2006 Regional Aerial Photo Project

KC Metro GIS members, through coordination with MARC, carried out a regional aerial photo flight in 2006 that provided local governments with new, highly detailed digital photos.This collaborative effort saved individual agencies money over the cost of independent photography collection.Additionally, this effort provided a regionally consistent set of images that can be shared by all local governments in the event of public safety response situations that cross jurisdictional boundaries.

With the 2006 project now completed, plans are now underway to repeat the project in 2008.

2006 Regional Aerial Photo Project Summary

A formal request for proposals was issued in November 2005, and KC Metro GIS formed an aerial selection committee to review the proposals. After this review, the committee recommended to the MARC Board of Directors that GE Energy Team should be selected, on behalf of the local governments in the region, as the preferred vendor for the Orthophotography and Oblique Imagery components of the project. (No bid was recommended for the LiDAR project component at this time.) 

The aerial selection committee for orthophotography included one GIS professional from each of the following organizations:

The oblique imagery selection committee was made up of only those members of the aerial selection committee who wanted to purchase obliques:

In both cases, the selection was based on quality of similar work, firm personnel, project approach and project management.

The contract between MARC and GE Energy Team was finalized and flights to capture the imagery began in February 2008. Image processing by the vendor, including an iterative process of quality checks between the vendor and the participating counties, occurred during the spring and early summer. Final delivery of the aerial photography was completed during the winter of 2006.