**An Inventory of Coastal and Ocean Mapping Programs, Products, and
Needs**

**John W. Haines, USGS**

**Co-chair: JSOST/ Interagency Working Group on Coastal and Ocean
Mapping (IWG-OCM)**

**[Drivers:]{.underline}**

1\) FGDC -- OMB Circular A-16

2\) NRC, 2004 "A Geospatial Framework for the Coastal Zone: National
Needs for Coastal Mapping and Charting"

Recommendation 3: *A single Web portal should be established to
facilitate access to all coastal mapping and charting data and derived
products. The site should be well advertised within federal and state
agencies, state and local governments, academic institutions,
nongovernmental organizations and conservation groups, and to other
potential users. The portal should work well with all Web browsers and
on all computer platforms, to make it easily accessible to all users.*

\... Coordination of such a site logically falls under the purview of
the FGDC, and is fully consistent with the Geospatial One-Stop concept.
(page 116)

Recommendation 4: *All thematic data and other value-added products
should adhere to predetermined standards to make them universally
accessible and transferable through a central Web portal. All sources
should supply digital data accompanied by appropriate metadata. (page
117)*

Recommendation 7: *All federally funded coastal zone mapping and
charting activities should be registered at a common, publicly available
Web site. This combined registry should be accessible through the single
Web portal for coastal zone information.*

\... Each entry in the registry should include a description of the
mapping activity, its location and purpose, the agency collecting the
data, the tools to be uses, the scales at which the data will be
collected and other relevant details. Non-federally funded agencies
conducting coastal mapping activities should be encouraged to register
their activities at the same site. A section of the registry should be
dedicated to descriptions of planned but unfunded coastal mapping
activities, as well as a prioritized compilation of coastal areas where
surveying would be particularly helpful to state or local agencies.
(page 118)

Recommendation 8: *To be effective, coordination should be carried out
among all the primary agencies involved in coastal zone mapping; it
should be mediated by a body that has the authority and means to monitor
and ensure compliance; and it should involve people who are
knowledgeable enough to identify the most critical issues. (page 119)*

Recommendation 9: *Whichever body is charged to carry out the needed
coordination activities, dedicated staff personnel should be assigned to
maintain the Web portal (Recommendation 3), the activities registry
(Recommendation 7), and associated Web sites, and to proactively search
for areas where efforts can be coordinated, supplemented, or combined to
increase efficiency. (page 119)*

3\) U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy, 2004, "An Ocean Blueprint for the
21^st^ Century"

Recommendation 25-7: *The Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC)
should coordinate federal ocean and coastal mapping activities with the
goal of creating standardized, easily accessible national maps. These
maps should be able to incorporate living and nonliving marine resource
data along with bathymetry, topography, and other natural features, and
should provide seamless data across the shoreline, coastal zone,
nearshore areas, and open ocean waters. To accomplish these goals, the
FGDC should:*

-   *Coordinate an interagency budget strategy to accelerate the
    completion of mapping priorities throughout coastal areas, the
    exclusive economic zone, and continental shelf.*

-   *Establish and maintain a Web-accessible registry that allows
    federal agencies to coordinate mapping and charting missions.*

-   *Establish and maintain a single Web-based source to provide easy
    access to geospatial data and integrated national maps.*

-   *Ensure that federal mapping and charting activities take full
    advantage of resources available in the academic and private
    sectors.*

-   *Ensure that federal mapping activities take advantage of state
    resources and address state information needs.* (page 391)

4\) U.S. Ocean Action Plan (2004)

**Coordinate Ocean and Coastal Mapping Activities:** *Through the
Committee on Ocean Policy, the NSTC Joint Subcommittee on Ocean Science
and Technology will lead the effort to coordinate Federal and
Federally-supported mapping activities for the U.S. coastal and marine
environment. Where appropriate the NSTC Joint Subcommittee on Ocean
Science and Technology will engage non-Federal entities in their
efforts. Activities should include, but are not limited to, the
following:*

-   *Development of an annual inventory of Federal, Federally-funded,
    and non-Federal governmental ocean and coastal mapping and charting
    programs, operations, and prioritized needs;*

-   *Assessment and reporting on common and shared needs for development
    of coordinated programs;*

-   *Coordinate and leverage resources and efforts across the Federal
    sector and with industry, academic, NGO, and non-Federal government
    entities;*

-   *Set priorities for standards development and developing strategies
    for promulgation of standards for data acquisition, data, metadata,
    tools and products;*

-   *Assessing and reporting on research and development needs for more
    effective development, delivery, and application of geospatial data,
    tools, products, and services; and*

-   *Development of shared and standardized mechanisms for processing,
    archiving, and distribution of geospatial tools, products, and
    services.* (page 15)

**[Response:]{.underline}** Formation of the JSOST Interagency Working
Group on Ocean and Coastal Mapping (IWG-OCM). \[Charter Attached\]

Initial priority is establishment of inventory of federal (and
federally-supported) coastal and ocean mapping programs, activities,
needs and information.

This means we have a charge that requires resources and is "product"
driven.

Co-chairs: USGS, NOAA, USACE, MMS

**[Partners/Synergies:]{.underline}**

1)  FGDC -- the federal focus for coordination of geospatial data
    activities with GOS as existing set of tools and infrastructure
    elements. Existing working groups and subcommittees as the
    appropriate venue for much of effort required -- and a mechanism for
    engaging the community broadly.

> Marine Boundary Working Group (MBWG)
>
> \- Synergies with the Multipurpose Marine Cadastre
>
> Marine and Coastal Spatial Data Subcommittee (MCSD)

2)  Integrated Ocean Observing System -- a federal focus for
    coordination of ocean and coastal observations, within which
    geospatial information should be a visible and priority element.

> Data Management and Communication (DMAC)
>
> Regional Associations

3)  Regional Associations, Councils and States -- provides venues for
    ensuring activities are responsive to regional/state priorities and
    to pilot inventory development at a "less than national" scale.

> Gulf of Mexico Alliance, Great Lakes and New England Councils,
> California Mapping Program

4)  Ocean Research Priorities Plan -- provides a focus (probably at
    regional scales) for coordinating across agencies to address
    coordination and integration.

> **[Status -- Next Steps:]{.underline}**
>
> At agency level there is an agreement that inventory development is a
> priority. Next steps are to engage representative technical expertise
> across agencies to define the technical requirements for inventory
> development. High-level requirements might include:

1)  Must be based on FGDC-compliant metadata

2)  Must be accessible via Geospatial One-Stop portal

3)  Must be easy to use and update

4)  Must have query capability

5)  Must be coordinated with IOOS requirements

Next Step: In Winter 06/07 bring together agency technical staff who are
knowledgeable about existing systems for managing and delivering mapping
data and products. Assess requirements for a broad inventory effort that
effectively "harvests" from existing systems without creating undue
overhead on agencies. Establish more detailed technical requirements as
basis for a) JSOST approval of approach and b) Statement of Work for
identification of software solutions and development of implementation
plan for the project.

**[Perspective from a USGS Data Manager:]{.underline}**

The Multipurpose Marine Cadastre effort is tightly defined: "its users
will have access to GIS capabilities and will not be equipped to
process, analyze, or interpret scientific data. For this purpose and set
of data uses, and inventory should only include our clearest and
cleanest data publications. We publish these with full FGDC compliant
metadata and make them available on internet map servers that can
respond to OGC Web Map Service protocols.

Example: Coastalmap
([http://coastalmap.marine.usgs.gov](http://coastalmap.marine.usgs.gov/))
is the CMGP ArcIMS web server that displays published GIS data to the
public via HTTP. Map views and data layers may be accessed via the
public with any WWW browser, WMS client, or ESRI ArcGIS software. Data
are served as either shapefiles or GeoTIFF imagery. Currently serves \~
576 individual geospatial data layers for project specific or regional
mapping.

![](media/image1.png){width="5.997916666666667in"
height="3.6493055555555554in"}

The Ocean and Coastal Mapping Inventory is much broader. Its purpose is
to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of ocean and coastal
mapping activities by facilitating the use of historical data to
constrain and minimize mapping activities, and by presenting
opportunities for serving multiple purposes with single mapping
expeditions. Its users would be everyone who plans, manages, or works
with data from mapping activities. This much larger user group spans the
full spectrum of capabilities \... so the inventory should include all
historical data that could still be useful, in all data repositories.
Fortunately, Inventory's purpose does not require serving the data
itself, with the convenience of OGC Web Map Service protocols, but can
be met with a simple (but exhaustive) index that provides sufficient
metadata to evaluate the suitability of the data for a given purpose.

The Ocean and Coastal Mapping inventory should build on the experience
of the Open Archives Initiative (<http://www.openarchives.org/>), which
is serving a similarly broad purpose and range of users. The basic idea
is to design a simple set of metadata which will serve the purpose of
the inventory, and develop a protocol for harvesting these metadata from
a variety of repositories, each of which serves a particular purpose.

Additional CMGP data sets that should be included cover our historical
data and information about previous mapping activities. For example, the
CMGP InfoBank which includes rescued industry seismic data
(<http://walrus.wr.usgs.gov/infobank/>) is compatible with automatic
harvest, and would provide a good pilot project for the development of
harvest protocols.

InfoBank is a structured information storage scheme of data bases and
software. Consists of 1) databases, including metadata, 2) software to
organize and sort information, 3) Web interface that presents
information to users. InfoBank-specific Google searching is supported.
Files may be copied and many thematic data stets are provided as .kmz's
. Metadata are provided in metadata standard version FGDC-STD-001-1998
format in faq, outline, text, and xml forms.

![](media/image2.png){width="5.995833333333334in" height="3.4875in"}