Geodesy & Geomatics Engineering

Dr. Shabnam Jabari from the Department of Geodesy and Geomatics Engineering at UNB Fredericton, recently received funding from the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation through the New Brunswick Priority Occupation Student Support Fund program. The funding will be combined with her Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada grant to support two new Ph.D. students. The students will work on developing 3D city models.

Most developed countries are now building “smart cities” to address various urban issues, including disaster management, security, and traffic. This concept relies on a massive stream of live geospatial data acquired by various sensors distributed throughout the city. In smart cities, decisions are made by using information systems to analyze this plethora of geospatial data, rather than ad hoc approaches or ones based on preconceptions.

Smart use of such data requires a 3D city model as the basis. 3D city models present urban objects and structures, such as buildings and roads, in three-dimensional geometry and can be generated at different levels of detail. Existing solutions for data collection and 3D city model generation are time-consuming and require significant manual work, with more work required, the higher the detail level. In this project, we will use artificial intelligence to generate 3D city models. Such an automatic method will deliver substantial savings in labour costs for municipalities, local governments, and the private sector on city management tasks, data collection, data processing, and system maintenance.

This project will bring together partners from academia, government, and the private sector to collaborate on cutting-edge technology to produce the first “digital twinning” of NB cities. This initiative will place NB as one of the leaders in smart city applications in the world.