Government Computer News
Maps: the new application interface
Agencies are adding GIS layers to existing programs to improve access to information
Patrick Air Force Base has put itself on the map, and not just metaphorically. The home to NASA’s John F. Kennedy Space Center on Cape Canaveral, Fla., is using geographic information systems to give its personnel fast access to information in an easy-to-use, familiar interface: a map.
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And Patrick isn’t alone. More agencies are finding that GIS can provide a front-end interface to information and applications they already have in place.
Web-based map apps let agencies bring together materials stored in disparate locations, applications and file formats, thereby breaking down data silos and creating central clearinghouses. Which in turn enables them to shave days off requests for information, save on staffing costs and respond more rapidly in emergencies.
Mapping mash-ups
In April 2004, Patrick AFB decided it was time to go digital. So it asked Autodesk Inc. of San Rafael, Calif., to help take 70 years’ worth of drawings, photographs, schematics and other paper-based documents and make them accessible via their browsers, said Mike Gilley, geobase manager for the base. The result: the Base Visualization Tool, which uses a 2-D map of the base as the door to terabytes of information.
Using the BVT, Gilley can see every one of the 595 buildings on Patrick’s 2,200 acres. With a few mouse clicks, he can view everything from aerial photographs and road maps to floor plans and schematics and see which buildings are considered critical facilities. So can any other base personnel who log into the system.
Gilley estimates that using the BVT will cut visits to the base’s GIS Office by 75 percent, as well as reduce off the time required to fill each request. Now, when base personnel need schematics or floor plans for a particular building, they can log into the BVT and fetch them in minutes.
But the BVT was only the beginning of Patrick’s GIS plans. The AFB recently rolled out two more map-based applications that use the same underlying data in different ways. Its Facilities Infrastructure Assessment Tool enables base personnel to quickly assess and collate damage reports after a storm or other cataclysmic event. Using FIAT allows the base to meet new requirements to report damage within 48 hours of the event.
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