Ground Truth Free Evaluation of Segment Based Maps

For ground truth free map evaluation, map intrinsic properties have to be utilized in order to define a measure of quality. This paper suggests the property of map consistency, based on the similarity of different model elements describing a single feature in the environment. The evaluation algorithm is tailored for segment based maps. Respecting the segment representation, it inherits the properties of memoryand runtime efficiency. In comparison to classic grid based evaluation models, which are mostly used for evaluation of maps represented by points, it is also able to detect structural inconsistencies of maps, even if the model elements (the segments) overlap. The paper explains the core technique, hierarchical clustering of segments, illustrates properties of the underlying segment similarity measures and cluster confidence measure. Experiments on different segment based maps show its consistency with visual inspection.