Skip to main content

Australia launches positioning technology trials

The Australian Government is to invest US$9 million (AU$12 million) in a two-year program looking into the future of Satellite Based Augmentation Systems (SBAS) positioning technology in Australia. The funding will be used to test instant, accurate and reliable positioning technology that could provide future safety, productivity, efficiency and environmental benefits across many industries in Australia, including transport, agriculture, construction, and resources. Federal Minister for Infrastructure
January 19, 2017 Read time: 2 mins
The Australian Government is to invest US$9 million (AU$12 million) in a two-year program looking into the future of Satellite Based Augmentation Systems (SBAS) positioning technology in Australia.

The funding will be used to test instant, accurate and reliable positioning technology that could provide future safety, productivity, efficiency and environmental benefits across many industries in Australia, including transport, agriculture, construction, and resources.

Federal Minister for Infrastructure and Transport Darren Chester said the program could test the potential of SBAS technology in the four transport sectors—aviation, maritime, rail and road.

The two-year project will test SBAS technology that has the potential to improve positioning accuracy in Australia to less than five centimetres. Currently, positioning in Australia is usually accurate to five to 10 metres.

The SBAS test-bed is Australia's first step towards joining countries such as the US, Russia, India, Japan and many across Europe in investing in SBAS technology and capitalising on the link between precise positioning, productivity and innovation.

Related Content

  • Making the most of Michigan
    January 9, 2018
    Michigan DoT’s Kirk Steudle takes time out from the ITS World Congress in Montreal to talk to Colin Sowman. Thirty years ago, a professional engineer named Kirk Steudle joined Michigan Department of Transportation (MDoT). Today he’s the state transportation director, responsible for more than 16,000km (10,000 miles) of state highways (including 4,000 bridges), some 2,500 employees and a budget of more than $4 billion. We caught up with Steudle during the ITS World Congress in Montreal and asked how he
  • US DoT launches largest-ever road test of connected vehicle crash avoidance technology
    August 22, 2012
    Nearly 3,000 cars, trucks and buses equipped with connected Wi-Fi technology to enable vehicles and infrastructure to ‘talk’ to each other in real time to help avoid crashes and improve traffic flow, began traversing Ann Arbor's streets yesterday as part of a year-long safety pilot project by the US Department of Transportation. Ray LaHood, US Transportation Secretary, joined elected officials and industry and community leaders on the University of Michigan campus to launch the second phase of the Safety Pi
  • Secretary Foxx sends six-year transportation bill to Congress
    March 31, 2015
    Over the past year, US Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx has visited more than 100 communities and heard one common story about crumbling infrastructure and dwindling resources to fix it with. Foxx has now sent to Congress his solution to this problem: a long-term transportation bill that provides funding growth and certainty so that state and local governments can get back in the business of building things again. The Grow America Act reflects President Obama’s vision for a six-year, US$478 billion
  • Modernising India's bus travel
    August 29, 2012
    Award-winning ITS initiatives are promising modernisation of bus travel as a key part of development plans for cities of the Indian state of Karnataka. The Indian state of Karnataka is poised to launch the next stage of a major rollout of ITS technology on its bus network following the August 2012 go-live of an award-winning passenger information system. The Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC), which is owned by the state government