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Geographic Information System Dynamics within Lasting Forests

Staff of Lasting Forests has been active in developing and using geographic informations systems before the process and facilities became known by that phrase or its acronym of GIS.

Primary uses will be within The Trevey and the thrust of work will be to produce unusual, highly useful products for a profit. Data are expensive; hardware declines in price, and the important issues still lie (and will do so for the future) in very practical maps. We see these as pictures of the results of the mental processes of experts. We sell these maps for use on the land.

Some of the maps are beautiful and deserve treatment (and sale) as an art form. Others show the parts of decisions and are needed by decision makers as a type of decision aid or support.

Elevations have over 20 different uses and many maps can be made from observations of the land stored in a square grid matrix (the UTM coordinates) called a digital elevation model (DEM). Whether each of the following is a new map or a simple transformation of a single data set can be debated. We propose any use that seems to bear on improving a decision. A simple two-factor map can be created such a greater than 3000 feet elevation and less than that amount. It may be shown as one map. There may be the need for two maps (perhaps to use with other data. We propose to develop ease with boolean comparators (e.g., greater than x and less than y or less than q.) Three dimensional land surface appearance can be meaningful, especially as new staff become acquainted with an area.

Other GIS layers to be developed are:

1. Slope
2. Aspect
3. Solar radiation
4. Monthly temperatures (mean, max, and minimum)
5. Precipitation (Other than snow)
6. Fog drip
7. Snow
8. Evaporation
9. Moisture ratio
10. Evapotranspiration
11. Runoff
12. Precipitation
13. Growing season length (with start and end dates)
14. Ground water surface
15. Surface water channels
16. Soil depth
17. Soil type
18. Slope (% and angle in degrees)
19. Aspect Type 1
20. Aspect Type 2
21. Flatland
22. Probable depth to bedrock
23. Groundwater (depth, detectable nitrogen, pH)
24. Well locations
25. Campsite locations
26. Trails
27. Trailheads
28. Land cover
29. Boundaries
30. Public-ownership lands
31. Species specific maps, probability of occurrence

Other plans are for sale of select GIS software. The primary work will be in sales of products such as those lested above. The Trevey products may consume all of the axtivities of the group but others may include:

• a state-wide corridor siting system to serve citizen groups
• a special package of services for realtors
• substantial work for The Fishery
• services directed at the leagal profession and court-room presentations
• a set of products and services for gardeners
• a series of services for TV stations.

In October, 1980, Giles used the following notes in a Virginia tech lecture:

Geobased Information Systems for Health Systems Planning in Virginia

Abstract:

A lecture on the role of computerized goegraphic data systems in comprehensive city, county, and regional planning, particularly health components of such plans. The infromation or input component of a general systems theory is emphasized. An existing system is shown and its potential role in a Commonwealth Data Base (CDB then being proposed) discussed. Potential uses, with examples, are shown.

Introduction:

1. Comprehensive plans (potential components)
2. Denial of previous land-use emphasis and focus on a plan for a total system.
3. The difficulty of goal-setting for large social systems
4. The potential of one or more health parameters or indices as perforrr2ncc measures for goal-achievement
   • Computed resident group life expectancy
   • An increase in a weighted set of about 50 health dimensions per unit cost
5. People as the synthesizers, over time, of their sociological, economic, and ecological milieu
6. The need for governmental or group action, to move the system down a desired course (where people set the destination and thus course, cost-effective of time, risks, energy, money, and available human and spatial resources.)
7. The guidance mission, the managerial role is to so understand and manipulate the factors of the environment that the course can be predicted and modified, either to shape trends or respond to new events. The quest: health system cybernetics.

The Environmental Factors:

• Classic: Marsh and wetland "vapours"; the insect vector of disease
• Trauma: proximity to hospitals and treatment
• Heavy metals: the zone of influence beside roads
• Contaminated areas: pesticides in alfalfa grown on orchard lands and soybeans grown on cotton lands
• Epidemic spreads: foci and areas of involvement
• Bone weakness: soil-nutrient relations
• Radiation: cumulative whole body radioactivity dose
• Occupational zones: populations at risk related to radiation, asbestos, brown lung, black lung
• Autopollution
• Airpollution: crowding stress interactions ... and others.

(page 2 missing)

Uses and Applications

• Regression analyses of cancer and related phenomena (factoring out personal versus contnunlty control phenomena)
• Displays of home of all entrants to a trep1~ment center over time (a zone of influence display)
• Determination of gaps and justification for efforts directed at the people unserved by present systems
• Sub-region specific cost-computations of care delivery as a function of local characteristics of the population and distance, road, gasolln3, cost, and stressors for each type of disease (weighted by risk level, recovery probability, and perceived social Importance.)
• Isolation of areas where genetic medicine is appropriately applied.
• Isolation of areas for targeted educational and behavioral modiflcatloi programs
• Improved allocation of funds based on geographic needs (gasoline, roads, disease incidence, available resources, needed resources, not on a regional basis, per Se, but on a disease or problem or population basis.
• Correlations of energy (e.g. solar maps) with life expectancy; of radiation levels with infant mortality; of cancer with technology zones.

The Need: