Civic leaders in Columbus, Ohio like to say their city ranks with the likes of Washington, D.C. and Moscow as a global information center. With information powerhouses such as Battelle, CompuServe and The Ohio State University as neighbors, the claim has considerable merit to it.
      Now, Columbus officials have chosen a geographic information system as a critical element in establishing the city government as an information technology hub for economic development. The GIS that will be built over the next several years is but one of Mayor Gregory S. Lashutka's strategic city-wide initiatives, which include expanding economic opportunities, improving and enhancing city government's efficiency and effectiveness and providing a "market-driven" community service.
      Plans call for the city's GIS to go beyond traditional mapping and engineering functions and reach into code enforcement, development, emergency response and management, financial management, fire protection, health management, infrastructure and facility management, land use management, police protection, public administration, public safety, recreation and parks management, roads and streets management and utilities management. The scope of the project is ambitious and holds the promise of changing the way Ohio's capitol city-not to mention the state's most populous (with some 640,000 residents) and largest geographically covering nearly 200 square miles-does business.
      "This electronic tool will change the way that city government identifies and responds to neighborhood needs," Mayor Lashutka said in announcing the project last April. Under the system, information will be available instantly to city departments and the community via a high-tech fiber optic network. Better decisions can be made and work can begin in a fraction of the time normally required to initiate and complete city projects that involve several departments. In addition, city officials will be able to use the graphic capabilities of the GIS to show citizens specific improvements that are planned or have been completed in their neighborhoods. Higher staff productivity, increased quality and better access to city information are also expected to result from this GIS.
      The idea of a city such as Columbus acting as an information provider is a revolutionary concept. So is the city's decision to build a GIS that extends across all city departments. To help the city achieve its ambitious goals, Columbus officials selected UGC Consulting of Englewood, Colo. to lead a project team in implementing the system. Other project team partners include ERM Technologies and BBS Corporation of Columbus, and Resource International of Westerville, Ohio.
      The project reflects Columbus officials' proactive approach to establishing their city as a central source of information about development and economic issues. And while revenues and staff time continue to be regarded as precious and scarce resources, Columbus officials are counting on the ability of the GIS not only to meet the existing demand for services, but expand the city's role as an information provider.
      In Bloomington, Ind. and Riverside, Calif. are two other communities that are typical of a growing number of local governments whose officials have chosen GIS to help them save money and operate more efficiently.
      Indeed, GIS is emerging as a principal tool used to enhance the delivery of local government services, including water and wastewater. The reason for their widespread use is straightforward: GIS technology has proven to be highly useful in managing spatial information about municipal facilities, their relationship to residents, the services these facilities carry, and the land environments in which they operate.
      "From the beginning, we have been selling GIS as the greatest invention in the world," said Scott Dompke, City Utilities Engineer for the City of Bloomington Utilities. "People are now beginning to think in terms of GIS and how they can use it to do their jobs faster and more efficiently."
      For Riverside officials, "our problems related to managing geographic records, but our real need was to get those records into a system that would allow us to deliver basic city services more efficiently," said Pat Hohl, senior engineer with the Public Utilities Department Electrical Division.

The Heart of a GIS
Cities such as Columbus, Bloomington and Riverside share at least one thing in common with public utilities and rail and road systems: each has a large number of facilities at "X" and "Y" locations. These facilities-and their coordinates-have been mapped for more than a century. The mapped records, maintained primarily on paper, vellum or microfilm, have always been bulky, are easily disorganized, prove time-consuming to find and often are difficult to coordinate. More importantly, as an increasing number of city and county governments-including those in Columbus, Riverside and Bloomington-have learned, paper-based systems simply cannot meet the time and "what if" scenarios necessary for decision making.

A Shared Geographic Tool
Bloomington is a community of 60,000 some 40 miles south of Indianapolis. City officials began looking at GIS as they anticipated updating topological maps dating from the mid 1970s. They recognized that Bloomington had grown substantially since the maps were created, and began exploring what new technologies-specifically GIS-could offer. Their goal was to develop a system to provide an automated approach to the day-to-day business of more effectively managing the city's water, sewer and street infrastructures.
      A feasibility study done by UGC Consulting found that the city sustained costs exceeding $350,000 annually in using mapped and related geographic records. The study further showed that GIS could save about 25 percent of those costs over the 15-year project period.
      The task of implementing the GIS in Bloomington included capturing planimetric data for some 160 miles of streets, 2,000 fire hydrants, 6,500 manholes, 20,000 or more building footprints with address information, 17 miles of active railroad tracks, and 23 miles of rivers, streams and other water bodies. Other data that was captured included 290 miles of water mains, 230 miles of sanitary sewers, storm sewers, easements, two wastewater and two water treatment plants, 29 lift stations, six water storage tanks and three booster pump stations.
      Since the GIS became fully operational in 1992, public works officials have been able to use the system to create a maintenance history of the city's water and sewer infrastructure. In the past, the work of maintenance crews went unrecorded meaning that no record existed of the improvements or changes that had been made to the system, explained Scott Dompke. With the GIS, changes are incorporated into the database and the information immediately becomes available to a wide number of users.
      "Having a single source of data with maps and other information on people's desktops in multiple departments is the biggest benefit of the GIS," Dompke said. The system has been put to wide-ranging use for the city's infrastructure management, for interdepartmental communications and for communications with the public about zoning changes and new residential, commercial and industrial development.

Crossing Departmental Lines
In Riverside, a 77-square mile city east of Los Angeles with 225,000 residents, the city's electric and water utilities, public works, planning and parks and recreation departments also joined together to develop an extensive, complex system to more efficiently and cost effectively deliver essential services well into the future.
      A feasibility study found the city was incurring some $7 million in costs annually simply by maintaining manual records that include 775 miles of street, 800 miles of water main, 75,000 land parcels and facilities providing 450 MW of electrical power. The study showed that an automated records system would deliver an estimated $2.3 million in annual savings.
      In selecting the team that would make the Computer Automated Design, Mapping and Engineering (CADME) project a reality, Riverside took a unique approach. CADME is structured horizontally, crossing departmental lines, ensuring that representatives from planning, public works, and the electric and water division of public utilities are included in the CADME process.
      With city management support, team members have the authority and responsibility to achieve project objectives. This unique working environment has fostered an atmosphere of teamwork and innovation that has led to the success of CADME. The team has not only consistently met its objectives-on time and on budget-but the project is achieving more than was expected.
      The GIS is still being built, but Riverside city departments already have put the system to good use, says Pat Hohl. Digital orthophotos and the city's landbase are being used to construct base maps that can be used for construction design work. Where outside engineering firms are used for projects, cost savings of as much as $50,000 are possible as contractors use the city's base maps, thus avoiding the need to redraw maps or rephotograph the city using expensive aerial photography.
      These same GIS landbases are being used by department officials in city council presentations and in other public meetings. The automated maps offer more up-to-date and accurate information than maps produced manually.
      GIS technology is a powerful tool that helps city and county governments all across North America cut operating costs, increase efficiency and serve the public better.

About the Author:
Bart E. Elliott is associate principal and manager of the public sector business unit for UGC Consulting, an Englewood, Colo.-based firm. UGC Consulting designs, develops and deploys technology-based solutions involving geographic information systems. He may be reached at 303-773-6166.

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