Major projects recently undertaken at the EDC include modeling and mapping Critical lands for conservation, landfill siting, coastal and freshwater wetland restoration assessment, shoreline change analysis, biodiversity mapping, natural hazards risk modeling, Lyme Disease risk assessment, wildlife management, landscape characterization, and environmental monitoring of near-coastal environments.
The EDC specializes
in designing and serving static and interactive GIS maps over the Internet. The RI Atlas is a series of 7 natural and cultural resource maps produced for each city and town within the state. The Coastal Eelgrass Habitats project provides the public an interactive mapping experience utilizing cutting edge technology. Along with serving the RIGIS database the EDC serves RI Statewide 1:12,000 digital orthophotography through a web-accessible browser developed in cooperation with MIT and EPA. The Center has built capacity to host web-based interactive mapping and is active in developing several applications of this technology.
In partnership with RI Cooperative Extension, the EDC offers introductory and advanced hands-on ESRI Certified
GIS training.The EDC serves as the National Park Service's (NPS) Regional Technical Support Center for GIS in the Northeast Region of the United States. The EDC also provides GIS application support to the NPS Inventory and Monitoring Program.
The EDC provides technical GIS application support to the Cooperative Extension Source Water Assessment Project which focuses on land use and best management practices in water supply watersheds. In addition, the EDC is in tegrating web services for the National and New England Regional Water Quality Programs.
The EDC is working with the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency to produce hardcopy maps for the statewide Hazard Mitigation Plan being developed for cities and towns in RI. Working with the State Hazard Mitigation Officer, two draft base maps are designed and produced by the EDC from federal, state, and municipal source data. Each map reviewed by RIEMA and the municipality for accuracy and completeness and then changes are incorporated by the EDC.
Since 1991, the EDC has operated a Global Positioning System Base Station. Mapping grade (2-5m accuracy) reference data from this station have been available free of charge first through a dial-in bulletin board and then through a WWW interface starting in 1995. In July of 2001 the system was replaced with a high-order Trimble 4700 reference station which supports precise (mm accuracy) survey as well as traditional mapping applications.
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