Top 5 Applications for 3D GIS Data

The world is three-dimensional, yet for much of modern history, we've relied on flat, two-dimensional maps to understand it. As urban density increases, particularly in major US metro areas, cities are growing taller and infrastructure is becoming increasingly complex. Relying solely on 2D maps limits the ability to fully understand and respond to real-world challenges. To truly capture the depth and complexity of our environment, detailed 3D geospatial data is essential.

This blog explores five powerful ways that Ecopia AI’s (Ecopia)’s 3D land cover data is driving real-world impact, and why 3D mapping is becoming a cornerstone of decision-making across industries.

Transforming access to 3D GIS data with Ecopia

Though 3D GIS data offers powerful insights, organizations have historically struggled to obtain it. Thankfully, Ecopia is changing that.

Ecopia’s 3D Land Cover data is the most comprehensive, accurate, and up-to-date data set of its kind for next-generation visualization, analytics, and decision-making. Leveraging the power of artificial intelligence (AI), Ecopia’s systems generate high-precision 2D and 3D vector data at scale from high-resolution imagery, resulting in a planimetric-level vector layers for natural and impervious surfaces, including buildings, driveways, roads, sidewalks, sports fields, water bodies, tree canopy, and more. Ecopia’s AI map engine can append height attribution to buildings, trees, and bridges, empowering organizations with 3D GIS data at scale without needing to manually digitize features. 

Today, Ecopia’s 3D Land Cover data is available off-the-shelf for over 440 cities across North America, enabling smarter and faster decision-making across diverse applications, from public safety and insurance to climate modeling and beyond.

Top applications for 3D GIS data

1. Locating emergency callers in multi-story buildings

In a moment of crisis, knowing the exact whereabouts of a 911 caller can make all the difference. In dense urban environments with high-rises and multi-story buildings, it’s no longer enough for emergency response teams to know just a street address; they also need to know which floor someone is on. That’s where 3D building data becomes essential.

Response crews often struggle to locate callers in multi-story buildings because traditional emergency call data only provides x- and y-axis coordinates, which identify the address but not the caller’s vertical position. Although the FCC now requires mobile providers to include z-axis (vertical) coordinates for 911 calls, without detailed 3D mapping and visualization tools, emergency teams lack the context needed to effectively use that information, making it difficult to pinpoint the exact floor or location inside buildings.

To alleviate this need, Ecopia partnered with NextNav to enable emergency response teams with 3D visualizations. By combining NextNav’s mission-critical z-axis positioning solution derived from ground stations and barometric calibration with Ecopia’s comprehensive, accurate, and up-to-date 3D building data, the partnership empowers response teams with greater situational awareness in emergency scenarios.

2. Understanding bridge elevation for flood modeling and public safety  

Understanding our world in 3D is essential for making informed, real-time decisions, especially when it comes to critical infrastructure. During severe weather events like heavy rainfall or flash floods, bridges can quickly become submerged and impassable. Without accurate, up-to-date data on bridge elevations, emergency responders and communities face serious challenges in rerouting traffic and delivering aid. In moments of crisis, this information can be the difference between safe passage and dangerous delays.

To address this, Ecopia partnered with the Center for Water and Environment at the University of Texas and the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) to extract detailed information on over 38,000 miles of roads and bridges. By creating a 3D road elevation model that includes precise bridge height data, the state gained the ability to assess which bridges are most at risk during flood events and which routes remain safe for use by emergency vehicles.

This critical data helps enable a proactive approach to infrastructure management during natural disasters, helping to plan for events and ultimately protect citizens.

3. Enhancing mapping applications

By providing detailed, three-dimensional representations of the built environment, 3D mapping data is enhancing a wide range of both B2C and B2B mapping applications related to navigation, weather forecasting, emergency response, and more. This rich spatial context allows these applications to better reflect the real world, providing a deeper understanding of complex environments.

For example, Ecopia’s high-precision 3D map data will soon be made available in NVIDIA Earth-2, a platform used for advanced climate simulations and analytics. This data provides users with unprecedented access to a comprehensive, accurate, and up-to-date digital representation of the physical world and enables users to simulate climate and weather conditions, efficiently providing invaluable insights to evaluate risks and plan for emergencies.

4. Assessing property risk

In the property and casualty (P&C) insurance industry, location accuracy and building intelligence are essential for managing risk, pricing policies, and responding to claims. Ecopia’s AI-powered Building-Based Geocoding delivers rooftop-level precision by assigning accurate geographic coordinates directly to building footprints, comprising 176M+ high-precision building footprints and rooftop-level geocodes for more than 270 million primary and secondary US address points. This high-accuracy location data enables insurers to know the exact location of each building in their portfolio.

Ecopia’s 3D mapping data provides additional context, offering three-dimensional insights for each property. By visualizing the height and structure of a building, insurers gain a clearer picture of exposure and potential vulnerability, enhancing risk assessment, underwriting, and claims.

Since Ecopia’s AI systems frequently ingest new imagery, insurers can monitor property changes over time, from home additions to potential structural damage, helping carriers proactively manage their portfolios and better serve policyholders.

5. Providing strategic insights for community planning

GIS has long been a standard tool for urban and regional planners, supporting a wide range of applications related to transportation infrastructure, asset management, and community development. While 2D geospatial data provides important information for planners, the availability of 3D data unlocks new opportunities for analysis.

For example, accurate population estimation is critical for urban planning initiatives such as infrastructure investment, public health, and disaster response. While traditional methods rely on census data, surveys, and 2D land use maps, these approaches can fall short, especially in fast-growing urban areas or regions where data is outdated or incomplete. 3D mapping data provides a powerful enhancement to population estimation by offering detailed insights into the vertical dimension of the built environment. Instead of simply knowing where buildings are located, analysts can understand how tall they are and what that implies about occupancy.

By combining Ecopia’s high-precision 3D building data with additional datasets, such as land use classification or regional demographics, planners can produce more granular and reliable insights. This can ultimately help decision-makers allocate resources, plan services, and respond to community needs with greater confidence. As the regional planning organization for Greater Tucson, Pima Association of Governments leverages over 61 layers of Ecopia land cover and transportation data, including 3D buildings, trees, and bridges. This data provides geospatial intelligence for active transportation planning, irrigation management, public safety, and beyond.

Creating a digital twin of the world with 3D map data

Today’s world is three-dimensional - and our maps need to be, too. 3D GIS data is a powerful tool that brings depth, context, and intelligence to the digital representation of our built environment. By capturing not just the footprints of buildings and infrastructure, but also their shape and height, 3D data unlocks critical insights across industries.

To learn more about Ecopia’s 3D Land Cover Data, available off-the-shelf for 440+ cities in North America, get in touch with our team.