Eun (Jessie) Hong, an assistant professor in the Department of Geosciences at the University of West Georgia, recently completed a content analysis of GIS job advertisements. She compiled almost 1000 GIS job postings, spanning 2007 – 2014, from GIScareers.com, GISjobs.com and the GIS Jobs Clearinghouse. The titles of the jobs were used to sort the positions into five different job categories:

Though programmers, developers and engineers differ in training and expectations, their primary job tasks are similar enough to be grouped at this scale. The “Other” category included GIS coordinators, instructors and the like.

Then, individual skills specified in each ad — such as data mining, web mapping, programming or project management, for example — were all coded into four technical areas:

Hong then used this coded information in NVivo, a product designed for analyzing text-based content.

What were the similarities and differences in skills among the five job categories? The most requested skill set across all jobs involved analysis and modeling, with over 56% of all job ads specifically referencing such needs. This includes such tasks as aerial image interpretation, data analysis, database development, data mining, network analysis and/or the use of spatial statistics. The second most requested skill set was a general one: communication, interpersonal skills, and self-motivation and independence.

Within job categories, the similarities were more interesting than the differences. Not surprisingly, the number one most requested skill for a programmer/developer/engineer was web or mobile application development; 57.4% of all job postings within that group identified that skill. But what was the most frequently expected skills for the other four categories of GIS jobs positions? Communication skills, above all other technical or more job-specific needs, with up to 45.9% of the postings specifying that skill set.

Another revealing result from within each job category was that database development was ranked as the second most frequently desired skill across all five job type categories. Within the domain of GIS&T, "database development" can have a specific meaning for a specific use case, but those two words are also common and important on their own within the fields of computer science and information technology. Their high frequency designation as a skill across all of these GIS job postings may reflect diverse and different interpretations of what “database development” actually means in a given scenario...which makes us wonder about the myriad ways that “communication” itself plays out in the world of GIS&T.

In practice, communication skills can include everything from accurately representing one’s self on a resume to finding out during an interview that everyone is interpreting “database development” in distinctive ways. In the Venn diagram world of database development, surely there is overlap with data manipulation, programming, and/or database design. Are you ready for that? Or, does the new boss really just need someone to populate an Excel spreadsheet and join it to a shapefile? Either way, whether you are a wise boss or an eager job seeker, are you prepared to listen carefully enough to the other person so you could tactfully, professionally and courteously adjust and address the miscommunications? Voila, now you get points for interpersonal skills as well!

If the ubiquity of “database development” may reflect instances of commission, Hong’s research also illustrates an example of omission with the absence of the term “geocomputation” in any of the job ads. She had been prepared to code the term as an example of a required or desired skill within the analysis and modeling set, based on the fact that geocomputation had been identified as an entire knowledge area in the 2006 GIS&T Body of Knowledge, one of the sources for her coding information. Geocomputation had been described in the BoK as the "development and application of computationally intensive approaches to the study of complex spatial-temporal problems.” The complete absence of the term from job ads does not mean that those complex spatial-temporal problems are no longer an issue! Instead, I would suggest that the high performance computing, cellular-automata and agent-based models, and simulation modeling that once differentiated a geocomputational approach have now become expected and necessary, and thus have been integrated into analytical approaches in general. Perhaps “Big Data analytics” is more likely to be the nom du jour in a job ad of today, but these are of the same ilk.

Overall, Hong’s findings confirm what many of us have experienced over time: that technical skills will always be critical on a particular day for a particular task, but those must be complemented with a life-long ability to unravel problems. When the Department of Labor’s Geospatial Technology Competency Model was revised in 2014, the bulk of the changes were specific technical competencies in Tier 4 and above. Personal effectiveness, academic and workplace competencies, largely the "general" skills in Hong’s study, have remained as solid and important as ever.

In psychological and human resources parlance, skills are things which we can acquire and learn, while abilities are things that we have naturally. Importantly, both can be refined through training and education. To increase your employability, hone your skills as well as your abilities, and develop your competence and confidence to communicate about them both. Consider these 20 Challenging GIS Interview Questions, which are as relevant today across all types of GIS positions as when they were first published; effective communication is central to them all. 

GIS Jobs of Today: Which GIS job skills are in highest demand?

Geospatial technology has become a fundamental component of modern information systems. As societies generate growing volumes of data, the ability to organize, analyze, and interpret information through geographic context has transformed how organizations understand the world around them.

Mapping is no longer limited to visual representation. Today, geospatial tools support analysis, prediction, and strategic planning across a wide range of industries.

From Geographic Data to Spatial Understanding

At its core, geospatial technology connects data to place. This connection allows users to explore relationships between location, time, and human activity. By layering multiple datasets within a geographic framework, analysts can identify trends and interactions that are difficult to detect in non-spatial data.

Spatial understanding enables organizations to move beyond isolated data points and toward holistic views of complex systems.

Location-based analysis improves decision quality by providing context. Whether assessing infrastructure investments, managing natural resources, or analyzing market behavior, geography plays a critical role in shaping outcomes.

Geospatial technology helps decision-makers:

These capabilities support evidence-based decisions grounded in real-world conditions.

Modern geospatial platforms integrate data from diverse sources, including remote sensing, field surveys, and operational systems. Bringing these datasets together within a unified spatial environment enhances consistency and analytical depth.

Effective integration also improves collaboration, allowing teams from different disciplines to work with shared spatial information and a common geographic perspective.

Challenges in Managing Geospatial Systems

As geospatial technology evolves, organizations face challenges related to data quality, scale, and interoperability. Spatial datasets often vary in resolution, accuracy, and update frequency, requiring careful management and validation.

Addressing these challenges involves adopting standardized workflows, investing in data governance, and ensuring transparency in analytical methods.

The future of geospatial technology lies in greater automation and intelligence. Advances in analytics and computational methods are enabling systems to detect patterns, generate insights, and support decisions with minimal manual intervention.

As the world becomes more interconnected, geospatial technology will continue to play a vital role in helping organizations understand change, manage complexity, and plan for the future through spatial insight.

The Role of Geospatial Technology in a Rapidly Changing World

The City of Honolulu is embarking on a new way for citizens and visitors to travel using an elevated transit rail system. As with any new transportation system, the rail project will significantly change the way communities develop along the new transit line. In urban planning, the use of carefully planned transit facilities and accesses to promote optimum mixed-use communities is known as Transportation Oriented Development (TOD).

The City of Honolulu TOD was showcased at the Annual Esri User Conference Plenary Session. Zebra Imaging® collaborated with Esri® and the City of Honolulu to demonstrate to over 14,000 conference attendees how TOD can positively impact the communities surrounding the transit line. Esri and Zebra Imaging presented the planning approach in an innovative way, using 3D GIS analysis and visualization technologies. The use of 3D allows city planners to best communicate with public and private community stakeholders to gain buy-in for major urban infrastructure projects.

Esri has been focusing on GeoDesign process and are evolving their 2D/3D design tools within ArcGIS. Esri® used CityEngine, 3D Analyst and Spatial Analyst within the GeoDesign framework to develop urban growth and 3D density models representing different scenarios of Honolulu’s TOD development. From these models, Zebra Imaging produces a series of full color, 3D holographic images to be used in public outreach forums. Holograms provide accurate, visually compelling 3D views of the GIS analysis results and achieve fuller understanding and better evaluation by the public of the development alternatives of the TOD. Using the Esri models, Zebra Imaging’s 12 foot long hologram conveyed a true and easily understood 3D picture of how the rail will visually impact Honolulu’s downtown and surrounding communities.

Zebra Imaging also created additional channel-type images depicting Esri urban growth and density scenarios before and after the TOD. Zebra’s channeled holograms fuse two or more images into one hologram such that the picture changes as the viewer moves around the hologram. The City of Honolulu will share the 3D visualizations created from this GeoDesign collaboration project in a series of meetings and community workshops to share information with the public.

Esri UC Plenary showcases Honolulu’s Transit Oriented Development (TOD) in a 3D Hologram

CityGML is an open data standard designed to represent three-dimensional city models in a consistent, interoperable format. As urban environments grow more complex, traditional 2D mapping no longer suffices for detailed planning, simulation, and analysis. CityGML enables the storage, exchange, and visualization of rich urban information — including buildings, terrain, transportation networks, and infrastructure — in a structured way that supports advanced spatial applications. This level of detail helps cities understand physical context, promote smart growth, and integrate geospatial intelligence into planning workflows.

The standard facilitates the representation of geometry, topology, semantics, and appearance attributes, so that urban objects can be interpreted meaningfully by different software systems. By defining common rules for 3D urban data, CityGML fosters collaboration between planners, engineers, developers, and analysts who need consistent and reliable city information.

Enhancing Urban Planning and Smart City Applications

CityGML supports a wide range of planning and analysis tasks that benefit from three-dimensional context. Urban planners use CityGML models to visualize proposed developments in relation to existing infrastructure, evaluate shadow effects, and test the impact of zoning changes. Transportation specialists can analyze 3D representations of road networks and transit corridors to improve accessibility and connectivity. The ability to integrate semantic information — such as building usage or material properties — also enhances modeling precision and decision support.

As cities adopt smart city initiatives, CityGML becomes a foundation for location intelligence that spans sensor networks, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, and real-time operational data. By linking 3D urban models with live data streams, municipalities can monitor infrastructure health, manage utilities more effectively, and respond dynamically to events such as traffic disruptions or extreme weather.

Interoperability and Data Integration Benefits

One of CityGML’s key strengths is interoperability. Because it adheres to well-defined schema and data structures, CityGML models can be shared across platforms, applications, and organizational boundaries without loss of meaning. This fosters efficient collaboration between stakeholders who may be using different GIS, CAD, or simulation tools, helping reduce data translation challenges and promote consistency in urban datasets.

CityGML also integrates well with other open standards, enabling organizations to build comprehensive geospatial solutions. When combined with geographic information system platforms, analytical engines, and 3D visualization tools, CityGML models become powerful assets for spatial analytics, scenario testing, and stakeholder engagement. The result is a coherent urban dataset that enhances insight and supports evidence-based decisions.

CityGML is increasingly used to support sustainability goals and environmental analysis. Planners can simulate energy use, assess shading and solar exposure, and evaluate environmental impacts of proposed developments using 3D models. Public safety agencies leverage 3D data to improve evacuation planning, risk assessment, and emergency response simulations. These applications illustrate how CityGML contributes to resilient and adaptive urban environments that respond better to changing conditions and community needs.

By embedding semantic richness and spatial precision, CityGML transforms urban datasets into actionable intelligence that supports long-term planning, operational efficiencies, and stakeholder communication. As cities embrace digital transformation, open standards like CityGML provide a scalable, interoperable foundation for next-generation spatial analysis and urban innovation.

CityGML: An Open Standard for 3D City Modeling and Urban Data Exchange

Accurate postal addresses play a vital role in most business analytics. Whether your aim is to understand your target customers, the physical infrastructure of an area, traffic flows, or even weather patterns, an accurate address is an essential first step toward linking meaningful datasets. By leveraging addresses, that place provides important context to how and why things occur as they do.

For example, most data points exist within some kind of geospatial context. For instance:

        Consumers almost always have a primary residence address.

        Businesses can have an office address, one or more warehouses, satellite offices, and more.

        Products you buy must first move through a supply chain, stopping at multiple physical locations along the way.

Most of the data that matters can be associated in some way with one or more addresses, which is why address data is an important link in providing the context you need to understand the relationships between multiple entities. A customer’s home address can offer clues to their income level, lifestyle, and what services are around them, for example. Businesses operate in the context of a broader economic environment, and location may offer clues as to a company’s competitive climate, its physical plant, and potential environmental risks.

Location unlocks a world of contextual detail about customers, competitors, markets, and opportunities. But you can only gain access to that information with accurate location data. Accurate, standardized addressing can be a meaningful first step in that process.

But on the road to achieving all those benefits, there’s a common challenge we see across industries: address verification and accurate geocoding (adding latitude and longitude coordinates).

Postal addresses can be the common thread to join disparate datasets together, but working with postal data, especially across multiple countries, can be a real challenge. It is extraordinarily difficult to standardize addresses due to variations among street names, spellings, abbreviations, numbering systems, and formatting options – especially across multiple countries. And without a verified address, it’s virtually impossible to join datasets and analyze information in its full context.

Some of the common sources of confusion and issues we see include:

        One street with multiple names, such as “Amherst Street” and “Route 101A”

        Abbreviations that lead to multiple variations of a single address

        Names and numbering schemes that may be subject to change

That’s why you need the right address verification and geocoding technology, or geo addressing – to ensure accurate and standardized address data that meets your application requirements and budget.

The solution to common addressing challenges is access to complete, accurate, and contextual data. This is accomplished using a combination of geocoding and address verification, which we at Precisely call geo addressing.

We offer the world’s leading solutions for both geocoding and geo addressing, and curate one of the largest, most accurate address databases on the planet. Our geo addressing algorithms resolve addresses to a highly accurate location, even in many cases where basic information has been omitted. We can correct errors in addresses and assign a latitude and longitude coordinate based on our vast global database of address locations.

In addition to inaccuracies, addresses are highly complex and constantly changing, and our Geo Addressing solution is built to tackle errors and complex formatting issues head on – thanks to the ability to:

        Match and validate the accuracy of addresses with Address Verification

        Associate latitude and longitude coordinates with Address Geocoding

        Enable easy and efficient look-up with Address Autocomplete

Geospatial on a Budget

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