IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

More than 500 local government organisations will be able to access the latest Ordnance Survey digital mapping and geographic data with the signing of a new agreement today.

Topographic, address and integrated transport network data are among a wide range of products that will be available for use in providing better front-line services, reducing local government costs and improving local and strategic decision making.

Northgate’s StruMap PAI Tools will work to accurately re-locate Southern Water’s digital assets, such as mains and sewers, in line with the new data from the Ordnance Survey and enable more efficient and effective network management.

Havering is the third biggest London Borough and centred on Romford. A pioneer in the use of GIS as a corporate resource, the Borough is one of the most extensive users of GIS in London. Council engineers, planners, librarians and environmental health officers are amongst hundreds of users of the GGP system that provides maps with overlays of every conceivable type of council information.

Topographic, address and integrated transport network data are among a wide range of products which will be available for use in providing better front-line services, reducing local government costs and improving local and strategic decision-making.

The national mapping agency reports encouraging market growth in the take-up of data, particularly in the private sector, with partner channels showing a 14% rise.

“Pinal County gets a lot of calls from people who want to know more about projects in their community, particularly if they’ve received or read a legal notice about a pending case,” said Arline Studley, Records Manager for Pinal County Planning & Development.

Following tragic flooding in the area, the city is using new GIS apps that may assist officials in flood zones across the U.S.

With the arrival of fall also comes the expectation of heavy rains and flooding. The swells of moisture can cause surface floods and flash floods, riverbanks that brim over, and sea surges spread across coastal cities. At best, it’s inconvenient, at worst, it turns tragic. In September alone two people died from severe flooding in Wisconsin, and in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, city officials are still warning more than 10,000 evacuees not to return home.

"GIS is the single most transformative technology that government can engage in," said Gregory, who explained that GIS provides a visual location-based view of data that helps expose trends and patterns not otherwise available. "We want to take data and provide information from that data," Gregory said.

The GeoPortal is a Web-based, interactive catalog of geographic information that provides government, businesses and citizens with direct access to the state’s geographic data, which they can search and use to make informed decisions about where to locate their businesses, where to live, and what schools in various areas are like.

Now the California Technology Agency (CTA) is hoping to encourage even more families and businesses to relocate, not with burly moving men and 18-wheelers, but with a powerful combination of mobile apps and geospatial data.

The county purchased eight high-resolution 3-D photos of its entire roadway system, encompassing 1,100 square miles and approximately 2,500 streets. County staff combined the images with existing GIS data to form virtual maps that can be used for planning projects, code enforcement issues and emergency situations.

The 3-D images were created using an elaborate camera system and software package called the Mars Collection System. The suite was developed by earthmine, a mobile mapping technology provider located in Berkeley, Calif.

Such is the case for Douglas County, Neb., which is using a cloud solution to test and run GIS applications. The county, whose boundaries include Omaha, has been a longtime user of solutions from Esri, the Redlands, Calif.-based company that specializes in geographic software and services. In 2010, the county put those GIS applications into the Amazon Web Services platform after the county decided it was time for a hardware upgrade, said Mike Schonlau, the county’s GIS coordinator.

GIS mapping technology plays a crucial role in helping public-sector employees identify hard-hit areas. Russ Johnson, Esri’s director of global public safety, answered Government Technology’s questions about how GIS technology affects disaster relief in crises like Sandy, and how it may evolve in the future.

Question: What is full next-generation 911?

Answer: Having a robust GIS solution so that you can graphically control your boundaries and the different things you need to control for 911 call routing. It’s having calls delivered in via Internet Protocol (IP); it’s having that IP network delivering those calls get as close as it can to what the vision of i3 [a technical standards document crafted by the National Emergency Number Association (NENA)] is through NENA.

GSA recently entered into an agreement with the Agriculture and Interior departments as well as the Environmental Protection Agency to move geospatial data from the geodata.gov portal into data.gov, said David McClure, associate administrator with GSA’s Office of Citizen Services and Innovative Technologies.

September is National Preparedness Month, and given the September we have been having with back-to-back hurricanes and raging wildfires, this designation is especially timely. Although hurricane season begins in June and peak wildfire season is typically early July, September is often an apex in the disaster realm. While technology can’t prevent natural disasters, it builds powerful preparedness and response tools; in particular, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), commonly referred to as “mapping,” creates critical tools that provide a vital function for preparedness. Any community can increase their preparedness by following a few simple steps before a disaster comes calling.

3-D modeling and DIY mapping tools are giving cities new ways to market their economic viability to prospective businesses.

Cities are looking for a competitive advantage with other municipalities to attract new business and grow their revenue base. They have to aggressively market and sell to targeted business prospects in order to survive and prosper. Such a strategy requires a well thought-out, innovative approach that showcases a city’s unique strengths. GIS technology lends itself perfectly to this need. It provides crucial information in a map-based format that’s easily understood, and that businesses will find invaluable in helping them make informed decisions.

The free tool — known as SAVI — helps Indiana hospitals link health indicator data to historical data on social economic conditions that can impact a person's health.

A health partnership in Indiana is urging hospitals and public health departments to use a free spatial data analytics tool to better assess and improve community health.

County Auditor Bob Wichlinski leads the team of elected officials whose goal is to provide an online environment in which Porter County taxpayers can find information regarding their property through the county’s Geographic Information System, or GIS, featured on the county website.

After the County Council put up the money for a total quality management plan in March, Wichlinski and his GIS Department set out to add more layers to the GIS.

Hurricane season is well in progress, and won’t wrap up until the end of November. And in looking back at last hurricane season, when Sandy rocked the East Coast, hundreds of lives were lost and countless people were displaced from their homes. But that's not all that was affected -- so was our energy infrastructure.