Sanitary District - GIS
General Information
A GIS, or Geographic Information System, provides for the collection, maintenance, analysis and management of geographically referenced information. A GIS combines the efficiency of a computerized mapping system with the power of a relational database. You can look at it as an intelligent map. On the screen you see the lines, points and symbols that make up the map. But behind every feature on that map - every street, lightpole or hydrant - is a table containing attribute data about that feature - it's name, ID number, water pressure etc. Because the map features (roads, sidewalks etc.) have information stored with them, you can query the map in much the same way as you can query a database. This map/database combination allows you to ask the map questions like 'Show me every hydrant which hasn't been inspected in the last six months' or 'What is the best route for our snowplows to take?'.
The most important component of a GIS is it's data and the most important data set is the basemap. This basemap is the foundation upon which the entire GIS will be built.
In March of 1995, the Hammond Sanitary District, along with the City of Hammond and the adjacent communities of Munster and Highland (the consortium is know as HHAMMP - the Hammond, Highland and Munster Mapping Project), contracted with Merrick and Co. to fly aerial photography and create a digital basemap as a foundation for a Geographic Information System. This basemap includes the following layers:
- Contour lines
- Hydrology - ponds, streams, ditches, lakes, etc.
- Street Centerlines
- Roads, alleys
- Railroads
- Sidewalks
- Parking lots
- Building footprints
- Above ground utility structures
- Utility points such as manholes, catchbasins, fire hydrants, water valves, and utility poles
Additional data layers have been added to the GIS since this intial flyover including planning geographies, police districts, transit routes, bikeways and trails as well as many others.
The Hammond Sanitary District also has a library of digital ortho-images covering the entire city. These images are an exact copy of the aerial photography used to create the digital basemap. Here's an example of a digital ortho photo of our Columbia Avenue Wastewater Treatment Plant:
The Hammond Sanitary District uses the GIS software ArcGIS 8.3 and ArcView from Environmental Research Institute (ESRI). Munster also uses the ESRI software while Highland uses AutoCad.
Data Dissemination Policy
If you are interested in obtaining digital data from the HHAMMP project, the following describes the policy adopted by the Hammond Sanitary District Board of Commissioners applying to its dissemination:
For further information, contact Becky McKinley, GIS Manager for the Hammond Sanitary District at 219-853-6520 ext. 516 or via email at bmckinley@hammondsd.com. This policy is based on applicable Indiana State Laws including: IC 5-14-3-8.5, IC 5-14-3-8.5(b), IC 5-14-3-8(j), and IC 5-14-3-8(k).
- The policy only applies to the selling of data in an electronic format. Any entity (city department, other HHAMMP - Hammond, Highland and Munster Mapping Project) participant) can set its own policy for selling hardcopy printouts of the maps.
- The GIS office at the Hammond Sanitary District is the only entity allowed to sell Hammond data in an electronic format. No City department will be allowed to disseminate electronic map data in any way.
- The GIS office at the District will sell Hammond data in both CAD and GIS formats. They will not sell Munster or Highland data in CAD format at all and will only sell it in GIS format until each is equipped to do so themselves. No revenue collected from the sale of Munster or Highland data will be returned to them.
- No data will be sold without a signed contract. This contract states that the purchaser is not allowed to disseminate (sell, give, provide electronic access to in any way) our data to any third party. This is a legally binding contract.
- The fee structure for the sale of data is to be two-tiered. The first tier is an Electronic Map Maintenance fee and the second is a processing fee. These fees adhere to all state statutes related to the sale of electronic map data.
- Parties purchasing data for non-commercial purposes including:
a) Public agency program support
b) Nonprofit activities
c) Journalism
d) Academic research
will be exempt for the Electronic Map Maintenance portion of the fee but will be subject to the processing fee. - The Electronic Map Maintenance portion of the fee will be as follows:
$4.50 per tile*layer except one foot contours (Highland and Munster only) which are $18.00 per tile. Digital ortho photos will cost $100.00 per tile.
This means, in Hammond, one complete tile will cost $90.00 and the entire basemap will cost $10,080. In Munster, one tile will cost $108.00 and the entire town will cost $3780.00. - The processing portion of the fee will be $50.00 for the first hour (or any portion thereof) and $10.00 per quarter hour beyond that.
- All monies generated from the sale of electronic map data will be held in a dedicated fund and used solely for the purpose of updating and maintaining the basemap. For Hammond, this fund has been created by the City Controller's Office - fund number 605, GIS Maintenance Fund.
Database Description
HIM/GIS refers to the Hammond Infrastructure Management GIS which is Hammond's implementation of the technology using the data obtained from HHAMMP.
Contact: Becky McKinley
GIS Manager for the HSD
219-853-6520 ext.516
bmckinley@hammondsd.com
GIS Software Used:
WorkStation Arc/Info w/ NetWork and GRID
ArcGIS 8x
ArcView 3.2
CAD Software used:
AutoCad 2000
Available media for data dissemination:
CD/Rom, 3 1/2 inch disk or via EMail
Available file formats for dissemination:
.e00 (ArcInfo export file format), shapefiles or .DXF. Raster data (digital ortho photos) are available in .tif format. Other file formats, supported by the above mentioned softwares, are also available by special request.
Vector Data
All vector data was compiled from aerial photography flown on March 24, 1995. This work was performed by an outside conversion vendor, Merrick and Co. in Aurora, CO. The data was compiled and is stored and disseminated in tiles approximating the quarter-section tiling schema of the Public Land Survey System.
Scale of Source Photography: 1"=660'
Accuracy:adheres to National Map Accuracy Standards for 1"=100' mapping (positional accuracy within ±2.5')
Contours are at an interval of 2 feet, accurate to ±half a contour interval (1 foot)
Spot elevations are accurate to ±quarter a contour interval (6 inches)
Map projection/coordinate system:Indiana State Plane
Horizontal Datum: NAD 83
Vertical Datum: NGVD29
Approximate file size (in .e00 format): all coverages, about 5 Mb per tile
Total number of tiles in Hammond: 112
The following Coverages are available for all of Hammond, IN plus a one hundred foot buffer area around the city:
- Building Footprints attributed by TYPE (residential, apartments/condos, industrial, commercial, public, miscellaneous, utility,trailer home, tank/silos)
- Hydrologyattributed by TYPE (major hydrology ( > 5 feet), major lake shoreline, minor lake shoreline, marsh, island, minor hydrography (< 5 feet)
- Railroads attributed by TYPE (operating RR centerline, abandoned, bridge)
- Transportation attributed by TYPE (paved road, unpaved road, paved alley, unpaved alley, bike path, back of curb, face of curb, bridge (edge of structure))
- Street centerlines attributed by TYPE (paved road, unpaved road, paved alley, unpaved alley, bike path) as well as Street Name
- Sidewalks attributed by TYPE (back of attached walk, detached sidewalk, other)
- Paved areas attributed by TYPE (paved parking, unpaved parking, parking lot medians, other paved areas, paved storm channel)
- Misc. Planimetryincluding piers/docks, bulkheads, dams, culverts, and other
- DTM or Digital Terrain Model consisting of spot elevations and ridge/breaklines
- 2 Foot Contour Lines (intermediate, index, depression, hidden (under buildings) and obstructed)
- Obscured areas attributed by TYPE (ground obscured by dense trees, ground under construction/movement)
- Quarter sections approximate Public Land Survey System quarter section boundaries - also the project tile boundaries
- Survey control points
Digital Ortho Photos
Color/BW: Black and white/greyscale
Resolution: one pixel equal to one half foot on the ground
Photo Boundaries: each photo approximates the boundaries of the public land survey system quarter section (the photos have been tiled the same as the above described vector data)
Registration: each quarter-section tile is registered to it's planimetric counterpart in the vector data set - Indiana State Plane, NAD 83. An Arc/Info World file (.tfw) accompanies each .tif.
Approximate file size: One tile is between 25 to 30 Mbyte (there are 112 tiles covering the entire city)
Other HHAMMP Participants
(Hammond, Highland and Munster Mapping Project)
Although the Hammond Sanitary District is not authorized to disseminate it, all of the above described data is available for both Munster and Highland, IN (with the same 100' buffer around each community).
The dataset descriptions are the same except:
- Munster also includes Vegetation
- Munster includes 1 foot contours accurate to ±3 inches
- Highland has 1 foot contours in some parts of the community and 2 foot contours in others.
For more information on Hammond's GIS efforts contact Becky McKinley,
Project Manager at bmckinley@hammondsd.com
