When a whole city changes…
Providing the best data visualization products for Canada means investing in the best sources of information possible. Streetfiles, postal codes and address points are key layers and must be accurate.
DMTI’s Data Visualization Tools
DMTI identifies areas to work on ranging from new subdivisions to urbanizing rural areas. Typically, the number of changes per area ranges from a few to a few hundred.
Our team occasionally encounters a scenario where a municipality has changed so much that it appears completely different. Everything is affected — from the street name to the postal codes that provide mail to their residents and businesses.
The Case of Shawinigan, QC.
Shawinigan is a city located on the Saint-Maurice River in the Mauricie area in Quebec, Canada. The population is 50,060 as of the Canada 2011 Census as per Wikipedia and 26,230 private dwellings occupied by usual residents.
As part of our focus on Canada, we are continually updating and comparing three (3) main sources of information. This includes streets, postal codes and addresses.
Our data team compared the latest Canada Post data against the current database. We found that Shawinigan, QC – many addresses suddenly fell out due to changes.
An investigation revealed the area recently changed most of their addresses, and was planning to change more. The Canada Post data was actually showing only about half of the changes. Nearly the whole area would be affected!
We compared this finding against additional sources to fact check the changes. Our team made the city-wide changes to our data as soon as possible.
The result was some Canada Post fallout within the product. But this allowed us to deliver greater accuracy and stay aligned with the changes.
Due to the scope of the changes (an entire municipality!) – the entire data team banded together and got this update into our upcoming Aug 2016.3 data release because of how important it is to ensure our products are in alignment.
Congratulations Data Team, and thank you for your on-going commitment to data quality and currency and all of the other changes that went into this release!
Click here to learn more about how DMTI Spatial delivers complete accuracy, helping businesses get ahead of the competition.
