What is GIS ?

Geographic Information System (GIS) can be defined as a combination of computer hardware and software that allows for the ability to manage, store, map and analyze geographic data. By asking questions, operators can produce analytical maps showing different features such as streets, the location of buildings, water mains, or sewer lines.

A Geographic Information System (GIS) has the ability to store and analyze information describing the location of entities and areas on the earth's surface, such as land parcels, sewer facilities, or water bodies. This location information is often referred to as spatial information or spatial data. In addition to spatial data, a GIS can store descriptive data about those same entities. Examples of such information include the installation date of a water pipe, or the owner of a parcel of land. The geographic data and the descriptive data that describe them are integrally linked and can be analyzed relative to one another in much the same way as one would analyze standard tabular data from a relational database.

The City of Grand Island GIS Divisions contribute to the Hall County/City of Grand Island cooperative GIS by producing map and feature data used to aid in the decision and policy making processes in and around Grand Island. Without the cooperative efforts between the City of Grand Island and Hall County.

GIS is experiencing rapid growth as an information management tool for local and regional governments and utilities. The following list provides a few ways in which GIS is used in and around Grand Island and Hall County.

• Organize a municipality's geographic-based information into one seamless environment.
   
• More effectively manage and maintain parcel, water, sewer, drainage, zoning, infrastructure and other information.
   
• Perform daily work more efficiently (e.g., updating record plans, or keeping records of maintenance activities and customer complaints).
   
• Provide a geographical reference to municipal records including assessing, utility billing, traffic incidents, and other records.
   
• Better analyze problems and identify solutions (e.g., identifying water main breaks in terms of location and returning vital information such as pipe size, material, or "as built" data and related images).
   
• Serve as community leaders in the collection and standardization of geographic data used by numerous departments (e.g., developing central repository of municipal data including parcels zoning, utilities, and other data).
  
• Better serve the needs of the citizens through web-based applications. No longer do you need to sift through records for available data on parcels, lots, subdivisions, easements, or utilities in question. 

Communities that have successfully implemented GIS have seen dramatic improvements in the way in which data are accessed, maintained, and analyzed. These improvements are allowing municipal departments to make more informed decisions, collect information more efficiently, and better execute daily responsibilities.