Over the past few weeks, Mapbox Data Team has been reviewing the OpenStreetMap Data quality in Taiwan with respect to Satellite imagery. By running a comparison against Bing Imagery and available GPS traces like Strava Heat Map we were seeing a notable data offset of 15-20 meters with respect to GPS Traces.

Data offset

Some observations

• City centers have varying offset which is not aligning to GPS Traces.

• Some major highways running between cities are having huge offset.

• Roads in mountain areas are not matching to Strava traces

• Some motorway junctions don’t match with the GPS Traces

Community Involvement

• With respect to the offset and data realignment, there have been a few discussions from our side in Taiwan mailing list and Taiwan OSM group in Facebook and members of Taiwan community have expressed their support in fixing these alignment problems.

New Mapbox Satellite for Taiwan

Seeing these imagery offset issues, Mapbox Satellite is now rendered with fresh imagery for major cities in Taiwan.

• New Mapbox Satellite imagery samples

Mapbox and Strava aligning compared to Bing Imagery

• Mapbox Satellite aligning with Strava in misaligned motorway junction

These are the cities where new Mapbox Satellite imagery is rendered. With respect to data misalignment and improvement, we hope Mapbox Satellite imagery will now enhance mapping in Taiwan!