Aerial Imagery Consortium

Overview

Given the important role geospatial data has in making planning decisions, SCAG is working with a number of local and regional agencies to form a purchasing co-operative that would obtain a variety of high quality aerial imagery at a reduced, shared cost.

The Regional Aerial Imagery Consortium will seek to obtain orthogonal, obliques, building outlines, LiDAR and digital terrain imagery for SCAG jurisdictions and other potential stakeholders. Counties, local jurisdictions, water districts, non-profits, special districts and other potential partners are encouraged to participate in this consortium.

The objectives of the regional imagery acquisition are:
  • Obtain high accuracy aerial imagery (and related products) to support local jurisdictions needs for land use and asset monitoring, pre-engineering design, and geospatial analyses.

  • Unify imagery acquisition to improve communication among SCAG local jurisdictions and the ability to better engage the public.

  • Integrate aerial imagery and related products with the SCAG land use database and other geographic information system (GIS) layers.

  • Eliminate duplicate imagery acquisitions for many jurisdictions and leverage economies of scale to obtain more and better products.

  • Save taxpayer money and increase efficiency through collaboration.

  • The proposed coverage area includes all of Imperial, Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, Ventura counties, and 4,800 square miles of San Bernardino County. The aerial imagery will be acquired at three-inch resolution in the region’s urban core and six-inch in the remaining areas.

As part of the acquisition, a software application will be provided through which users would be able to view the image data and perform analytics, as well as the ability to use in most geospatial software. Training will be included for all participants.

SCAG staff will manage the entire procurement process, project management and coordinate the purchasing with all interested parties. The project calls for the selected vendor to fly and obtain the imagery in early 2020, so that the data will serve as a benchmark for the 2020 Decennial Census and SCAG’s regional planning efforts.