Mapping technology

New geographic information software will allow students and departments to gather spatial data more efficiently about things like land and population.

Portland State has begun using the Economic and Social Research Institute’s ArcGIS Server. PSU already runs the ArcGIS software, which is a Geographic Information System that uses data development and management, spatial analysis and modeling, and map design and production, according to the PSU Web site.

“GIS is a platform for learning. It can be used in any department and provides a new way of thinking and understanding because it not only allows us to analyze data in the context of location, but also provides a wealth of tools that help students learn through modeling their knowledge. The implementation of the ArcGIS Server at PSU will give students and their professors a unique opportunity for cross-disciplinary research and study,” Toni Fisher, ESRI higher education manager, wrote on the ESRI Web site.

 The institute formed in 1969 and is a privately owned firm that deals with land-use analysis projects. In 1980 the firm began research into developing an application that could run on computers and would take information about the environment and turn it into a set of tools that could be used to analyze and retrieve data. This technology became the GIS technology that PSU, the military and other private and public entities use to format spatial information about the world.

The implementation of an ArcGIS Server would mean that PSU would have greater access to information, which would be more readily available to students, faculty and staff.

One user at PSU is the Population Research Center located in the Nohad A. Toulan School of Urban Studies and Planning in the College of Urban and Public Affairs. This center uses the ArcGIS programs and servers to work in partnership on a state and federal level to analyze and collect data.

The GIS program also works to collect data for the Oregon State Data Center and for the Oregon Population Estimates Program. At the SDC, PSU helps collect data about the population for the U.S. Census Bureau, which provides information on the demographic, economic, social and spatial populations of the state.

Through the ArcGIS server, PSU will be able to allow this information to be more easily obtained by public and state agencies. With the Oregon Population Estimates Program, the PRC creates annual population estimates for Oregon’s cities, counties and other demographics.

 Geographic information and spatial analysis for population research is said to be the “backbone” of GIS research at the PRC. The GISAPR focuses its research on public health, crime prevention, market area analysis and water resource management.