One of the biggest challenges for local government is determining funding that will help cover anticipated project costs for a particular budget year. While most of this funding can be covered by a department’s budget, additional sources of money are often needed to cover new projects or programs that come up throughout the year. Federal or state grants can typically serve as a medium for this additional funding and have become a fundamental part of most local government departments. For the City of Des Plaines IL, the Model Communities grant was a recent opportunity to receive funding for implementing city programs aimed at improving the overall health of city residents.
Supported by the Cook County Department of Public Health (CCDPH) and the Public Health Institute of Metropolitan Chicago, the Model Communities Grant Program provided the city with a unique opportunity to acquire federal funding for the design and implementation of public health initiatives. Funded by a $4 million federal grant called Communities Putting Prevention to Work, the city needed to provide information, through the grant application, on why it would be an eligible candidate for part of the allotted funds.
To assist with this effort, the city’s GIS (Geographic Information System) department was asked to supply numerous mapping products and statistics for a wide-range of community information, including all agencies in and around the city that would benefit from the funds, the number of schools in lower income 2000 census block groups, and the percentage of minority residents within 2000 census block groups. Displaying this information through mapping products tied the statistics and numbers in the grant application to a real-world location and helped to visualize the positive impact any received funds would make.
As a result of the hard work put in by city staff members, in combination with the information and products provided from the city’s GIS, the city was recently awarded a $96,000 grant from the Model Communities program. With this money, the city hopes to supplement existing community programs and implement new ones that can help to make the city a healthier place to live.
Roadway improvements have been recorded for decades in one of Elk Grove Village’s community databases. It contains much useful information such as the base and surface materials of a roadway, years in which a road was repaved, and years in which a road received some form of maintenance. This data has been integrated into the village’s GIS (Geographic Information System) to provide an interface to visualize the roadway pavement history. The GIS allows users easy access to pavement information that can facilitate planning and scheduling of improvement projects as well as evaluation of the effectiveness of certain materials when looking at the road condition assessments. Highly accurate construction quantities can be calculated for roadway surface areas, sidewalk squares, curb lengths, and more because the village invested in base data for the GIS.
In order to properly drive a car or walk across a street requires that someone knows where they heading. Although these everyday tasks seem to happen naturally it would be foolish to overlook the hard work that people do to ensure that we are accurately guided. Guidance comes in many forms, but for this article we will focus on the guidance that the City of Park Ridge provides its residents by making certain that their street pavement markings (thermoplastics) are identifiable and easy to follow. For not having crosswalks painted brightly enough or turn lanes not properly identified, could easily result in an unnecessary accident.
Every year the City of Park Ridge conducts a survey of all their intersections and decides which ones need to have their street pavement markings updated, a process that has always been done by an outside contractor until this year. By taking this survey in-house it immediately saved the city $13,000 but then begged the question of what would be the best way to conduct its survey independently. Lucky for the city they have staff knowledgeable in the use of a Geographic Information System (GIS). This system has been used for many projects already and so why not test it out with their Thermoplastic Paving Program.
Once it was decided that GIS would be the method of data collection and storage for this year’s program, the Engineering Technician started to hit the streets and conduct his survey. After only a few weeks of review, the Engineering Technician then brought the data collected in the field into the office and began to digitize the data into a GIS database. This database held information about all pavement markings for both installation and removal as well as what type of marking was included at each location. Moreover, all pavement marking information was assigned to its respective intersection so as to be able to calculate the amount of removal and installation for each intersection. Once all intersections were fully surveyed, the Engineering Technician was then able to run a summary in order to apply a total cost for this year’s program as well as a break down of the individual cost for each intersection. This in turn would allow for easy analysis should the Engineering Department decide to add or remove an intersection based on their current budget. Last but not least, the finalized intersection list will be supplied to the contractor who will do the work accompanied by a map book that displayed what was to be installed or removed at each intersection.
In conclusion, community needs that require definitive answers usually require a systematic approach. In the example above, it easy to see that using GIS not only allowed the Engineering Department to better track and replace their street pavement markings, it also saved them money while they to continue to keep their community a safe place for travel.
The Village of Deerfield has began a using an Engineering Firm to survey and smoke test the sewer storm system within the village. This program involves using provided GIS data to be used in the field by the Engineering Firm and village staff to conduct the smoke testing program. Smoke testing involves using special equipment to help find defects and issues within the sewer storm system. As smoke is passes through the system equipment is used to detect any leaks within the system. Defects are then recorded and mapped using GPS technology. The process also included verifying mapping information and GPS was then used to update, add, or remove sewer storm system infrastructure.
Once the field data and smoke testing program was completed the Engineering Firm provided the GIS department with all the field data collected by GPS, photos of defect areas, and locations of all defects within the system. The GIS department was able to use this information to update GIS data and mapping and also map the collected defects. The maps then can be used to find trends within the system as well pin point locations that where found to be defective.
This multi-year program provides information that is crucial to the village to help maintain the sewer storm system. The program also benefits the GIS department with providing accurate data to map and use in updating and maintaining mapping data. Working together and integrating community processes with the GIS department helps achieve the greatest benefit possible while conducting field maintenance programs
Employees for the Village of Glenview often request very simple, but effective ways for determining attributes for property owners and one of these attributes is\are, zip codes. With assistance from Geographic Information System (GIS), Employees are now able to quickly look at the zip code map and find out a residence(s) zip code in a matter of seconds.
With the readiness of the GIS data\maps for zip codes, Employees are now capable of verifying residences zip codes on the fly. You may not think this is very important, but before GIS, Employees had to look this information up on the County’s website which in most cases took\takes 5-10 minutes. Not only does GIS provide maps like this, it also increases Employee productivity.
Although it is possible to put a number on the purchase price of a device that notifies people of an emergency, giving people amble time to reach safety is priceless. Like all Public Safety personnel who pride themselves in the art of providing a safe place for their residents to live, the Village of Morton Grove Fire Department is no different. They continue to look for new ways to ensure that they know their town and they know what their residents need.
One item that makes this list of needs is the ever-important emergency siren. Emergency sirens act as noisemakers that have the ability to be heard for up to almost a mile in distance. If these devices are properly located throughout a municipality, they can offer enough noise to warn all residents of an oncoming emergency. The question is “How do you know where to position these sirens so that they can be heard village-wide.” That is a question that the Morton Grove Fire Department knew might be easily answered by the help of Geographic Information System (GIS) Department.
Considering that the Fire Department already knew where their existing siren locations were located they could start the analysis right then and there. By using a simple tool found within GIS, a process known as a “Buffer” would be applied to existing siren location in order to generate a fixed-distance ring around the existing structure. This distance would depict the range in which the siren manufacturer indicated humans could hear the siren noise. Although the emergency siren manufacturer indicated that the siren could be heard from 5,000 feet away the Morton Grove Fire Department decided to play it safe and run the “Buffer” at a distance of 4,000 feet instead. This way they could add a cushion of ensured safety to their analysis.
Once the first buffer was run it was then up to the Fire Department to locate village owned land that they could use in order to install as many new emergency sirens as it would take to cover the entire municipality. Each time they were granted the right to use a piece of land they would submit the location to the GIS Department to run an additional buffer. Furthermore, they continued to analyze what locations might work as which location might not work in order to reach their goal of blanketing the entire community with an emergency siren call during a time of need.
After many alterations between existing and proposed locations, the Fire Department has narrowed down the placement search to five proposed sites and one existing location. These locations and their respective buffers have been placed on map and submitted to the Fire Department for their internal use. All in all, a once daunting task has now been made easier by the use of GIS.
Since 1994, the Estelle Sieb Center in Norridge has, among other things, held classes and meetings for local communities in law enforcement, fire protection, etc…Typically, these classes can last all day, requiring the attendees to find a place for lunch. In the past, the center would have a few old maps or a village employee would mention a few places in the area. The village wanted to create an updated map that could be distributed to all attendees that would show the locations of restaurants in the village as well as a few near by in Chicago. The village asked the GIS department to put together a map showing up to date restaurant locations.
By using a current business license list and employee input, an 11” x 17” map was created. The map shows approximately 35 restaurants near the Estelle Sieb Center that would be convenient for lunch. Each restaurant is represented by a number that then corresponds with a restaurant name in the legend. This allows for a large number of points to be displayed in small area without having to worry about squeezing text into the map. Because the map is printed on 11” x 17” paper, it can be easily distributed and carried around.
With the old outdated restaurant map at the Estelle Sieb Center, there were issues with people attempting to go to restaurants that were closed. By having an updated map, the attendees could choose a location and not worry about wasting too much time. Because the map was created in GIS, each time a restaurant opens or closes, the changes can be made to the map quickly, which allows the map to be distributed as quickly as possible. This allows the attendee to enjoy their lunch break before getting back to their class.
The Village of Oak Brook contains a wide variety of restaurants. The village posts the list of restaurants and local attractions on their website along with the address and phone number for public use. However, this list is lengthy and contains outdated information. In order to create a more visually appealing and up to date listing, Oak Brook enlisted the help of GIS to create location points, which are then placed in Google Maps. The GIS Department created a map showing the location of each restaurant within the village as well as address information and a link to the restaurant’s website. This interactive map located on the village website allows the user to find restaurants within the village based on location.
Clicking on the Restaurant Location link takes you to a Google Map showing the Village of Oak Brook. A red dot represents each restaurant within the village. Clicking on the restaurant name in the table of contents on the left or on the red dot on the map brings up an information box for that location. Each information box contains the name of the restaurant, address, phone number, and website link if available. Unlike the previous list, the interactive map is easily modified when new restaurants open up or old restaurants close down.
Providing the information in a format that people are familiar with allows the user to access the information without having to learn new software. Providing the location of each restaurant on a map allows residents or other visitors visiting the village to locate a restaurant or eating establishment more easily.
The Village of Lincolnshire has completed a process of identifying all storm sewer outfalls that discharge into streams and rivers. This process was completed to help prepare for NPDES requirements and also to determine if all outfalls have been correctly accounted for throughout the village.
Village staff used provided GIS maps showing the existing storm sewer infrastructure and ArcView technology to review the current system. The review process allowed staff to verify the data in the GIS system and report any needed updates. Staff also assigned a unique id system for each outfall to be maintained for reporting purposes.
After the review, the GIS department conducted the data updates and produced a Village-wide Storm Sewer Outfall Map showing the newly developed id system. This map is currently being used to ensure all outfalls are accounted for and for future planning and reporting activities.
This is a basic example how the GIS department and village staff work together to ensure the current data is correct and ensure data within the GIS system is being updated on a regular basis.
From its inception GIS has used hard copy maps as a presentation media for geographic information. Maps are still used extensively to display analysis results, however new opportunities in technology have provided other ways to distribute and even interact with data. Now-a-days it is commonplace to distribute maps electronically through e-mail as an image, in PDF format for example. Doing so saves both time and money as paper and ink supplies are spared and the information can be received by many people in a matter of seconds regardless of their location. Better yet, due to technology advances, interactive mapping applications are now available to everyone for consumption. These products place GIS tools in the hands of all users allowing them to perform geographic operations in a dynamic way, to discover their data and analysis results interactively, and still provide the opportunity to share that information in an electronic or hard copy fashion. The Village of Riverside has invested in such products through its GIS program and those interactive applications are known as MapOffice™ and MapOffice™ Advanced.
MapOffice™ is a free interactive map of all GIS Consortium member communities in the Chicago Metropolitan area and is available to the general public. This allows residents and business people alike to navigate a place and search for addresses, important places, measure distances, obtain parcel information including PIN numbers and zoning information, and even connect to other services such as the County Assessor, Microsoft’s Bird’s Eye View, and area school district information seamlessly.
MapOffice™ Advanced is an interactive map restricted to village staff in each GIS Consortium community which allows employees all of the functionality of MapOffice™ and then some. Additional tools provide the ability to identify floodway information, view utilities and associated data, map a list of properties of interest, and create address lists for mailings by simply choosing properties on the map. Additionally, custom information can be created to display in this product as well such as zoning boundaries. And the list of tools continues to be expanded based on requests.
Interactive maps are extremely useful tools to facilitate discussion and to derive conclusions about any location or event. In many locations they are used during public meetings and are very effective resources to focus attention to the matter at hand and also allow the flexibility to view areas near or far from an issue area. An opportunity that is not possible when using static images.
Nearly everything in life is related to location. Whether you are looking for a new job closer to home, a beach vacation or your set of missing car keys, everything is correlated to space and location. Geography is heavily associated with location and in recent history has become a staple in people’s everyday workflow. Google Maps StreetView, Bing Bird’s Eye View, MapQuest, and other mapping sites have created a niche in mainstream America that allows people to access geographic information (street names, directions, aerial photography) at the push of a button. This is the basis of Geographic Information System (GIS).
GIS creates an environment that harnesses geographic and tabular data and combines them to better understand the information. This is especially important in local government with its defined boundaries, parcels, ordinances, signage and infrastructure. Paper maps and plans become digital and easier to consume and share via the internet or by electronic document. GIS also has the framework to be a centralized data center and can be incorporated by every department in a useful manner. With data consumption increasing at an exponential rate, the need to associate data with a geographic feature has increased as well. Whether it is crimes on a certain street, creating a mailing list within 500 feet of a certain address, or showing the direction of flow for a sewer line, GIS can create a better understanding of the spatial environment surrounding the decision makers. GIS is spatial technology. GIS is location.
Back in the fall of 2009, a village trustee was trying to inform a resident of the businesses available in the village of Wheeling. The trustee was unable to find anything on the internet or the village website in regards to the business. The trustee asked the economic development department to put together an updated business inventory for the new village website. In turn, economic development asked the GIS department to create a series of maps that would accurately display the inventory information.
Keyhole Markup Language (KML) was developed by Google for an easy way to express geographic elements on internet-based maps such as Google Maps and Google Earth. It was determined the best way to map out all the businesses in Wheeling, was to use Google KML to map out each location as a point with the familiar Google Maps as a background. Close to 900 businesses in the village were categorized as either, Industrial, Commercial & Retail, or Food & Hospitality. By breaking the businesses down into categories, it relieved the issue of congestion when opening a map with close to 900 points. Each category would get its own map so that the user would not be overwhelmed. After the businesses were categorized, attributes such as phone number, address, and website were added to each location allowing the user to click on a point and see all contact information. The businesses were then mapped out and tested before being added to the village website.
By having an updated business inventory on the village website, the village provides information that is important to its residents. With having each business mapped out, a resident or someone visiting the village can find a specific business and then get all related information by interacting with the point on the map. Business locations maps could be created without using GIS, but it would be very difficult. The sheer number of locations ensures that to correctly find a location, a map would have to zoom in and out so as not to appear as just a big collection of dots. By using GIS and Google KML, the village was able to create an interactive map that could provide all relevant information and be accessed by anybody who visits the village website.
Having an accurate inventory of the components that make up a municipal utility system is very important to the overall success of a city or village maintaining that utility at a high performance level. While this type of inventory has traditionally involved descriptive text information regarding a particular utility system feature, with a robust GIS system that same inventory can now contain a spatial component. By adding this spatial aspect, the municipality can better track and maintain their capital investments and the overall integrity of the system. Recently, the Village of Winnetka took advantage of its GIS system to help develop an electric pole inventory for its Water and Electric department to use for future maintenance and analysis.
Developing a utility inventory can include GIS on varying levels of involvement and complexity. For the Village of Winnetka, a basic GIS pole feature class existed prior to the current inventory, however it lacked completeness, both spatially and in attributes, and was not heavily used by the Village staff. To help make the data more complete, the Water and Electric Department hired a utility consulting firm to collect GPS field data of the village poles, using the existing GIS pole features as a base. Having an existing GIS database structure to work from, the data collection only took a few days and was able to be seamlessly transitioned from the field to the office using a simple database relationship. While the Village GIS Department did not create the more advanced inventory currently being used, it did provide the basic framework that made the data collection process run more smoothly and provides the tools for viewing and analyzing the final product.
Moving forward, the Village can now use the electric pole information to help locate potential problem areas and better plan for future enhancements or changes to the system. While the existing, descriptive text inventory that was primary being used was useful for general information about a specific pole, it did not provide a holistic view of how that information related to other assets across the Village. By integrating a spatial component, the department can now better analyze how individual parts of the system relate to each other and be more informed about the system moving forward.
Using GIS as a medium to store utility system information provides a significant advantage to governments at all levels when considering the time and money it can save in general maintenance and everyday labor. Viewing this kind of information spatially and relationally to surrounding features, as the Village can now do with its electric poles, expands the ability of both individual departments and overall government bodies to maintain higher performing systems and more provide more reliable services to their residents.
The GIS Consortium (GISC) has been awarded the Geospatial Information and Technology Association (GITA) Excellence Award for 2010. The organization is one of the oldest in the GIS industry started back in the late 1960's. The GITA's Excellence Award is an overall industry award that recognizes a user organization for its outstanding application of geospatial technology. Candidates for the Excellence Award demonstrate dedication, insight and a high degree of initiative in implementing, managing and expanding multifaceted geospatial systems incorporating multiple applications that reach across their organization.
In November the GISC submitted a six page application outlining the GISC model. The article outlined GISC's leadership and insight in the GIS industry along with the dedication of the Board. The article highlighted the business accomplishments of the GISC and the benefits attained by the GISC member communities. Past recipients of the Excellence Award are XCel Energy in Minneapolis, Duke Power Company Charlotte, and Telefonica in Sao Paulo.
For many municipalities, paying the electric usage costs for all community owned and maintained facilities can result in a significant annual expense. This cost can be compounded when the various accounts registered to the municipality are incorrectly managed. Recently, the City of Des Plaines began the process of reviewing all the city electric accounts that have been paid over the years and discovered several problems, both in how the accounts were related spatially to actual city facility locations and how many accounts the city was responsible for. To determine the correct spatial relationship of each facility account, the city’s GIS department was asked to assist in developing both a database for storing and managing the account information and a map to assist city staff in tracking each account issue as it was reviewed.
While GIS was not necessary to perform a basic cost analysis of the city’s accounts, adding a spatial element to the account information provided a means to visually track the accounts as they were reviewed. It also allowed those reviewing the information to see the distribution of the types of facilities across the city receiving power as recorded by the power company and allowed staff to cross-check the information for inconsistencies. After mapping out the facility locations and types as indicated in the electric usage accounts, the accounts were field verified for accuracy and all erroneous information, such as unmatched account numbers and incorrect addresses or locations, was removed.
Moving forward, the mapped facility features and their associated attribute tables will be stored in a GIS database to allow for future analysis or map product development as needed. Before the introduction of GIS, this information was disjointed across multiple files and file formats, making it difficult to perform a comprehensive review. By centralizing this information in a spatial platform, the city now has a means to both visualize and review their account information in a way that’s accessible across multiple departments.
For many municipalities, paying the electric usage costs for all community owned and maintained facilities can result in a significant annual expense. This cost can be compounded when the various accounts registered to the municipality are incorrectly managed. Recently, the City of Des Plaines began the process of reviewing all the city electric accounts that have been paid over the years and discovered several problems, both in how the accounts were related spatially to actual city facility locations and how many accounts the city was responsible for. To determine the correct spatial relationship of each facility account, the city’s GIS department was asked to assist in developing both a database for storing and managing the account information and a map to assist city staff in tracking each account issue as it was reviewed.
While GIS was not necessary to perform a basic cost analysis of the city’s accounts, adding a spatial element to the account information provided a means to visually track the accounts as they were reviewed. It also allowed those reviewing the information to see the distribution of the types of facilities across the city receiving power as recorded by the power company and allowed staff to cross-check the information for inconsistencies. After mapping out the facility locations and types as indicated in the electric usage accounts, the accounts were field verified for accuracy and all erroneous information, such as unmatched account numbers and incorrect addresses or locations, was removed.
Moving forward, the mapped facility features and their associated attribute tables will be stored in a GIS database to allow for future analysis or map product development as needed. Before the introduction of GIS, this information was disjointed across multiple files and file formats, making it difficult to perform a comprehensive review. By centralizing this information in a spatial platform, the city now has a means to both visualize and review their account information in a way that’s accessible across multiple departments.