Rhode Island Army National Guard

Overview:

The University of Rhode Island’s Environmental Data Center and the Rhode Island Army National Guard (RIARNG) began a GIS partnership in 2002. The broad goal of partnership is to aid and enhance the RIARNG’s current and future training needs while ensuring environmentally sustainable training areas. RIARNG manages and owns 18 installation properties, covering a total of 200 hectares (ha) including Camp Fogarty and Camp Varnum which are the major training centers. The RIARNG also utilizes the 300,000 ha of open space available in RI for training operations. To meet the partnership’s goals, environmental data layers have been collected and developed in conjunction with RIARNG Environmental Office, the Integrated Training Area Management (ITAM) coordinator and the Training Division. Many of these data have been collected from the RIGIS state repository of GIS data. Detailed, installation-specific data have been collected using GPS including: boundaries, fence lines, roads, utilities and buildings.

As data are created and collected it is converted into the Spatial Data Standard for Facilities, Infrastructure and Environment (SDSFIE), a graphic and non-graphic standard for GIS at government organizations, created by the US Army Corps of Engineers. SDSFIE provides a standardized grouping of geographically referenced features depicted graphically on a map at their real-world location. Each geospatial feature has an “attached” attribute tables containing pertinent data about the geospatial data. These standards are being developed so GIS and CADD users within the CADD/GIS community can easily transfer and communicate data and information.

Overview of Current Projects:

The Army National Guard’s Environmental Management System (EMS) Policy Statement for RIARNG states “The RIARNG is committed to environmental steward at all training areas, facilities and land used by RIARNG units. A sustainable training environment is critical to our continued utilization of these resources.” To support sustainable management the Rhode Island Natural History Survey (RINHS) conducted field work for the inventory of invasive vascular plant species at Camp Fogarty. Spatial analyses were run to see if there was a spatial pattern of the invasive species and what variables that determine that pattern.

In addition, the Public Archaeological Laboratory (PAL) was hired by the RIARNG to complete archaeological investigations of Camp Fogarty and Camp Varnum, The Ottery Group was hired to perform a Phase II archaeological investigation at Camp Varnum. The goal of these archaeological survey’s was to locate and identify any potentially significant Native American and/or historic period cultural resources that could be impacted by future post development and construction. The data was received at the EDC, organized, converted to SDSFIE and added to the RIARNG SDE Enterprise Geodatabase, with related tables. Several analyses were run on this data.

Links:

www.riguard.com
www.sdsfie.org
www.uri.edu/ce/rinhs/index.htm