1 Dwight Hughes Geographic Names Project U.S. Geological Survey U.S. Department of the Interior West Virginia Partnerships and the Geographic Names Information System West Virginia GIS Forum & Workshops May 16-17, 2006

2 Why Standardize Geographic Names?  National Security  Emergency Preparedness & Response  Regional & Local Planning  Site Selection & Analysis  Cartographic Application  Environmental Problem-solving  Tourism  All Levels of Communication

3 Supports the U.S. Board on Geographic Names  Federal body authorized by law to ensure names standardization (not regulation) Official source for geographic names on Federal products depicting areas under U.S. jurisdiction  Maps, electronic products, documents, etc. One Feature, One Name, One Location  As specified by data owner within Board guidelines  Normally Federal, State, County, Local authority-You GNIS The Geographic Names Information System

4 GNIS Public Web Query

5 GNIS in The National Map

6 GOS Geographic Names Community

7 GNIS in a Map Viewer

8 Why GNIS? Conforms to BGN principles, policies, guidelines 30 Years of Data from authoritative sources Like you – local stake holders Stable, mature system Full national coverage, consistent, seamless Quality assured, prevents duplication Open, interoperable, available Functioning partner base – Federal, State, Local Large user community of long standing Data readily available to all levels of Government and to the public through multiple services and options Provides unique feature identifier, official name, and official location If your features are in GNIS, they are official

9 Two Million – And Growing Fast 502,000 hydrographic features – Synchronized with NHD 395,000 cultural features – Mostly structures  Cemetery, Dam, Locale, Mine, Military (historical), Oilfield, Tower, Trail, Well 376,000 structural features  Airport, Building, Church, Hospital, School, Post Office 257,000 landforms – In no other layer of The National Map  (Other than hydro) 170,000 populated places 100,000 admin features  Civil, Forest, Park, Reserve 97,000 historical features – In no other layer 14,000 transportation point features  Bridge, Crossing, Tunnel (14,000 Antarctica features) Thousands added per month. If its not in GNIS, it should be.

10 GNIS Features A Feature ID A location A name A Geometry? Other Secondary Attributes A feature is an Entity on the landscape with Attributes

11 GNIS Official Feature ID Unique, permanent, national feature identifier  System assigned number - no information content  Superseded FIPS55 Place Code  Discussions concerning ANSI Standard  Added to local data sets for future reference/maintenance  Immediately assigned upon web data entry For comparing, reconciling, merging data sets  Eliminates need for difficult attribute matching in data from multiple, overlapping jurisdictions & sources Available to all levels of government and the public No confusion or doubt about identity of feature

12 GNIS Official Feature Location Single point at 24k – The primary point  Official point to which official name is attached  Independent of size, extent, spatial representations  80% of GNIS features are point features  Easily added, corrected, or modified  Apply to Address Standard? Vital for correctly identifying & locating features  Boundaries not reliable as official feature location  Boundaries: Don’t exist, change, are undetermined, cannot be determined, subject to disagreement, multiple versions at differing scales/resolutions

13 GNIS Official Name Official because data owner (you!) says it is  (In all but a very few cases, mostly natural features)  Resolves confusion from multiple, overlapping, conflicting jurisdictions and sources  Subject to general guidelines of the BGN All sources authorized and verified All data validated & QA’d Names complete, standard, nationally consistent Available to all levels of Government & the public

14 Full Service – Data In Web Services & Applications GNIS Partner Transaction Entry/Edit Partner Data Maintenance Partner Data Batch Files Synchronized by Feature ID Working

15 Full Service – Data Out GNIS National Map Any other GIS GNIS Web Site TNM FeatureLook up Any other App Feature Service File Download Custom Files GNIS Map Service GNIS XML Service

16 Electronic Maintenance Program Since 1987  U.S. Board on Geographic Names  U.S. Geological Survey  U.S. Forest Service (1997)  Office of Coast Survey (1997)  National Hydrography Data Set (NHD) Partners Synchronized 1997  National Park Service (1999)  Bureau of Land Management (2005)  Fish & Wildlife Service (soon)  General Services Agency (MOU in for signature)

17 State Partners North Carolina – GNIS only official source Delaware – GNIS only official source Florida – State Gazetteer based on GNIS West Virginia Oregon – working Hawaii – discussions Nevada – startup Missouri – preliminary discussions New York – discussions Others – preliminary contact

18 Partnerships Are Critical USGS Geographic Names Project State Names Authorities State/Local GIS Authorities Long Standing Working Develop For West Virginia Paul Liston Kurt Donaldson

19 Contacts Louis Yost – Executive Secretary U.S. Board on Geographic Names (Acting)  (703)  Robin Worcester  (703)  Jennifer Runyon  (703)  Eve Edwards  (703)  Dwight Hughes  (703) 

20 Thank you for your interest! Questions? The End