Nahant to be photographed from above

NAHANT-A low flying plane will be circling the town sometime in the next couple of weeks.Nahant Town Administrator Mark Cullinan said the plane would be taking high resolution aerial photographs that would be used as a base for the town Global Information System (GIS).?It’s relatively inexpensive,” he said. “It will cost $2,000 and the cost will be spread out over a three year period.”Cullinan said Pictometry International Corp., which is headquartered in Rochester, N.Y., would be doing the flyover. He said the company is a leading provider of geo-referenced aerial imaging and related software.According to information provided by the company, unlike traditional information systems that photograph only one view of an area, Pictometry captures images from an angle to create a more natural 3-dimensional view so that users can see land features and structures clearly and in their entirety. The company allows users to access detailed imagery for every square foot of a region and navigate between views of a map to images associated with it and to specific features contained within images such as doors, manholes, fences and fire hydrants.Cullinan added the locational data associated with each pixel makes it possible to measure geographic details including distance and height.Cullinan said the town has 8-inch photographs in its GIS database but the new images would be much higher resolution.?You could see people walking on the ground,” he said.The town has already its mapped water lines, sewer lines and is in the process of mapping trees.?We would use the high resolution photographs as a base,” he said. “We could layer maps of sewer lines and almost anything else in town over it. When this project is complete we could access anything listed in the database. We could pull up a map of all the sewer lines, all the elm trees or anything else in the system.”Cullinan said the program would be a valuable resource for Department of Public Works crews and public safety personnel.?The police and fire could use it for planning purposes,” he said. “It would be helpful in terms of access to some of the buildings in town.”Cullinan said the database would also be available to the public through the town Web site.