Automatic alignment of vector data and orthoimagery for the national map

A general problem in combining road vector data with orthoimagery from different sources is that they rarely align. There are a variety of causes to this problem, but the most common one is that the latest products are collected with higher accuracy and improved processing techniques. In previous work, we developed techniques to automatically correct the alignment of vector data with orthoimagery using a technique called conflation. However, in applying our technique to real-world datasets provided by USGS, we discovered that these techniques failed in some areas. In this paper, we describe some refinements to our original approach that provide consistently better results in aligning the vector data with the orthoimagery.