1. Jeffery S. Horsburgh Utah State University
Creation of a Google Maps Interface for Publishing Hydrologic Observations Data in the Little Bear River
Jeffery S. Horsburgh
Utah State University
CEE 6440 Gis in Water Resources
Final Project Presentation

2. Little Bear River Test Bed
One of 10 WATERS Network test bed projects funded by the National Science Foundation: projects focused on environmental observatory design.
Developing a set of “smart” sensors connected to a central database. The sensors collect real-time, high frequency data of easily monitored variables.

3. Sensor Network 7 autonomous water quality stations measuring:
Turbidity
Water level pH
Conductivity
Water temperature
Dissolved oxygen
2 weather stations measure a suite of meteorological variables
Air temperature
Barometric Pressure
Solar radiation
Relative humidity
Precipitation
Wind speed/direction

4. Monitoring and Telemetry Network Internet Map Server
Observations
Database
(ODM)
Base Station
Computer
ODM Streaming
Data Loader
Internet
Monitoring and Telemetry Network
Remote Monitoring Sites
Data discovery, visualization, and analysis through Internet enabled applications
Radio Repeaters
Internet Map
Server
Central Observations Database

5. Objectives
Create a simple to use website for plotting monitoring site locations and other useful geographic layers using freely available GIS technology
Provide point and click access to the data collected at each monitoring site through a map based display
Create the ability to display current conditions within the watershed for selected environmental variables
Create the ability to query the observations data spatially and map monitoring sites where data is available for selected variables

6. Existing Map Server Technology
ESRI ArcIMS
Bear River Watershed Information System
Older version of ESRI map server
Browser as client
Difficult to implement and maintain

7. Existing Map Server Technology
ESRI ArcGIS Server
CUAHSI DASH Application
Newest ESRI technology
Spatial data plus spatial analysis
Powerful but can be overkill
Browser client

8. Existing Map Server Technology
Microsoft Virtual Earth
Hydroseek
Freely available
Browser client
Requires programming
No server overhead

9. Google Maps http://maps.google.com
Why Google Maps?
Platform Independent (browser client)
Freely available (no-cost license)
Supports addition of GIS layers as KML
Little overhead – do not have to configure or maintain the GIS engine!

10. The “Hello World” of Google Maps

11. Google Maps API Functionality
JavaScript Application Programmer’s Interface
Adding map controls
Adding GIS Layers as KML
Plotting points and adding custom HTML tags
Adding event “listeners” to capture user clicks

12. Adding Layers as KML Several step process:
Reproject layers to Geographic, WGS 84
Symbolize in ArcMap
Export from ArcMap as KML – ESRI Arc Scripts!
Copy KML files to server where they are publicly available
Create JavaScript code to add layers
var geoXml = new GGeoXml("
map.addOverlay(geoXml);

13. Little Bear River Map Server Demo http://water.usu.edu/littlebearmap/

14. Discussion and Conclusions
Demonstrates how environmental observations data can be published through a GIS map based interface that:
Provides simple point and click access to the data
Removes some barriers to efficient data access:
Discovering which data are available and where they were collected
Platform independent access through a web browser

15. Discussion and Conclusions
Google Maps Pros and Cons
Pros:
Freely available
Relatively simple to use with JavaScript
Little overhead/licensing issues
Flexible
Nice imagery
Cons:
Limited cartographic layers
Addition of layers via KML slows it down
Size limits to KML files (~ 1 MB)

16. Questions?