Edu Data Package North Carolina

This page is an ideas collection for a new educational/training data set. We want to create a new data set similar to the GRASS Spearfish dataset. This page is being worked on by Helena Mitasova and Markus Neteler.

NC related Data Sources

 * Check all possible data layers and status of mapping here: http://nc.gisinventory.net/
 * Most data can be obtained through the USGS National map: http://nationalmap.gov/ (click on viewer)
 * The above viewer links to USGS seamless data server: http://seamless.usgs.gov/
 * as well as to the NC One map http://gisdata.usgs.net/website/NC_OneMap/viewer.asp
 * NC One map data (in SP meter) can also be dowloaded from ftp site from here http://www.nconemap.com/data.html
 * Wake county data (in SP feet!) are here http://lnweb02.co.wake.nc.us/gis/gismaps.nsf/WebGlobals%21OpenView&ViewCat=shp
 * General list: Geodata Packaging Working_Group


 * Additional, specialized data can be obtained here:
 * Imagery:http://glcfapp.umiacs.umd.edu:8080/esdi/index.jsp
 * Coastal lidar: http://www.csc.noaa.gov/crs/tcm/about_ldart.html
 * Flood maps:http://www.ncfloodmaps.com/default_swf.asp
 * Real-time streamflow data (these should be available through the national map too): http://water.usgs.gov/waterwatch/
 * Climate data: http://www.nc-climate.ncsu.edu/cronos/map.php
 * USDA should have the soil data or http://www.ncgc.nrcs.usda.gov/products/datasets/ssurgo/
 * County data (parcels, building footprints, etc.) can be viewed here: http://imaps.co.wake.nc.us/imaps/main.htm?msize=525 (no downloading - that should be handled by the National map?)


 * Additional links are here: http://skagit.meas.ncsu.edu/~helena/classwork/hon297webgis.html (sorry some are obsolete)

Proposed new data set North Carolina
Area in and around Wake county (eastern section of the Triangle) has public data for all basic data layers that were in Spearfish and there is an easy access to USGS data, local county data, EPA, State Climate Office, NCFlood maps and others through the above listed web sites. There is a big enough city, but also some rural areas that still have some agriculture with rolling topography. SE of it is Johnston county that has FOSS-based county GIS, running mapserver and PostGIS on-line.

Suggested region (15km x 13.5km city + rural) in stp[m]: in lat/long
 * north: 228500 south: 215000 west: 630000 east: 645000
 * nsres: 30 ewres: 30 rows: 450 cols: 500
 * long: -78.77428134 lat: 35.80960938 (north/west corner)
 * long: -78.60830318 lat: 35.80918894 (north/east corner)
 * long: -78.60889171 lat: 35.68750730 (south/east corner)
 * long: -78.77462049 lat: 35.68792712 (south/west corner)

previous suggestion (larger region - that would be too much data)
 * LL(SW) corner: -78.7854 (78:47:06), 35.5897 (35:35:23)
 * UR(NE) corner: -78.4466 (78:26:46), 35.8689 (35:52:08)

For DEFAULT region we use entire NC (slightly beyond) to accomodate various subregions for thematic data sets (e.g. coast, mountains, urban)
 * LL(SW) corner: -85.0000, 33.0000
 * UR(NE) corner: -75.0000, 37.0000

Coordinate systems:
 * Geographic Coordinate System in decimal degrees WGS84 horizontal datum (close to NAD83 but there are submeter differences). This is EPSG:4326 SRS/CRS that all the OGC compliant software tends to use
 * NC State Plane Coordinate System, NAD 83 datum, units of meters: EPSG 3358
 * lot of local data and NCFlood mapping lidar come in US Survey feet (new EPSG 3404, the old wrong 3359 is deprecated)
 * xy for scanned historical maps and other non-georeferenced data

In addition to GRASS databases, the data will be provided in their original formats (shapes files, Arcgrid, tiff/tfw, etc.) and links to sites where the data can be downloaded will be provided too.

We suggest to package the data set in thematic sets (aka GRASS Mapsets concept).

The preliminary GRASS LOCATION and external data can be downloaded from here
(this is just a preview, don't use yet, it will be further cleaned up and tested, see README.txt for data description) 

The below list needs to be further organized into thematic sets, Ramona GIS inventory terminology http://nc.gisinventory.net/ is used in the updated sections

Status: Framework data layers (minimum needed to replace Spearfish) - put into PERMANENT

 * elevation: done for 30m and 10m lidar-based NED, 3m lidar raster and points for rural subarea (Lake Wheeler farm LW)
 * landcover: LU 1992, 1996, needs labels (see category.txt)
 * orthoimagery: 2 tiles for LW

all other rasters can be derived from elevation and vector data: put them into dedicated mapsets (this makes packaging in pieces easier - like data plugins)


 * derived from DEM:
 * slope, aspect
 * contributing area, stream network
 * erosion


 * derived from vector data
 * geodetic points (to replace bugsites)
 * fields (replace by parcels?), soils, geology (done, needs labels), landuse
 * rairoads, roads
 * hydrography (note Ramona does not use terms streams, lakes, rivers, should we?)

Additional data that can go into the basic/general data set

 * Original data:
 * elevation (NC One map USGS NED, lidar based)
 * landuse/landcover (NC One map EPA 1998, check for newer)
 * aerial images (raw stereo pair + orthophotos)
 * raw geocoded satellite data, derived vegetation indices and land surface temperatures
 * raw SRTM V2
 * DRG topo sheets
 * Historical maps, e.g. Schools situation North Carolina 1871 to 1876
 * HydroSHEDS data (check if resolution is high enough) URL, but only non-commercial use
 * Derived data (from vector maps, maybe not needed? - this should go into specialized packages - e.eg. terrain analysis, image processing):
 * DEM from Lidar vector points
 * complete set of topographic parameters (slope, aspect, different types of curvature)
 * streams from DEM
 * landforms
 * derived satellite indices
 * hydrologically conditioned SRTM V2

Status: Framework data layers (minimum needed to replace Spearfish) - put into PERMANENT

 * point data:
 * schools (to replace bugsites and archsites): done
 * climate stations
 * geodetic control points: done
 * bridges: done
 * geographic place names
 * line data
 * hydrography (streams)
 * roads,
 * railroads: done
 * contours
 * polygon data
 * boundaries: cities, counties: done
 * zip codes
 * parcels (to replace fields)
 * soils: done
 * building footprints

Additional data for general and specialized data sets

 * needs cleanup, can be nicely organized using Ramona GIS inventory that also shows which data layers are available for our area
 * Lidar point clouds for DSM/DEM
 * climate stations: temp., precip., frost, wind, cloud cover, ... (from State Climatology Office)
 * Air quality data (EPA EMPACT)
 * human and animal diseases incident data
 * wildlife data
 * hydrology:
 * watershed boundaries (EDNA, HUC)
 * real-time water data (streams and lakes) (WaterWatch)
 * groundwater data (NC Division of Water Resources)
 * water quality per watershed (EPA Surf Your Watershed)
 * flood data (NC digital flood maps)
 * placenames (gazetteer data) (US Gazetteer)
 * pollution and contamination data
 * results of elections
 * soils (Wake County Soil data)
 * line data:
 * railroads
 * roads (TIGER and simplified)
 * streams
 * area data:
 * countyboundaries
 * geology
 * landowners (should cover owners, fields)
 * landuse/landcover
 * parcels (land owners, fields)
 * quadrangles
 * soils
 * urban areas
 * US Census 2000 maps
 * voting districts
 * zoning districts
 * ZIP codes

Packaging issues

 * convert feet to meters if needed
 * File Naming convention
 * Metadata management (most data include standard FGDC metadata), where to store them in GRASS?
 * provide in common GIS formats as well as GRASS location

... see Geodata Packaging Working_Group.

Additional proposed themes for data sets

 * 1) Coast
 * 2) Urban
 * 3) Atmospheric 3D
 * 4) Hydrology and earth surface processes
 * 5) Vegetation, land use (image processing, multitemporal)
 * 6) Note, for example, the NCOne hydrography, has the old USGS streams but also the high resolution streams derived from the lidar data using the methodology developed for EDNA, so one can nicely demonstrate how the small scale (in cartographic sense) national data are inaccurate when one would try to use it a local scale (also how you would damage your DEM if you would have tried to use them for stream enforcement).