Design of a 3D virtual geographic interface for access to geoinformatin in real time

In 1999, the County of Northern Jutland in Denmark became a national project for implementation of Information & Communication Technology (ICT) in local government. It was supposed to become the Lighthouse for others in the implementation of ICT, elearning and e-democracy. The idea about a digital region struck this part of Denmark at it has struck many other places in Europe and around the world. At about the same time the first ideas about a virtual geographic interface was initiated and launched as one of the projects at the newly build Virtual Reality Centre of Aalborg University. Later named as VR Media Lab. The Centre for 3D GeoInformation was opened in 2001 and the main purpose of this facility is to extrude the region from 2D to 3D. Through the means of traditional geoinformation such as building footprints, geocoding, building and dwelling register and a DTM the region will be build as a 3D model. The purpose of this 3D model is not only to provide a visual presentation, but also to use it as a real 3D GIS - for both queries through the use of a 3D model and for visualisation of geoinformation in 3D. This paper will present the design framework for the 3DGI system and also give some examples of future use of these kinds of multi-dimensional geographic interfaces.