In 1900, the International Latitude Service started to monitor the wobbling and wandering of the North Pole. Since that year, the North Pole has been moving south. In everyday terminology, it has moved secularly on the Earth’s surface in the only direction it knows, i.e., south. The total motion has been about 13.5 meter over the past 100+ years, which in other words amounts to an amazing rate of 13 cm per year or about 1 cm per month…

This paper is an update of the GAGAN status presented at NSP meeting on May 8-19, 2006 held at Brussels, Belgium and also provides the future roadmap of the project. GAGAN will provide augmented information for satellite navigation to the aircraft flying within Indian Flight Information Regions (FIRs), which consists of seven boundaries. India is situated inthe vicinity of equator. In the equatorial region the ionospheric variations are very predominant…

Professor Laboratory of Communication Engineering, Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, Tokyo, Japan QZSS is a Japanese Satellite System to augment the performance of GPS positioning. It was expected to provide the services of positioning, communication, and broadcasting…

Positioning and navigating: 2007
AKIO YASUDA, DICK SMITH, GERARD LACHAPELLE, IAN DOWMAN, JOHN W
LAVRAKAS, SANG JEONG LEE, VANESSA LAWRENCE
Gagan update ARJUN SINGH, S K SARASWATI AND K RAMALINGAM
North pole keeps moving south MUNEENDRA KUMAR
Acquisition sensitivity limits of new civil
GNSS signals SEPPO TURUNEN
US National Space Policy GEORGE CHO
Can use of GPS be legal in India?
SUDIPTO ROY
Galileo Technology Centre H SU, W EHRET, H BLOMENHOFER, E BLOMENHOFER

EU, Morocco seal deal on Galileo
The European Union (EU) and Morocco signed an agreement in Brussels for cooperation on the European satellite radio navigation program Galileo. The two sides will join hands in a wide range of activities, including scientific research and training, industrial cooperation, trade and market development, standards, certification and regulatory measures. Morocco is the seventh international partner of the EU on the Galileo global positioning system. The 25- nation bloc has signed cooperation agreements with the United States, China, Israel, Ukraine, India and South Korea.

£2 million printing press for paper maps
Ordnance Survey Director General and Chief Executive Vanessa Lawrence officially pushed the on button of a massive new £2 million printing press at the mapping agency’s Southampton head office recently. The six-colour printing press is one of the largest in the country and will be used to produce Ordnance Survey’s paper maps, including the 650 different recreational and leisure maps that together cover every corner of Britain. www.OrdnanceSurvey.co.uk

GPS infrastructure network in Southern Poland
Trimble has announced it has supplied its VRS (Virtual Reference Station) software to establish a national GPS infrastructure network in the south of Poland. The VRS network provides a geospatial infrastructure for surveying, engineering and GIS professionals. The network is the first of its kind in Poland and supplies centimeterlevel RTK GPS data for a variety of positioning applications including geodetic and cadastral surveying, road and bridge construction, and archeological excavation site location and documentation. There are also plans to use the network for managing and dispatching emergency medical and rescue teams in Krakw to improve efficiency and response times.
The VRS network, known as Malopolski System Pozycjonowania Precyzyjnego, is operated by the BGUM, the survey office of the local government. Built with Trimble GPSNet and RTKNet software, the network covers the southern part of Poland, called Malopolska. In addition to improving the accuracy of results, the network is expected to enable fast measurements within 2-5 seconds. The use of the network will be free of charge for surveyors in the next three years. www.trimble.com

BSNL Cellone launches pilot project in Andhra Pradesh
The BSNL cellone has taken up a pilot project in Andhra Pradesh, India to develop location-based services for cellone subscribers. A gamut of services like Industry “Where Am I” information by various industry services will be provided. Once successful, the services will be introduced in entire South India, said J V Reddy, General Manager, Cellone services, A P Telecom. www.hindu.com

China has a vast expanse of land with intertwining rivers and mountains, abounds in lakes and reservoirs. The survey of rivers and lakes as well as the protection and exploitation of these resources plays an important role in Chinese economy. Cross-section survey of water bodies is a key part in hydrographic engineering survey. Traditional methods of cross section survey of a river such as theodolite intersection, theodolite stadia, electronic distance measurement, depth-surveying bar, leadline, handlead survey and echo sounder are the main methods used for water bathymetry. These methods are not only prone to the inaccuracy of instruments, distances, weather conditions, intervisibility and communication device, but also involved in tedious workload which leads to low efficiency. Some unfavorable factors such as the flow of the water and the nonlinear movement of the surveying ship make measuring the depth of the water more difficult. Lack of skills and cooperation among surveyors might result in a low accuracy in the position fix of cross-section points, thus further affects the quality of cross-section survey of the river. The application of real-time kinematic (RTK) GPS positioning technique has opened a new avenue for the crosssection survey of rivers (Wu, 2005). Simultaneous utilization of RTK GPS technology and the shipboard sounding method (e.g. digital depth sounder) will greatly improve the accuracy and efficiency of cross-sectioning survey of rivers(Qiu and Fong, 2002; Qiu 2004; Zhang et al, 2002).

I am delighted to participate in the 26th Congress of the Indian National Cartographic Association (INCA). My greetings to the organizers, delegates of the Conference, cartographers, scientists and technologists, users of cartographic products and distinguished guests.
India has a vision of transforming itself into a developed nation before 2020. There are number of missions which need inputs from cartography technologies that will certainly accelerate the process of development. The programme such as Bharat Nirman Programme including PURA (Providing Urban Amenities in Rural Areas), networking of rivers, infrastructure development in 63 cities through Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Renewable Mission, mapping of earthquake prone areas and recurring floods in north Bihar and Assam require vital inputs at the stage of planning and implementation level. The mission of INCA should be to assist the implementation of developed India vision using their core competence in cartography in partnership with ISRO, NRSA, Survey of India, State Remote Sensing centers, Thematic map making organizations, Indian Remote Sensing Industries, Academia, Research Institutions and other IT organizations. Hence, I would like to talk to you on the topic “Cartographers: Partners in National Development”. Let us now look at some typical requirements of rural and urban development programmes of the nation, where cartographers are major partners.