Massachusetts Institute of Technology Department of Urban Studies and Planning 11 520 A Workshop on Geographic Information Systems 11 188 Urban Planning and Social Science Laboratory Lecture One Overview of Course GIS Principles Elements of Maps ArcGIS Basics 1 Overview of Course Syllabus Lectures Labs Homeworks Project Other GIS courses 11 204 11 220 11 521 IAP miniclasses Harvard BU Student background 2 GIS Principles 2 1 Geographic information is information about places spatial dimension 80 of all information include spatial component how should one embed location in data knowledge about both where something is and what it is with query capability in both directions geographic resolution o very detailed information about the locations of all buildings in a city information about individual trees in a forest o very coarse climate of a large region population density of an entire country characteristics o often relatively static e g GPS coordinates of fixed features natural features and many features of human origin don t change rapidly static information is easier to portray on a static paper map o can be very voluminous 12 a terabyte 10 bytes of data is sent from a single satellite in one day 9 gigabytes gigabyte 10 bytes of data are needed to describe the US street network Abstraction Geometrical Representation Model the boundaries of spatial objects vector data models Point a single location is enough MBTA Stops Is Boston a point At different scales or for different purposes Boston could be a point or polygon Line only one dimension needs to be represented Street centerline MBTA Railroad track ridgeline bux route How does it matter if street is modeled as centerline or as void between blocks Polygon 2D planar surfaces Cambridge border endif central square boundary census tract parcel What about river boundary edge of ocean at high tide Beyond planar surfaces terrain models 3D CAD models Model the space that contains things raster data models 30m x 30m grid cells for Landsat image classified based on predominate land use within each cell 6 inch pixels for color orthophotos developed from aerial photography 3 km x 3km x 1 km height volumes for meterological modeling 2 2 Five examples to view and discuss which are GIS what to learn how to add your own data analyses Private sector mapping services o Mapquest or Google Maps to find a location and generate a street map www mapquest com maps google com o Google Earth and Keyhole Digital Earth etc to navigate and fly over the earth earth google com Spatial analysis using commercial GIS software o ArcGIS to analyze the demographics and economic development potential of Appalachia we ll use ArcGIS Web services using open source LAMP tools o commute sheds and labor sheds for a community database driven web pages ia servers running Linux apache mysql postgresql minn mapserver php Mapping Metro Boston Growth http subway mit edu umi ctpp o location based services tracking WiFi usage on campus iSpots Wireless Technology at MIT http ispots mit edu 2 3 Geographic information systems 2 3 1 Definition GIS is a computer based information system that enables capture modeling manipulation retrieval analysis and presentation of geographically referenced data Worboys 1997 Other definitions of GIS A container of maps in digital form A computerized tool for solving geographic problems A spatial decision support system A tool for revealing what is otherwise invisible in geographic information A tool for automatically performing operations on geographic data 2 3 2 Components of GIS Hardware Software Data People Procedure Network Internet GIS hardware is like any other computer nothing special about the hardware o keyboard display monitor screen cables Internet connection o with some extra components perhaps large monitor disk drive RAM maps come on big bits of paper need specially big printers and plotters to make map output from GIS need specially big devices digitizers scanners to scan and input data from maps to GIS software o o o o ESRI http www esri com Intergraph Corporation http www intergraph com Autodesk http www autodesk com Caliper GIS Software Mapping Software http www caliper com what is important is the kind of information that s stored and analyzed representing and managing information about what is where the contents of maps and images o special functions that work on geographic information functions to display on the screen edit change transform measure distances areas proximity adjacency combine maps of the same area together o useful functions can be much more sophisticated keep inventories of what is where manage properties facilities judge the suitability of areas for different purposes help users make decisions about places to plan make predictions about the future o 2 3 3 Example GIS Applications Resources inventory what is available at where Network Analysis How to get to a place in the shortest amount of time Location Analysis Where is the best place to locate a shopping mall Terrain Analysis What is the danger zone for a natural disaster Visibility analysis Spatio Temporal Analysis Land use what has changed over the last twenty years and why Transportation applications a state department of transportation needs to o store information on the state of pavement everywhere on the state highway network o maintain an inventory of all highway signs o analyze data on accidents look for black spots a traveling salesperson needs o a system in the car for finding locations routes a delivery company e g Federal Express UPS needs to o keep track of shipments know where they are o plan efficient delivery routes a school bus operator needs to o plan efficient collection routes a transit authority needs to o know where transit vehicles are at all times studies have shown substantial savings when routes and schedules are managed using GIS Public Policy applications Education Health and Safety Public Service Land Use and Transportation interactions Term Project Example Measuring Diversity of Land Use Pattern and its Relation to Transportation Mode Choice 2 3 4 Systems science and studies what does it mean to be doing GIS using the tools of Geographic Information Systems to solve a problem o such as those in the previous examples o a GIS project might have the following stages 1 define the problem 2 acquire the software and the hardware 3 acquire the data 4 clean the database 5 perform the analysis 6 interpret and present the results data