City planning and development using geographic information systems

In recent years, GIS technology is used for managing natural disasters such as landslides to habitat mapping through remote sensing. GIS system has also been used to address land use issues. Many local governments are adding GIS technology as part of their regular administrative management system. High cost of GIS system, shortage of appropriate GIS specialists, lack of understanding and policies for homogeneous integration of GIS into planning are making the system, in many public sector cases, less than successful. We worked with a city government in the middle USA and participated in evaluating their system. Although small in size (population - thirty thousand), it's location next door to a large metropolitan city made things complicated. The city incorporated a GIS system into many aspects of public sector development, offered Web-based services to its community and published maps with search tools. The GIS based services gave the city government a high-tech reputation and a need-based analysis of public sector projects. The system gave the city officials access to real and accurate data which were not previously available. This often added more policy debates on sensitive and long range issues. It added a new dimension to city development and helped to find a combination of solutions in city wide constructions, drainage system, traffic control, and other engineering applications. Overall, the GIS system improved the efficiency of the city government and their administration processes as well as improved quality of decisions made by the city planners and managers.