52°North Spatial Information Research GmbH

After the devastating flash floods in the Ahr valley in July 2021, the insurance industry identified the need to have access to near real-time data in order to better prepare for such events. They have therefore commissioned a platform that can process any Earth Observation data for the short-term integration of real-time data from current flood and disaster events. The goal is to ensure the continuous provision of open data satellite and weather data from flood warning systems (i.e, GloFAS) and flood monitoring systems (GFM, EMSR), as well as precipitation radar data from the German Weather Service (RADOLAN). The resulting information product contains the classified data sources as well as the raw data used and is made available in near real-time (NRT) in WebGIS for further analyses.

Throughout the first phase of development in 2024, 52°North calculated statistics on the aforementioned raster time series products and estimated pixel-by-pixel extreme value distributions. Based on the distributions, we derived thresholds according to a given return period per data source. We also jointly developed the architecture and workflow concept based on Argo. The platform pattern implements data stream enrichment with extensive processing on a maximally scalable Kubernetes platform. With the help of automated Argo workflows, an information product is generated daily from forecasts, floods and suspicious areas and made available for further processing via an API. The data is delivered as decision-ready information that has been co-created with the end users of the product.

The Atrai Bikes project aims to support urban planning by involving citizens, businesses and local governments in the systematic collection and analysis of bicycle infrastructure data. The two-year project, funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the São Paulo Research Foundation, FAPESP in Brazil, is a joint effort of three organizations: re:edu and 52°North in Münster, Germany, and the Cordial Institute in São Paulo, Brazil.

A key component of the project’s objectives is the integration of hardware technology from the open source senseBox:bike project, which is seamlessly connected to a dedicated app and a web-based analysis platform. This infrastructure enables the effortless collection of important data during daily bike rides and provides insights into parameters such as distance to car traffic, vibration levels, temperature fluctuations and particulate matter concentrations. These insights are invaluable to various stakeholders and provide a comprehensive understanding of the urban cycling experience.

The data collected is carefully stored and visualized using the openSenseMap solution, an open data platform enhanced with a web-based analysis component with GeoAI tools. This technology not only enables cyclists to make informed decisions about their routes, but also allows businesses to optimize logistics and governments to improve cycling infrastructure and understand cycling flows.

A robust citizen science approach complements this technological innovation. Workshops will be held in both Münster and São Paulo to engage participants, deepen their connection to the project and strengthen their skills and motivation. This joint effort promises not only to enrich the user experience, but also to advance the sophistication of the software analyses, bringing significant advances to urban cycling environments.

The Operational Design Domain describes the constraints under which a driving automation system is designed to operate. This includes environmental and geographic information as well as the required presence or absence of certain traffic or roadway characteristics. At Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles, a dedicated team defines such boundary conditions for the development and testing process. This allows the team to evaluate potential service areas for Mobility as a Service applications. Based on our expertise in geospatial data analysis and efficient processing of large volumes of geodata, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles contracted 52°North to develop a toolbox that enables the automatic derivation of these characteristics from available spatial datasets.

The content-rich road network data provided by Open Street Map builds the foundation for the analysis toolbox. It enables the derivation of basic properties such as the distribution of road types and street fruniture, speed limits or number of lanes for a given area of interest. The toolbox will also support complex analysis capabilities, such as statistics on curve radius, the intersection impact angle, or intersection complexity. The system combines two different analysis concepts: