Arising from the requirements of the EU Environmental Noise Directive (END) (2002/49/EC), Compass Informatics are leading an on-going project on the development of advanced spatial video and photography capture and integration methods, along with systems for interactive display of noise maps and spatial imagery.  The project is supported by the EPA RTDI Programme, and is undertaken in partnership with the National Centre for Geocomputation at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth, and also the National Roads Authority.

Data gaps have been identified that must be filled in order to fully meet the road-related noise modelling and mapping requirements under the Directive. The techniques under development by the project will allow the efficient vehicle- and air-based survey of roadways and the road buffer zone, and the extraction of features from the derived ground and aerial imagery.

The project is also tackling the lack of dissemination systems to present noise maps and action plans to the public and professional user, and will also integrate the project’s spatial and aerial imagery into such a system. A demonstration system and procedures for providing web-based public information systems are being developed.

It is expected that the approaches once developed and proven through this project, will be of use in efficiently meeting the Directive requirements, and will indeed be applicable in other environments and other application areas.

For further information please see the following:

• Project summary document

• Paper presented at EuroNoise 2006 (conference website previously at www.euronoise2006.org)

• Presentation made at EuroNoise 2006