Community Access to GIS

Avoiding Intimidation & Trivialization

University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

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00 Abstract

The explosion of the World Wide Web (WWW) as a popular and widely available technology for connecting digital resources has provided the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) industry with a new delivery mechanism. GIS information delivered via the WWW has the potential of reaching beyond traditional audiences to reach experts and non-experts alike. This development is particularly significant for organizations and government agencies that deliver public information to citizens. This paper discusses some issues involved with providing community access to such information. Three case studies are presented. The different approaches used by these case studies to organize and deliver public information are examined. This paper suggests mechanisms to improve community access to public information.

(Presented at Data Visualization '97, St. Louis, October 1997 by Abhijeet Chavan. )

01

Introduction

• Widespread use of GIS
  • Scientific, business, government applications
  • Vast amount of public domain data generated
• Delivery: GIS end-products delivered predominantly as hard copy maps, charts, and reports
• Audience: geared towards experts and specialists

02

GIS and the Internet

• GIS integrates vast networks of related data
• Widely separated experts, data, models
• Internet as a network for GIS
• Delivery: GIS end-product delivered via the Internet as images, text, animations
• Audience: ease of delivery makes it possible to communicate beyond traditional audiences, experts and non-experts alike

03

Community access to GIS

• Sites now deliver public information to citizens and communities
• Different sites choose different ways to bring GIS information to the public
• Case Studies:
  • Mapquest (Geosystem Global Corporation)
  • EGRETS (ESLARP)
  • Envirofacts (USEPA)

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Indicators of success

• critical mass
• interaction
• user gratification

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Community access: Availability

Principal mechanisms

• provide internet access points
• promote your website, get found
• use appropriate technology

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Community access: Involvement

Principal mechanisms

• demonstrate how data can be used to solve problems
• increase interest and understanding of data
• help the user navigate the data

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Community access: Gratification

Principal mechanisms

• create customized end-product
• extract and create user-relevant data
• extract data for further analysis

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Case Study: Mapquest

Geosystem Global Corporation

• General purpose online atlas, trip planner, and relocation planner
• Yellow pages, city guides
• Allows map customizing and sharing

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Mapquest: Task oriented view

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Mapquest: Online atlas

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Mapquest: Trip planner

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Mapquest: Relocation Guide

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Case Study: EGRETS

East St. Louis Geographic Information Retrieval System

• Community resource for East St. Louis
• Data covering various disciplines
• Data available for downloading
• Accepts request for maps

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Egrets: level-of-familiarity view

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Egrets: Explore

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Egrets: People

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Egrets: Atlas

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Egrets: Store

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Case Study: Envirofacts

U.S.Environmetal Protection Agency

• Vast collection of public domain data
• Technically complex but relevant information for communities

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Envirofacts: Data-oriented view

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Envirofacts: Maps on demand

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Envirofacts: Education

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Summary

• put commonly understood metaphors in between people and the data (task-oriented view)
• flexible to user's level of familiarity
• provide tools to customize end-products

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