Florida S Wetland Webgis and Geo-Database

Florida’s Wetland WebGIS and Geo-Database

S. Grunwald, K.R. Reddy, V. Mathiyalagan, and S. Bloom Soil and Water Science Department, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL

Introduction Emerging geographic information technology enables us to integrate geospatial data of land and water resources derived from a variety of sources and to facilitate universal data sharing across the Internet. Sharing of information and spatial data with other users is outlined in the National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) (Clinton, 1994), a concept defined as the technologies, policies, and people necessary to promote sharing of geospatial data throughout all levels of government, the private and nonprofit sectors, and the academic community.

Burrough (1986) defines a geographic information system (GIS) as a powerful set of tools for collecting, storing, retrieving, transforming, and displaying spatial data from the real world. WebGIS provides interactive GIS functionality delivered to end-users via the Internet and it has the potential to make distributed geographic information available to a worldwide audience (Cobb and Olivero, 1997; Green and Bossomaier, 2002). Users can access the geospatial information and data via web- browsers without purchasing expensive, proprietary GIS software. Data and map services can be implemented using WebGIS. Data services provide interactive capabilities to retrieve spatial data and information from the Internet to local machines. For example, the Florida Geographic Data Library (FGDL) (http://www.fgdl.org/) provides a repository of spatial data for Florida to clients using the data service concept. In contrast, map services are constrained to online use and no data or information can be retrieved to local client machines. For example, the web site “Surf Your Watershed” developed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency provides map services to clients (http://cfpub1.epa.gov/surf/). An example of an interactive WebGIS site providing map services is the Florida Seminole County Watershed Atlas web site (http://www.seminole.wateratlas.usf.edu/help/aboutcontent.asp). The Southern California Wetlands Recovery Project Information Station (http://eureka.regis.berkeley.edu/wrpinfo/) and the Clinch River Environmental Restoration Program (CRERP) (http://research.esd.ornl.gov/CRERP/SUB/INDEX.HTM) web sites allow users to interactively explore all data and information related to specific wetland and river restoration projects. Our objective was to develop an interactive web-based tool to integrate and visualize geospatial data and information for Florida’s wetlands providing map and data services to users. Methodology We standardized and integrated 2130 geo-referenced point observations of 78 different soil physical, chemical, and biological attributes collected in Florida’s wetlands from 1987 to the present. These datasets were collected by scientists and staff of the Wetland Biogeochemistry Laboratory, Soil and Water Science Department, University of Florida and provide a valuable resource documenting historic and present environmental quality in Florida’s wetlands. A WebGIS tool was created using ArcIMS software (ESRI Inc., Redlands, CA) to augment point observations with other GIS layers such as soils, geology, land use, and county boundaries providing query, selection, and navigation functions to users. Our server-side implementation allows clients to submit requests for data and map services to a Web server. The server processes the requests and returns data or a map to the remote clients’ web-browser. A schema for metadata description was developed according standards outlined by the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC-STD-001-1998 at http://www.fgdc.gov/metadata/metadata.html).

A graphical interface was developed using VBScript to provide data services to users. They can run SQL-based queries and select specific data records using one or all of the following constraints: (i) geographic location, (ii) projection, (iii) time period, (iv) depth of sample, (v) vegetation type, and (vi) soil property. The selected data can be downloaded to local machines.

Results from a geostatistical analysis were made accessible using one of the provided datasets. The analysis was conducted using ArcGIS Geostatistical Analyst. The quantitative spatial analyses were used to describe the spatial patterns of phosphorus. Different geostatistical techniques were employed to provide a better understanding of the spatial distribution and variability of soil quality parameters in the Everglades ecosystem.

Results and Discussion Our global learning environment for Florida’s wetlands is accessible at http://GISWetlands.ifas.ufl.edu (recommended web browser: Internet Explorer) (Fig. 1). Users without GIS knowledge can intuitively explore the data. GIS maps can visually enhance the spatial and temporal understanding of phenomena and improve our interpretation of soil-landscapes and wetland ecosystems. Geo-data can be downloaded to client machines and augmented with other environmental datasets to document the ongoing restoration efforts in the Greater Everglades ecosystem.

Fig. 1. Florida’s Wetland WebGIS - URL: GISWetlands.ifas.ufl.edu.

Sabine Grunwald, Soil and Water Science Department, University of Florida, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, 2169 McCarty Hall, PO Box 110290, Gainesville, FL 32611-0290, Phone: 352-392-4508, Fax: 352-392-3902, Email: [email protected]

Acknowledgement We would like to acknowledge the contribution of R.E. Jessup for his support with the ARC IMS based WebGIS implementation. The data integrated in the geo-database were derived from several research projects conducted by graduate students, staff and faculty of the Wetland Biogeochemsitry Laboratory, Soil and Water Science Department, University of Florida-IFAS.

References Burrough P.A., 1986. Principles of Geographical Information Systems for Land Resources Assessment. Oxford University Press, Oxford. Clinton W.J. 1994. Executive Order 12906 – edition of the Federal Register, 59(71): 17671-17674. Available at: http://www.fgdc.gov/nsdi/nsdi.html. Cobb D.A. and A. Olivero. 1997. Online GIS services. J. of Academic Librarianship. 23(6): 484-507. Green D. and T. Bossomaier 2002. Online GIS and spatial metadata. New York, Taylor & Francis.