May 31, 1999
Athens County Commissioners
15 South Court Street, 2nd Floor
Athens, Ohio 45701
RE: Monthly GIS Progress Report
Commissioners:
Last month I introduced an ESRI concept called Spatial Database Engine
software. Spatial Database Engine (SDE) is an ESRI software solution for
managing and providing access to many types of spatial data. It is
available in three configurations: Enterprise SDE, Workgroup SDE. And
ArcSDE.
* Enterprise SDE provides open access and central management of
shared spatial data.
* Workgroup SDE is for smaller organizations that need the functionality
of enterprise SDE and yet do not need to support a large number of
clients.
* ArcSDE is a special version of SDE that operates as an extension to
ArcInfo and adds the ability to serve ArcInfo coverages and data, and
ESRI shapefiles.
I plan to obtain additional information, including price, on these three
products to see which if any fit well with our GIS.
We will receive our report from Jeff Hanson of Farragut Systems early next
month.
EmergiTech and Digital Information Systems are progressing with our E-911
project. This project is on schedule and is now 58 % complete.
Attribution of building structure locations (address database development)
is in progress. Attribution of the street centerlines (development of
street centerline database) is nearing completion.
I received our copy of NovaLIS software obtained through our ESRI grant. I
will conduct an evaluation of the software. As part of the grant
acceptance we must pay for a training class. I will attend a class as soon
as it can be scheduled. Then if the software checks out as good as it
looks initially, I will train others on it.
I attended a presentation, arranged by Dave Lovett, by the Geauga County
GIS Department. The presentation was well attended and included a lot of
information, including the cost of their system ($1,500,000), they started
their GIS in 1991, their sof tware (ESRI), their parcel maintenance taking
one hour per day, their data distribution on CDs monthly, and having public
access terminals in several offices. They funded their GIS from their
Auditor's Real Estate Assessment Fund and the County Gen eral Fund. A
copy of their handout is attached.
I met with Tom Reid and several staff members of Ohio University
Communications Network Services (CNS). I found them to be extremely
cooperative and very willing to work with us as we begin to implement an
Athens County network:
We discussed the need to have an independent County network with our own
government call sign and the need for GIS capable bandwidths. We discussed
O.U.'s need to have a centrally located router to serve all of the local
agencies presently connected or seeking to be connected to the network.
We discussed possible locations for a Network Access Point (NAP) and
concluded that probably the Radio TV (RTV) Building may be the most central
location. Also, the RTV Building is one of the highest buildings in case
we need to use wireless radio w ave transmission.
Such a central NAP structure could become a reality as early as this Summer
and almost certainly within a year. I recommend that we stay in close
communication with O.U. CNS on this concept and strongly consider it as the
basis of our County network.
We also discussed how the cabling and switches could be configured in the
County Courthouse and Annex Buildings. CNS is willing to advise us on this
and I recommend that we accept their offer of help. Perhaps we could ask
CNS to advise us on a stag ed implementation plan that could be
accomplished as funding is available.
One thing we should do soon, is to determine how many computers in each
office that will need to be connected to the network. A second question to
ask each office is how many computer connections will they need ten years
from now. We should plan ou r switches larger rather than smaller to allow
for growth. Communications technology, once it is understood and
experienced is needed by almost everyone.
I met with the County Data Board regarding our network strategy. The Data
Board appointed a network sub-committee, and authorized me to request
assistance from CNS, in designing our County network. I contacted Tom Reid
at CNS and he agreed to assist us.
The Network Sub-committee met with Tom Reid and CNS staff to seek advice
and cooperation in establishing a County network:
The first step will be to gather together a map of all County building
locations and the number of people working in each building. We will
have this information together early next week and transmit it to Tom
Reid, who will then give us a first cut estimate for how much it will
cost to network each building.
Tom explained the University's plan for a centrally located Network
Access Point (NAP) which would serve all partners equally, allowing for
an Intra-net among our direct network participants as well as efficient
Inter-net networking.
Lenny Eliason brought up the subject of using space at 13 West Washington
as a place for the NAP as well as to house our eventual GIS operation.
This idea seemed to be well received by all.
ILGARD has completed Dover, Ames, and Bern Townships. Work is progressing
on Rome and Waterloo Townships. We have five students who will be working
full time this summer on our project.
Our GIS Steering Committee met:
We discussed the need for an ArcView Users Group. The suggestion was
made to make it a GIS users group and include the GIS portion of our
AutoCAD Users Group, Map Info (since the Health Department uses it), and
Arc View. We will discuss the subject again at the next Steering
committee meeting.
Bob Eichenberg introduced Dennis Brown, a college intern working with Bob
on GIS. They have ArcView up and running, and have data layers of soils,
topo, Road centerlines, and political boundaries. They are anticipating
being ready to offer maps pub lically by the end of this Summer. With
ILGARD, they have formed a farmland study committee. The Auditor's
Office will have a member on the committee also to help coordinate the
CAUV (Current Agricultural Use Valuation) program. Bob is interested i n
participating in the pilot project to be developed by ILGARD as discussed
above.
Dave Lovett is interested in having the CAUV program as a GIS
application. Once he receives a computer, he will order a copy of
ArcView. We may then overlay soils onto parcel data to evaluate the type
of soil on each farm. This will also be a part of the pilot project
noted above. Dave is hiring two students for the summer to assist ken in
catching up the backlog of splits.
Ron Lucus is working on a fire response GIS application, which will
enable response times to be analyzed and used to locate any potential new
fire station locations. He is developing an "image catalog" which will
organize all the City's orthophotos into a City-wide map which can be use
to locate a certain area, and then by a simple mouse click, pull up the
correct orthophoto for that area. He has been working on FEMA maps and
several other City Department's projects.
Howard Fokes has a student to work on some Facilities Management projects
this summer. Work continues with the flood plain mapping, and utility
map scanning projects.
John Branner reported that he has upgraded his computer to a Pentium III
500 MHz, and is using the Autodesk Civil Software to analyze watershed
production and to then appropriately size culverts, bridges, and
retention ponds.
Our next GIS Steering Committee meeting will be July 15, 1999 at 10:00 a.m.
in the O.U. Facilities Management conference room.
I will make a GIS progress report presentation to the Elected Officials
Luncheon to be held on June 23, 1999.
Thank you for allowing me to coordinate this important aspect of Athens
County's future, and for your usual cooperation.
Archie Stanley
GIS Coordinator