Cartographers hit the road to update online maps

ST. LOUIS -- In an sport utility vehicle crammed with high-tech gear, Dan Donovan and Ben Woodley trolled last week through a new and virtually treeless subdivision in Troy, Ill, outside St. Louis.

A green arrow on a dashboard monitor connected to a roof-mounted Global Positioning System satellite tracked their progress as Donovan called out addresses: "Corner right, 536. Corner left, 535."

Woodley, in the passenger seat, used a plastic wand to scribble the figures on a computer tablet. Later, that information will be taken back to the office, downloaded into a computer and disseminated to clients.

To these cartographers with Chicago-based NAVTEQ, the Troy subdivision represented terra incognita -- a neighborhood heretofore unmapped. They work to make such areas accessible worldwide to users of Internet sites such as MapQuest, Google and Yahoo.

"I guess you could say we are modern-day explorers," said Donovan, 36, of Wildwood, a NAVTEQ employee since 1994. "We'll sometimes map an area where addresses haven't even been assigned yet."

"As long as the road's paved, we'll drive it and map it," said Woodley, 23, of St. Charles, who joined the company a year ago.

Donovan, Woodley and four other local NAVTEQ employees are among 2,000 in 55 countries who navigate roads to check that directions, distances and estimated travel times are accurate and current.

They mostly map newer settlements on the outskirts of established cities and towns, like the Troy subdivision, called the Homes of Liberty Place. The inner parts of cities don't change much, Donovan explained.

But they also closely watch construction projects, especially lengthy ones like the rebuilding of 10.5 miles of Highway 40 scheduled to begin this year.

Their clients in the Internet map industry will use information that NAVTEQ, or its major competitor, Tele Atlas NV of Boston, collect to plot alternate routes for local drivers hoping to avoid major traffic nightmares.

MapQuest manager Christian Dwyer said his company typically adjusts its maps any time a construction project exceeds three months; the Highway 40 project is expected to run about three years.

"We've already begun investigating our options when the work there begins this spring," Dwyer said, alluding to the start of construction at the interchange of Interstate 170 and Highway 40 (Interstate 64) interchange.

"We expect that NAVTEQ will flag construction at every step of the way so that we can use computer programs to adapt the routes for our users."

Such adaptations are not being considered by the Missouri Department of Transportation for its official foldout paper map, which is published every year.

"The official state map never reflects any construction," said MoDOT spokeswoman Linda Wilson. "We have construction work or closures all over the state. I know that this is a bigger deal, but my guess is no, we won't be showing it on the map because we just don't normally do that."

Wilson said MoDOT will provide detour routes during the construction project to the online site Traffic.com.

Back in Troy, Donovan and Woodley were checking addresses and intersections on their GPS system. A video camera captured images along the way -- road signs, businesses, landmarks.

NAVTEQ data includes such features as turn restrictions, physical dividers and one-way streets.

On Route 162, the mappers spotted an error.

"We've got Kennedy Drive wrong," Woodley said.

Donovan pulled a quick U-turn and veered onto Kennedy Drive, a short strip of blacktop surrounded by limbs that had collapsed during the Nov. 30 ice storm.

The GPS showed that the road is actually 50 yards south of its location on the NAVTEQ map.

Woodley made the correction, and the team rolled on.

Donovan was one of the first two people NAVTEQ hired to "build" its St. Louis database.

"Back then, when I told people what I did for a living, they'd give me a blank look, like 'Good luck with that,"' he said.

"Now, the first thing they say is, "What a cool job."'

"And then," Woodley added, "they immediately tell you what's missing (from the map database).

"But that ends up being a good measure of how well we're doing. We welcome all corrections."