Speeding up of GIS Mapping Vital to City’s ‘Smart’ Hopes
Published: 14th July 2014 08:51 AM | Last Updated: 14th July 2014 08:51 AM | A+A A-
KOCHI: With Union Urban Development Minister M Venkaiah Naidu giving the indication that the NDA Government’s mission is to build 100 smart cities across the country using GIS (Geographic Information Systems)-based town planning, it is high time the authorities in the city completed the GIS-enabled mapping project of the Kochi Corporation that was launched five years ago. The civic body has initiated the procedures to carry out the GIS mapping, which is mandatory as per the guidelines of Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM).
The tenders were floated by Kerala Sustainable Urban Development Plan (KSUDP) and a Mumbai-based agency was entrusted with the work. “The Corporation did not own the GIS mapping project and every procedure was carried out by KSUDP. The agency submitted the survey result to the KSUDP authorities. But we have learnt that the KSUDP was not satisfied with the report that was submitted by the Mumbai-based agency. Though we recommended a re-tendering, it also did not work out as the agency took legal recourse,” said a top official of Kochi Corporation.
The prestigious project will help the Corporation to attain a digital map of Kochi. The mapping will track each building in the city, nearly 1.5 million people, every road, tree and even the garbage bins and all this data will be made available at the click of a mouse.
GIS is designed to capture, manage, analyse and display all forms of geographically-referenced information and merge these with the hardware and software to create a digital map.
Access to geographical information is easy and there is a range of tools which give the capability to interact with the map contents.
This will ensure that organisations and single users can use the most up-to-date information.
The official said that if GIS mapping is completed, chances will become brighter for Kochi to get listed in the ‘100 smart cities’ project. “A geographical survey has to be carried out. It will cover various aspects, including property, land details, drainage system, street lamps, roads and other details. We will ask KSUDP to take steps to complete the survey soon,” he added.