For emergency first responders starting up a GIS program, one frequently asked question is "Where do I find data?" Of course, there's a lot of spatial data to be found on your state's GIS website, other government websites (like USGS), and don't forget those CDs that came with your software. One of the critical infrastructure datasets is transportation for planning and responding to emergencies involving railroads, ports, bridges, airports, and freight terminals - all of which might be the site of your next hazardous materials incident.
If you're a fire or police department looking for transportation data for emergency planning and response, I suggest a likely source is the US Department of Transportation's National Transportation Atlas Database for 2009. Updated files for 2010 are coming soon either on the web of DVDs.
On this site, you'll find several specific databases dealing with transportation, such as hazardous materials routes data from the state departments of transportation, railway networks, navigable waterways, and other data, some gathered from other sources like the Census Bureau. But the value is that a lot of what you might need for transportation emergencies is right here, free, and formatted for use. The downloadable files contain shapefiles, index files, dBASE attribute data, spatial indices, and metadata, all in the familiar ESRI formats.
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If you're a fire or police department looking for transportation data for emergency planning and response, I suggest a likely source is the US Department of Transportation's National Transportation Atlas Database for 2009. Updated files for 2010 are coming soon either on the web of DVDs.
On this site, you'll find several specific databases dealing with transportation, such as hazardous materials routes data from the state departments of transportation, railway networks, navigable waterways, and other data, some gathered from other sources like the Census Bureau. But the value is that a lot of what you might need for transportation emergencies is right here, free, and formatted for use. The downloadable files contain shapefiles, index files, dBASE attribute data, spatial indices, and metadata, all in the familiar ESRI formats.
