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Toward a Federal Land 

Information System: 

Experiences and Issues 

By JAMES A. STURDEVANT 

U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY BULLETIN 1852 
DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR 

DONALD PAUL HODEL, Secretary 

U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 

Dallas L. Peck, Director 

Any use of trade names and trade marks 

in this publication is for descriptive 

purposes only and does not constitute 

endorsement by the U.S. Geological Survey 

UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 1988 

For sale by the 

Books and Open-File Reports Section 

U.S. Geological Survey 

Federal Center, Box 25425 

Denver, CO 80225 

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data 

Sturdevant, James A. 

Toward a Federal land information system. 

(U.S. Geological Survey bulletin ; 1852) 

Bibliography: p. 

Supt. of Docs. no.: I 19.3:1852 

1. United States-Public lands-Data processing. 2. land use-United 

States-Data processing. 3. Mineral lands-United States-Data processing. 4. Information storage and retrieval systems-land use. I. Title. 

II. Series. 

QE75.B9 no. 1852 [HD216] 557.3 s 88-600162 [333.1'028'5] 
CONTENTS 

Abstract 1 

Introduction 1 

Background 2 

Medford, Oreg., pilot project 2 

Data files and sources 2 

Data base structure 3 

Data query, analysis, and output 3 

Alaska pilot project 3 

Data files and sources 3 

Data base structure 6 

Data query, analysis, and output 7 

FLIS research accomplishments 8 

Alaska 8 

New Mexico 11 

Conclusions, issues, and recommendations 12 

References cited 14 

FIGURES 

1. Composite map showing the result of overlaying Federal administration areas, 

Federal mineral rights areas, areas open for mining, and chromite favorability 

areas 4 

2-5. Maps showing: 

2. Polygons generated from the U.S. Geological Survey's Regional Alaska Mineral Resource Assessment Program 5 

3. Status of the entry of mineral data from the U.S. Geological Survey's Alaska 

Mineral Resource Assessment Program and the Mineral Resource Data System into the Federal Land Information System data base 6 

4. The mineral terranes of Alaska 7 

5. Surface administrators from the Bureau of Land Management's Alaska Automated Land and Mineral Record System, as of 1984 8 

6. Images showing the spatial results of area-filtering land use and land cover data 

of a portion of the Valdez, Alaska, 1:250,000-scale quadrangle 10 

7. Flow diagram showing the procedure for converting parcel-level tabular land status data referenced to legal land descriptions to section-level spatial land status 

data referenced to geographic coordinates, for the Silver City, N. Mex., Federal 

Land Information System project 12 

8. Map showing mineral availability on Federal mineral lands and past mineral production areas within the Silver City, N. Mex., 1:100,000-scale quadrangle 13 

Contents Ill 
IV Contents 

TABLES 

1. Data base files in the Federal Land Information System Medford, Oreg., data base 3 

2. Comparative digital storage requirements of the Medford, Oreg., data base for 

Interactive Digital Image Manipulation System and Map Overlay and Statistical 

System 4 

3. Summary of Alaska Federal Land Information System data files and selected characteristics 9 

4. Statistical results of area-filtering land use and land cover data of a portion of the 

Valdez, Alaska, 1:250,000-scale quadrangle 11 

5. Comparative digital storage requirements of several types of Federal Land Information System data in raster and vector formats 11 
Toward a Federal Land Information System: 

Experiences and Issues 

By James A. Sturdevant 

Abstract 

From 1983 to 1987, the U.S. Geological Survey conducted research to develop a national resource data base 

of Federal lands under the auspices of the Federal Land 

Information System (FLIS) program. The program's goal 

was to develop the capability to provide information to 

national mineral-use policymakers. Prototype spatial data 

bases containing mineral, land status, and base cartographic data were developed for the Medford, Oreg., 

area, the State of Alaska, and the Silver City, N. Mex., 

area. Other accomplishments included (1) the preparation 

of a digital format for U.S. Geological Survey mineral 

assessment data and (2) the development of a procedure 

for integrating parcel-level tabular Alaska land status data 

into a section-level geographic information system. Overall findings indicated that both vector and raster capabilities are required for a FLIS and that nationwide data 

availability is a limiting factor in FLIS development. 

As a result of a 1986 interbureau (U.S. Geological 

Survey, Bureau of Land Management, and Bureau of 

Mines) review of the FLIS program, activities were redirected to undertake research on large-area geographic 

information system techniques. Land use and land cover 

data generalization strategies were tested, and areafiltering software was found to be the optimum type. In 

addition, a procedure was developed for transferring 

tabular land status data of surveyed areas in the contiguous 48 States to spatial data for use in geographic information systems. 

The U.S. Geological Survey FLIS program, as an 

administrative unit, ended in 1987, but FLIS-related 

research on large-area geographic information systems 

continues. 

INTRODUCTION 

The U.S. Congress, the Department of the Interior, 

the Department of Agriculture, and other Federal agencies 

require a tremendous amount and variety of resource 

information on Federal land to formulate policies affecting 

mineral exploration and development, water and land use 

management, and agricultural production. The data are 

collected and synthesized by many Federal land management agencies. These agencies are comprised of divisions, 

offices, regions, or other organizational units that have 

administrative management responsibilities for portions of 

Federal land. Thus, when national-level resource information is required, the compilation and accurate summation of 

these data from the agencies are difficult and time consuming. The process involves obtaining detailed, site-specific 

resource data of varying quality and scales and then 

aggregating and summing the data. A single, easily 

accessed source of current national-level resource data is 

one alternative for solving the problem. 

From 1983 to 1986, under the auspices of the Federal 

Mineral Land Information System program, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) conducted research to develop a 

single source of national-level natural resource data for 

Federal lands. The goal was to provide information concerning mineral resources on Federally administered land to 

national policymakers. To achieve this goal, digital spatial 

data bases and geographic information system (GIS) software for data base query, analysis, and output were used. 

During the first 3 years of the program, data base development for several pilot project areas was emphasized. However, the program was limited to working with a mineral 

data subset of natural resource data, and two conditions 

were established. First, the program was to use GIS's 

existing in the USGS and, second, only data readily 

available from Federal agencies were to be used. 

In 1986, the program name was changed to the 

Federal Land Information System (FLIS), and the program 

was reviewed formally by an interbureau (USGS, Bureau of 

Land Management, and Bureau of Mines) study team. As a 

result of this review, program direction and emphasis were 

changed from operational data base development to 

researching large-area GIS techniques. The techniques studied included automating data accession from other digital 

data bases and the processing and storing of large volumes 

of data in GIS's (Arndt, 1987). 

The FLIS program, as an administrative unit, ended 

in 1987, but the USGS continues to conduct research related 

to large-area GIS' s. There are no plans to establish a single 

national system. 

Introduction 
This bulletin summarizes the activities and documents the major accomplishments of the FLIS program. 

Research results and data base development accomplishments are emphasized, and recommendations for the future 

direction of FLIS-related research are provided. The figures 

in this bulletin are examples of graphic products generated 

by using GIS technology and do not meet USGS map 

standards and accuracy requirements. 

BACKGROUND 

The USGS Management Implementation Plan, which 

called for the establishment of a Federal Mineral Land 

Information System research program, was finalized in 

February 1983. Although there was some support for the 

program to address many types of natural resource data, the 

final approved program called for a data base containing 

only mineral, land status, and base cartographic data. 

Excerpts from the plan follow: 

The Survey needs to be more responsive to the 

Secretary of the Interior's stated objective to open 

Federal lands to public access and increase domestic 

energy and mineral production .... There exists no 

source whereby questions can be answered rapidly 

and effectively concerning the location of Federallyowned lands, the agencies administering them, 

Federal mineral rights, and the specific restrictions 

on mineral exploration and development. . . . A 

geographic information system . . . would serve as a 

mechanism for rapid and effective formulation of 

policy to guide the accelerated domestic production 

of energy and mineral resources. 

The program was developed to meet the needs of 

Departmental- and Congressional-level policymakers. 

These needs were defined by questions already being asked 

of the USGS, such as, what is the availability of minerals, 

particularly those of critical importance to the national 

interest? The program's objectives were (1) to use GIS 

technology to provide information about Federal mineral 

lands and (2) to develop procedures to access existing 

mineral and land status data for incorporation in GIS's. The 

goal was to be able to rapidly answer mineral-use policy 

questions. Primary data files needed to answer anticipated 

mineral-use policy questions were land status data 

(including surface ownership or administration, mineral 

rights, and restrictions affecting mining) and mineral assessment, mineral occurrence, and base cartographic data. 

By 1983, the USGS had some experience with 

raster-based GIS' s but had limited experience with vectorbased GIS's. The Interactive Digital Image Manipulation 

System (IDIMS), a raster-based system, had been used 

traditionally for image processing. By 1985, however, the 

USGS had become proficient with several vector systems, 

including the Map Overlay and Statistical System (MOSS) 

and the ARC/INFO system. However, little was known 

2 Toward a Federal Land Information System: Experiences and Issues 

about either system's capabilities for handling the large 

volume of data required for a FLIS. 

Generally, a lack of data seemed to be more limiting 

to the development of an operational FLIS than a lack of 

available GIS technology. As early as 1980, mineral assessment data were being prepared by the USGS on a 

1:250 ,000-scale quadrangle basis, but by 1987, 13 quadrangles in the contiguous States and 17 quadrangles in Alaska 

had been completed. Mineral occurrence data were readily 

available; for example, some data on mines and mineral 

deposits were available from the USGS Mineral Resource 

Data System (MRDS) for every State. Current land status 

data of a consistent format are difficult to obtain in graphic 

or digital form, because each land management agency 

maintains the records on its own lands. The Bureau of Land 

Management (BLM), however, maintains current records 

for all public domain lands, until those lands are transferred 

to other Federal agencies (such as the U.S. Forest Service or 

the National Park Service). 

To aid in developing the FLIS, two pilot projects 

were conducted. Each addressed a different aspect of data 

base development and research (Kleckner, 1984). The main 

objectives of the Medford, Oreg., project were (1) to 

demonstrate the feasibility of a FLIS program by establishing a data base of a 1:250,000-scale quadrangle area and (2) 

to investigate the use of mineral data from the USGS 

Conterminous U.S. Mineral Assessment Program 

(CUSMAP) for the Medford quadrangle. The State of 

Alaska was chosen for the second pilot project because of 

the large amounts of available data and the opportunity to 

explore large-volume data handling techniques. 

MEDFORD, OREG., PILOT PROJECT 

Data Files and Sources 

The Medford, Oreg., pilot project was conducted 

between April and September 1983 to demonstrate the 

concept of a national-level system for providing information 

on mineral-use policy. The study area, the 1 o by 2° 

Medford, Oreg., quadrangle, was selected because of the 

availability of mineral and land status data. The mineral 

data sources were (1) a USGS CUSMAP report (Singer and 

others, 1982) and associated maps of the Medford quadrangle and (2) the USGS MRDS (Calkins and others, 1978). 

The results of CUSMAP studies are published as folios and 

include mineral assessment maps, statistics, and text. The 

MRDS is a set of digital records on mineral occurrences, 

including locational and bibliographic information. 

The land status data were digitized from the BLM 

1:100,000-scale Surface-Mineral Management Status map 

series, published in 1978. The data categories on the BLM 

maps include surface administrators, Federal mineral 

ownership, and Federal mineral restrictions. Base cartogra-
phic data representing township boundaries, county boundaries, and National and State highway networks were taken 

from the same BLM maps. Information about the Medford 

data base is shown in table 1. 

Data Base Structure 

The Medford project involved data input, data transformation , data registration, spatial analysis, and output. 

The data processing capabilities of the vector-based MOSS 

and the raster-based IDIMS were used and evaluated. 

Several methods of entering data were used. Because the 

CUSMAP data and the BLM land status data were in 

polygonal form, they were digitized manually by using a 

vector digitizing system. Multiple attributes associated with 

the CUSMAP polygons were entered by keyboard into files 

in both the vector and the raster systems. Because data from 

the MRDS were already in digital form, they were entered 

directly into both systems. All data were transformed to the 

Universal Transverse Mercator projection for use in both 

systems. For use in the IDIMS, the data were rasterized to 

a ground-equivalent cell size of 200 by 200 m (about 10 

acres). 

Data Query, Analysis, and Outpu~ 

Hypothetical land- and mineral-policy questions were 

addressed by using vector and raster retrieval and analytical 

capabilities (fig. 1). Some of the questions follow: 

• Which Federal agencies administer land resources in an 

area? 

• How many acres are involved? 

• Where do the lands occur? 

• On what Federally administered land does a particular 

mineral occur? 

• Where does the Federal Government have mineral 

rights? 

• Where is the land not withdrawn from mining? 

• What minerals occur, or have a known potential for 

occurring, in the area? 

• Where do the minerals occur? 

The generic spatial analysis functions used to address such 

questions were (1) attribute data handling (search, sort, 

merge, and others), (2) overlay analysis, (3) area calculation, (4) single- and multiple-file query, and (5) distance 

analysis (Sturdevant and Kleckner, 1984). 

Part of the Medford pilot project was a study to define 

the complementary spatial-data handling capabilities of the 

raster-based IDIMS and the vector-based MOSS. Results 

indicated advantages to using both a raster and a vector 

capability for a national-level natural resource information 

system. The advantages of raster processing (IDIMS) 

include fast and flexible data modeling operations and direct 

links to several output devices. The advantages of vector 

Table 1. Data base files in the Federal Land Information 

System Medford, Oreg., data base 

[BLM, Bureau of Land Management; CUSMAP, Conterminous U.S. 

Mineral Assessment Program; MRDS, Mineral Resource Data System] 

Data base files 

Mineral assessment . 

Mineral occurrence . . 

Federal surface . .... 

ownership. 

Federal subsurface . . 

ownership. 

Source 

CUSMAP .. .. .. 

MRDS •• ••••• 0 

BLM land .. ... 

status maps 

... do .... . ..... 

Federal restrictions. . .. .do ......... . 

Townships . . . . . . . . . ...do ......... . 

Counties . . . . . . . . . . . . .. do ......... . 

Roads ............ . . ... do ......... . 

Form Attributes 

Areal . . .... Multiple. 

Point ...... Do . 

Areal ...... Single. 

... do ....... Do . 

...do ....... Do. 

Linear and Do. 

areal. 

.. . do ....... Do. 

Linear . . ... Do. 

processing (MOSS) include a flexible data retrieval capability, convenient area computation commands, direct linkage between multiple attributes and spatial features, and 

relatively small data storage requirements (table 2). However, the limited overlay functions and the inability to 

handle multiple attribute functions prohibited the use of 

MOSS for further FLIS program activities. 

The Medford pilot project demonstrated that several 

data files can be incorporated and analyzed by using GIS 

technology to provide answers to certain mineral-use policy 

questions for a 1 :250,000-scale quadrangle area. 

ALASKA PILOT PROJECT 

Data Files and Sources 

The second pilot project, conducted from late 1983 to 

mid-1987, was the development of a mineral and land status 

data base in Alaska (Sturdevant and others, 1986). Alaska 

offered an opportunity to build a statewide data base and to 

test techniques for large-area high-volume data base development and analysis. 

A key objective of the Alaska project was to automate 

and convert various mineral and land status data to a 

common digital spatial format. The mineral data were from 

four sources: (1) USGS Alaska Mineral Resource Assessment Program (AMRAP) maps, mapped on 1:250,000-

scale quadrangles, (2) USGS Regional Alaska Mineral 

Resource Assessment Program (RAMRAP) maps, mapped 

statewide on 1:1,000,000-scale maps, (3) USGS MRDS 

digital files, and (4) the "Mineral Terranes of Alaska, 1982" 

map series. 

Both the AMRAP and RAMRAP data in Alaska 

indicate that mineral deposits may be grouped by their 

geologic characteristics and that different types of deposits 

differ in grades, tonnages, and other characteristics (Singer 

and Ovenshine, 1979). Reports from both programs contain 

Alaska Pilot Project 3 
MEDFORD 

LEGEND B-----~~ ---=38 I:HRDMITE AND FEDERAL 

"Iu::s: MINERAL lJEUELDPMEHT :STATUS • UDITIIJ'tS IJ" DIUIITE PRilJI.I:ERS< CRIB> 

• UDITIIJ'tS IJ" DIUIITE IEI::lRJCES<CRIB > 

FIRERS F'fMRRLE FtR DIUIITE ( aJ:IJfiP > IIi FIRERS PERI'USSIUE TD FEJERF1... "It£JR..S JEUEUPt£tiT II • = ~ssnrUE~rlr: ~~ ~. • FIRERS PERI'tiSSIUE TD FEJERF1... "It£JR..S JEUEUPt£tiT 

• FIRERS IIJT PERI'tiSSIUE TD F'ED • "It£JR..S JEUEUPt£tiT 

IITI£ FIRERS tiEET II...L IJ" Tl£ F11...L[11IIfi CRITERIR• 1 • SI.Rffi:E [Y£IJ Jl( FEJERFI... f&l£V 

e • II...L "It£JR..S [Y£IJ Jlf n£ FEJERFL EiDUERti£JtT 3. Ill FEJERFI... RESTRICTIIJ'tS TD "It£RR.. JEUEUPt£tiT 

1RT L.£FIST !liE IJ" Tl£ RJIJUE CRITERIR IS 11JT I£T 

EUEM FEJERFI... L.fltDS IIJT II'GIICRTED RS IRJIIIi FEJERFI... RESTRICTIIJ'tS ttRY BE SUB.£CT TD RESTRICTED USE lJGER II'GIIUIJIR... f&l£V I RI&J£KT PlJitS 

KIUI£1'ERS DIUIITE JRTR WERE mmuttEII FRII 1J£ EDI'!In'ERIZEII RESIIJIIE 

III"'RRRTI!Ji IHIC C.CRIB) ·IJ" Tl£ &DJiiiC DIUISIIIiloUS&S·o fl'lll 

Tl£ IDfTERI'UtllJS lJUTEII STATES "lt£RR.. .HSSESSHEhT ,fllllilllt 

<DmH">• II'EJt FILE RERJn' ll!-lB37o rtf D ;R. SilliER JI'IIIIJl'HERS. 

FDERfl.. "lt£RR.. 1IE\.QJI't£lfT DR1US DITR WERE DITRI~ 

f"'It B..M Sl:RFRCE iii'III. "II£JII.. snmJS IIJJEiRPRIJfTSo 1'rv&-1"Pt. 

RRSTER BRSEII IA"o l!lll-t£TER &RID CEU..So lJUUERSII.. 

TIRtSUER!SE ttERCRTDR PAWECTIIIt. 

Figure 1. The result of overlaying data showing Federal administration areas, Federal mineral rights areas, areas open for 

mining, and chromite favorability areas. Light blue areas indicate land favorable for chromite and open to mining under 

the management responsibility of the Federal Government. 

Table 2. Comparative digital storage requirements, in 

megabytes, of the Medford, Oreg., data base for Interactive Digital Image Manipulation System (IDIMS) and Map 

Overlay and Statistical System (MOSS) 

Point data line data Areal data Total (28 files) (1 file) (11 files) 

!DIMS ... . ... 15.12 0.54 5.94 21.60 

MOSS . . ..... 1.19 .02 2.18 3.39 

4 Toward a Federal Land Information System: Experiences and Issues 

maps of geologic tract areas (fig. 2), attribute tables, and 

grade and tonnage models of 18 types of deposits known or 

suspected to occur in Alaska. The quadrangles covered by 

the AMRAP reports are Ambler River, Big Delta, Blying 

Sound, Chandalar, Chignik, Circle, Ketchikan, McCarthy, 

Medfra, Nabesna, Philip Smith Mountains, Prince Rupert, 

Seward, Sutwik Island, Talkeetna, Talkeetna Mountains, 

and Tanacross (fig. 3). The RAMRAP data for Alaska, 
U .S • EiEn.lEICRL. Sl.RUEV 

RE6l[Jft. FLRSKR I'III£Rfl. 

REm.RCE RSSESSI£1"1T PRll6Rfl'l 

EiRRV SI-IUES REPRESENT EiEn.lEIC TRFI:TS • 

EfDI TRfi:T RELATES TO R SET IF RTTR IBJTES 

IN R DI6ITR. RTTRIBJTES F'ILE. RTTRIBJTES 

Ir«:LUUJE DEPDSI T TYPES I t1fUR I:R I'III"'I:R, 

KtDif I:R SI.ISPECTED I'III£RFI..SI RI"'II 6RRIJE 

RI"'II 1llt'RiE t'IJIELS • 

Figure 2. Polygons generated from the U.S. Geological Survey's Regional Alaska Mineral Resource Assessment Program. 

with the exception of the Southeast Panhandle area, and the 

AMRAP maps were digitized and entered into the FLIS data 

base. 

The mineral occurrence data from MRDS were available for the following 1 :250,000-scale quadrangles (fig. 3): 

Ambler River, Anchorage, Blying Sound, Bradfield Canal, 

Craig, Dixon Entrance, Goodnews Bay, Gulkana, Healy, 

Kenai, McCarthy, Mt. McKinley, Nabesna, Petersburg, 

Seldovia, Seward, Talkeetna, Tyonek, and Valdez. These 

data were obtained in computer-compatible form and 

entered into FLIS computer systems. 

Another file of mineral data in the Alaska FLIS 

contains information on hardrock mineral regions and coal 

basins that have been digitized from the "Mineral Terranes 

of Alaska, 1982" map series (Arctic Environmental Information and Data Center, 1982) (fig. 4). The map units, or 

terranes, are defined as assemblages of related rocks that 

contain mineral deposits or show evidence of common 

processes that are known to produce minerals. The data 

were on six 1: 1 , 000, 000-scale regional Alaska maps that 

cover the entire State. 

The land status data in the Alaska FLIS were obtained 

from the BLM Alaska Automated Land and Mineral Record 

System (ALMRS), formerly called the Alaska Automated 

Land Record System. The system is a comprehensive 

tabular data base containing data on 223,000 case files and 

withdrawal orders covering 18,651 townships (U.S . Bureau 

of Land Management, 1983). Its purpose is to assist in land 

status management and to track the progress of the massive 

Alaska land conveyance mandated by Federal law. With the 

assistance of BLM adjudicators, ALMRS records, indicating surface administrators, were identified and aggregated 

into categories such as Federal land (National Park Service 

land, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Refuges, and so on), 

Alaska Pilot Project 5 
ALASKA MINERAL RESOURCE 

ASSESSMENT PROGRAM <AMRAP> 

MINERAL RESOURCE DATA 

SYSTEM ( MRDS > 

AMRAP AND MRDS 

CURVILINEAR GRID REPRESENTS 

USGS 1-2SB,BBB SCALE ~UAD BNDS 

lBB 2BB 3BB 

MILES 

Figure 3. Status as of July 1987 of the entry of mineral data from the U.S. Geological Survey's Alaska Mineral Resource 

Assessment Program and the Mineral Resource Data System into the Federal Land Information System data base. 

State land, native land, and private land. The spatial 

locations of the surface administrator polygons, recorded by 

legal land description, then were converted to the standard 

protracted sections defined by geographic coordinates. By 

using software developed by the BLM, the files were 

converted to formats compatible with GIS' s used in the 

FLIS program. The result was a data file that contained 

locations of land areas managed by various Federal, State, 

and private organizations (fig. 5). 

Subsurface ownership and areas restricted from mining are not represented spatially in the ALMRS. Under the 

guidance of BLM mining law experts, these two data types 

were derived from the surface administrator data. For 

example, if the land area is a National Park established 

before 1981, in nearly 90 percent of the cases, the subsurface minerals are owned by the Federal Government, and the 

6 Toward a Federal Land Information System: Experiences and Issues 

land is closed to the mining of metallic ores. The subsurface 

ownership categories are Federal, State, native, and private. 

The Federal restrictions categories (open, closed, and not 

affected by Federal laws) apply to metallic minerals only. 

The Alaska FLIS also contains hydrography , transportation, and water bodies data from the USGS digital line 

graphs, which are available in a topologically structured 

vector format (Domaratz and others, 1983). They were 

derived from the 1 :2,000,000-scale sectional maps of the 

1970 National Atlas of the United States of America. 

Data Base Structure 

The raster-based IDIMS and the vector-based 

ARC/INFO system were the GIS software packages used 
II UNDIVIDED GRANITIC ROCKS 

II ALKALIC GRANITIC ROCKS 

II FELSIC GRANITIC ROCKS 

II INTERMEDIATE GRANITIC ROCKS 

II MAFIC INTRUSIVE ROCKS 

II ULTRAMAFIC ROCKS 

II UNDIVIDED FELSIC VOLCANIC ROCKS 

II ALKALIC FELSIC & INTERM. VOLCANIC ROCKS 

II UNDIV. SEDIMENTARY & FELSIC VOLC. ROCKS 

II UNDIVIDED MAFIC VOLCANIC ROCKS 

II UNDIV. SEDIMENTARY & MAFIC VOLC. ROCKS 

OPHIOLITE TERRANE 

II LIMESTONE & SHALE 

II BLACK CARBONACEOUS SHALE & LIMESTONE 

II PHOSPHATIC SHALE 

II CHERT 

II CONGLOMERATE 

II COAL-BEARING SANDSTONE & SHALE--A :t: 

II COAL-BEARING SANDSTONE & SHALE--B :t: 

II COAL-BEARING SANDSTONE & SHALE--C :t: 

II COAL-BEARING SANDSTONE & SHALE--D :1: 

II COAL-BEARING SANDSTONE & SHALE --E :1: 

II GRAYWACKE & SHALE 

II LIMESTONE 

II TERRANES OVER WATER 

1 B !BB 2BB I ;,_.. __ MILES 

3121121 

Figure 4. Mineral terranes of Alaska (Arctic Environmental Information and Data Center, 1982). 

for the Alaska FLIS project. The IDIMS was available at 

the start of the project and was used exclusively until 1986, 

when the ARC/INFO system was acquired. Most data files 

were originally digitized by using the vector-digitizing 

subsystem of the IDIMS and then rasterized for analysis and 

output. Multiple attributes, such as those associated with 

the mineral data, were handled by another subsystem of the 

IDIMS, the Earth Resource Information System. The raster 

data describe cells of 40 acres and cover most of the State 

in six coverage blocks. Each block comprises 2,500 by 

2,500 cells. The data also were rasterized to 1-mi2 cells to 

produce 1,500- by 1 ,500-cell files covering most of the 

State. The files are registered to the Albers Equal-Area 

Conic projection. 

All of the Alaska mineral data were converted to the 

vector-based ARC/INFO system by using the Earth 

Resources Observation Systems (EROS) Data Center's 

vector data interchange software. The statewide mineral 

data (RAMRAP) were appended into one statewide coverage and stored in the Albers projection. The AMRAP and 

the MRDS data were stored in 1:250,000-scale quadranglebased coverages in the Universal Transverse Mercator 

projection. Information about the Alaska data base is 

provided in table 3. 

Data Query, Analysis, and Output 

The FLIS data files were queried, analyzed, and 

output to demonstrate capabilities. Traditional GIS operations, such as reclassification and overlay analysis, were 

used to generate answers to such questions as: 

Alaska Pilot Project 7 
• BJREFIU [F UI1IJ tRR1J'EHT 

• U .S • FI:REST SERVICE 

• tt=IT J[Jft_ PARK SERVICE 

• U.S. FISH & WILD. IFE SERVICE 

• llll£R FElERFI... 

• 11IXED FElERFI... 

• tt=IT I VE I:D'tVE'I'EII 

• STATE I:D'tVE'I'EII 

• PRIVATE PRTEtfTS 

• 11IXED rDi-FEIERfl... 

• 11IXED FElERFI... & rDi-FEIERfl... 

til IJJTR 

1 

LitES ARE I..ISiiS IUUI liU'iiiRIES 

Fl...lERS EIUI.. -ARER PRDLEI:Till1 

Figure 5. Surface administrators from the Bureau of Land Management's Alaska Automated Land and Mineral Record 

System, as of 1984. 

• What Federal land in Alaska is restricted from mining? 

• Where are Federally administered lands that are favorable for the occurrence of a particular mineral? 

• Where on non-Federal land is there high potential for a 

particular mineral? 

The raster and vector Alaska data bases are located at 

the EROS Data Center in Sioux Falls, S.Dak., at the EROS 

Alaska Field Office (AFO) in Anchorage, Alaska, and, in 

part, at the USGS Geographic Information System Labora-

. tory in Reston, Va. The data bases will be expanded or 

updated at user or cooperator request. The AFO will use the 

data bases where appropriate to support the USGS Alaska 

Peninsula Mineral Assessment Project, the Chugach 

National Forest GIS project, and other GIS projects that 

require statewide mineral and land status data. Requests 

8 Toward a Federal Land Information System: Experiences and Issues 

for information about the Alaska data bases should be 

directed to the AFO, 4230 University Drive, Anchorage, 

AK 99508-4664. 

FLIS RESEARCH ACCOMPLISHMENTS 

Alaska 

During 1986 and 1987, FLIS staff addressed two 

research topics defined by Alaska government agencies . 

One was the generalization of land use and land cover data, 

classified from satellite data, for input to vector data bases. 

The second was the development of a procedure for 

accessing BLM Alaska ALMRS data and converting them 

to a vector data base. Alaska government agencies are 
Table 3. Summary of Alaska Federal Land Information System data files and selected characteristics 

[USGS, U.S. Geological Survey; BLM, Bureau of Land Management] 

Data files Source Form Attributes IDIMS ARC/INFO Coverage 

RAMRAP..... . . . ... .. ...... ...... USGS . . . . . . . . . Areal............. Multiple . . . . . . . X...... X ........ . Statewide, 

except SE and 

North Slope. 

AMRAP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. do . . . . . . . . . . . .. do . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. do ....... ... X ...... X ........ . 17 1:250,000-

scale quadrangle areas. 

MRDS ........... . > .............. . .. do .......... Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. do .......... X ...... X......... 19 quadrangles, 

about 100 

points per 

quadrangle. 

Mineral terranes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . University of .. Areal............. Single .. ....... X ...... X ......... Statewide. 

Alaska. 

Federal surface ownership . . . . . . . . . . BLM ...... ... . . .. do . . . . . . . . . . . . . Multiple ....... X ..... . Do. 

Federal subsurface ownership....... . .. do . . . . . . . . . . . .. do . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. do .......... X...... Do. 

Federal restrictions ..... . .. . .. ...... . .. do . . . . . . . . . . . .. do . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. .do ... .. .. . .. X...... Do. 

Quadrangle boundaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . USGS ......... Linear and areal... Single ......... X ...... X .... ..... Do. 

Hydrography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. do .......... Linear...... . ..... . .. do .......... X...... Do. 

Roads ....... ......... .. .............. do . . . . . . . . . . . .. do . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. do ... ....... X ..... . Do. 

Coastline ..... .................... . ...do . . . . . . . . . . ...do . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. .do .......... X ...... X ......... Do. 

interested in vector data because of their growing involvement in the ARC/INFO system. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife 

Service, the Alaska State Department of Natural Resources, 

the North Slope Borough, and the AFO are working with 

the ARC/INFO system, and several agencies are planning to 

acquire it. 

The first research topic developed because of the 

inclusion of Alaska land use and land cover data in the 

ARC/INFO system by land resource agencies in Alaska. 

Land use and land cover data classified from Landsat 

multispectral scanner data (Shasby and Cameggie, 1986) 

are available for more than two-thirds of the State. The data 

are in raster form (50- by 50-m cells), 1 :250,000-scale 

quadrangle-based, and projected to Universal Transverse 

Mercator. Each quadrangle contains a large number of 

homogeneous and spatially contiguous grid cells, or 

clusters, that are converted to polygons when incorporated 

in ARC/INFO or other vector systems. The Valdez quadrangle, for example, contains 98,000 clusters; consequently, the FLIS research addressed strategies to reduce 

the number of clusters while limiting data degradation. 

Four generalization strategies were chosen: ( 1) area 

filtering, (2) category aggregation, (3) systematic resampling, and (4) modal searching and replacing (Mayers and 

others, in press). Category aggregation to a lower category 

precision (such as USGS land use and land cover category 

level II to level I) resulted in the largest reduction in the 

number of regions. Area filtering, applied to the results of 

category aggregation, resulted in an image of high overall 

agreement with the original aggregated data and little individual category error. Of the three strategies tested with 

unaggregated categories, area-filtering results had the highest overall agreement with the original data and relatively 

little individual category error (fig. 6 and table 4). Area 

filtering permits individual category filtering and weighting, thus allowing user control of the generalization process. The area-filtering functions were developed by the 

EROS Data Center and were based on the segmentation 

procedure developed by Rosenfield ( 1978) and implemented by Nichols ( 1981). Two of the statistical tests used to 

compare the results of the generalization strategies were 

Cohen's KHAT Statistic (Cohen, 1960) and the fragmentation index (Monmonier, 1974). 

The second area of Alaska FLIS research was the 

development of procedures to access ALMRS data and to 

incorporate them in the ARC/INFO system. The required 

procedure should permit convenient access to digital surface 

administration data by the public, as well as generate 

ALMRS data as ARC/INFO files. Software was required 

that would access the appropriate files, aggregate the 

inherently parcel-level tabular data to Alaska protracted 

sections represented by geographic coordinates, and 

restructure the data to the arc-node format required by the 

ARC/INFO system. The BLM wrote the software and the 

FLIS program assisted in data testing. By the end of 1986, 

ALMRS data of the Valdez quadrangle were converted and 

implemented on the EROS Data Center's system. The 

Valdez data contained 9,500 sections, or polygons, and 24 

attribute items. The data for this one quadrangle required 

about 3.2 million bytes of storage. This is a large amount of 

byte storage for just one quadrangle, and there are 153 

quadrangles in Alaska. Storage requirements are much less 

FLIS Research Accomplishments 9 
LEGEND 

-~ 

UNFILTERED 1b PIXEL FILTER 

•

SifLLIIol 

WFITER 

b'l PIXEL FILTER 25b PIXEL fiLTER 

Figure 6. Spatial results of area-filtering land use and land cover data of a 

portion of the Valdez, Alaska, 1 :250,000-scale quadrangle. 

if specific data themes are generated as individual data files 

and if the boundaries separating redundant sections (polygons) are eliminated. 

Both the land use and land cover generalization 

research and the Alaska ALMRS work provided insights 

into raster and vector data storage requirements (table 5). 

Review of the storage requirements of various data types 

shows that complex data such as land use or land status in 

vector form, having a minimum mapping unit smaller than 

a section, require more storage space than the same data in 

raster form, having a 50- to 100-m grid cell size. Thus, the 

generalization that data in raster form require more storage 

space than the same data in vector form is not always true. 

In general, a data file having a complex polygon structure 

can require more storage in vector form than the same data 

in raster form. Storage space needed for vector data is 

proportional to the number of polygons, lines, and points in 

the study area. Conversely, storage space needed for raster 

data is proportional to the size of the study area and 

inversely proportional to the ground size of the grid cells. 

10 Toward a Federal Land Information System: Experiences and Issues 
Table 4. Statistical results of area-filtering land use and land cover data of a portion of the Valdez, Alaska, 1 :250,000-scale 

quadrangle 

Minimum area threshold size, 2 16 68 100 128 number of pixels 256 512 

Number of polygons 1 ••••.•..•••.• 7,138 1,916 466 310 249 121 59 

Percent reduction of clusters ....... 23.1 79.3 95.0 96.7 97.3 98.7 99.4 

Percent unchanged ..... .. .... ... .. 99.7 95 .3 88.5 86.7 85.5 81.6 77.5 

KHA T2 (percent) ......... .. ...... 99.6 94.3 85.9 83.6 82.1 77.3 71.3 

Fragmentation3 ................... .77 .21 .05 .03 .03 .01 .01 

The number of clusters before area filtering = 9,278. 

2

Cohen's KHAT Statistic = ((NEXij)-XI + Y + i)/(N-E(Xi +X+ i)), where 

N = the total number of elements in a contingency table, 

EXij = the sum of all the diagonal elements in a contingency table, and 

E(Xi +X+ i) = the total sum of each category row and column product. 

3

Fragmentation index (F) = (m-1)/(n-1), where 

m = the number of clusters and 

n = the number of cells. 

New Mexico 

In 1986 and 1987, the New Mexico project served as 

an opportunity for cooperative research among the BLM, 

the Bureau of Mines (BOM), and the USGS. The BLM 

ALMRS data of the Silver City, N. Mex., area became 

available in 1987. The BOM Inventory of Land Use 

Restraints Program (ILURP), a State-by-State inventory of 

mineral availability, was evaluating New Mexico at the 

same time. Both the BLM and the BOM were interested in 

how GIS expertise in the USGS could assist their programs. 

By late 1987, a three-bureau project plan still was being 

developed, but preliminary research was progressing at the 

working levels. 

The goal of the ongoing BOM ILURP program is to 

compare Federal land availability for mineral exploration 

and development with mineral production areas. The final 

reports include 1 :500,000-scale section-level State maps 

that show mineral production areas on Federal land status. 

Maps are prepared by using traditional cartographic techniques. The reports also include area statistics of mineral 

availability recorded for the individual land status parcels. 

The mineral availability data sources are BLM Master Title 

Plats and individual agency management plans (such as a 

National Forest Resource plan). The mineral production 

areas are determined by reviewing data on past production 

and major deposits from Federal and State sources. The 

BOM plans a study for each of the 11 Western States and 5 

Alaska regions; of these, Washington, Colorado, Arizona, 

and two regions of Alaska have been completed. 

One of the objectives of the FLIS program in New 

Mexico was to demonstrate the use of GIS technology for 

automation of the ILURP process. The major research task 

was to convert the land status data collected by the BOM 

from a parcel-level tabular format referenced to legal land 

descriptions to a section-level spatial format referenced to 

geographic coordinates. The procedure developed by the 

FLIS staff is depicted in figure 7. It is similar in concept to 

the procedure for converting Alaska ALMRS data to spatial 

data, but the differences are that (1) the ILURP land status 

data were in a dBASE III format and the Alaska ALMRS 

data were in a Data General format and (2) the ILURP land 

status data locations were converted to surveyed section 

coordinates and the Alaska ALMRS data locations were 

converted to protracted section coordinates. The land status 

data were aggregated to sections, linked to the section 

coordinates digitized from 1: 100,000-scale base maps, and 

entered into ARC/INFO. The study area was the 1 o by 2°, 

east half of the Silver City , N. Mex., quadrangle. The 

mineral production areas were digitized and entered into 

Table 5. Comparative digital storage requirements, in kilobytes, of several types of Federal Land Information System 

data in raster and vector formats 

Data base files Coverage Number of Raster Raster Vector regions 50-m grid 1-mi grid 

Land use and land cover ............. Valdez, Alaska quadrangle ... 98,000 8,300 7 40,960 

Surface administrator .............. .. ... do ....................... 7,000 8,300 7 2,474 

Mineral assessment (AMRAP) ........ Circle, Alaska quadrangle . ... 20 8,300 7 26 

Mineral assessment (RAM RAP). • 0 •• 0 Alaska ..................... 260 1,408,000 1,500 420 

Mineral terranes ... . ........... . ..... ... do ....................... 1,400 1,408,000 1,500 2,261 

FLIS Research Accomplishments 11 
Relational 

Data Base 

Management System 

2 Restructure 

Enter Parcel - Level/ 

Land Status Data 

Data 

1 

Enter Section - Level 

Public Land Survey Data~ 

ARC/INFO 

Statistical Software 

System 

3 Aggregate Parcels 

To Sections 

4 Join Public Land Survey Data To 

Land Status Data 

From ARC/INFO, The 

Section - Level Data 

5 Store And Analyze Both The 

Parcel - Level and Section - Level 

Attribute Data 

~Can Be Transferred To 

Several Other 

Geographic Information 

Systems 

Figure 7. Procedure for converting parcel-level tabular land status data referenced to legal land descriptions to 

section-level spatial land status data referenced to geographic coordinates, for the Silver City, N. Mex., Federal 

Land Information System project. Numbers indicate the order of steps needed to complete the process. 

ARC/INFO. Dozens of map products were generated to 

illustrate the results of various queries and overlays. One 

map product is depicted in figure 8. 

The USGS FLIS and the BOM ILURP cooperative 

effort showed the advantages of using GIS technology for 

BOM ILURP studies. In addition, it demonstrated how the 

technology provides a rapid means to evaluate analysis 

scenarios, generate new products, and update the dynamic 

land status data. 

The mission of the BLM ALMRS for the contiguous 

48 States is "to develop and to implement an efficient 

system for recording, maintaining, and retrieving land 

description, ownership, and use information to support 

Federal program and public users of such records" (U.S. 

Bureau of Land Management, 1984). Since 1984, the FLIS 

program has recognized ALMRS as an important future 

data source and has been planning to incorporate ALMRS 

data in the FLIS Silver City, N. Mex., data base that was 

developed for the cooperative work with the BOM. The 

data base covers the 1 :250,000-scale Silver City, N. Mex. , 

quadrangle and includes mineral data from CUSMAP 

and MRDS, land status data from the BLM surface and 

mineral management status map series, land use and land 

cover data from the USGS, and base cartographic data from 

the USGS. Currently, ALMRS data are being incorporated 

into the data base and analyzed with the other data categories by using ARC/INFO software. Results will indicate the 

future utility of ALMRS data for large-area GIS applications. 

CONCLUSIONS, ISSUES, AND 

RECOMMENDATIONS 

For more than 4 years, the USGS conducted GIS 

projects and research under the FLIS program. The original 

program goal to develop a national resource data base was 

not reached, but much was learned about design requirements and strategies for system implementation. 

The major accomplishments of the FLIS program are 

1. Raster and vector data bases of land status, mineral 

assessment, mineral occurrence, and cartographic data of 

12 Toward a Federal Land Information System: Experiences and Issues 
SILUER CITY 111111111 

UTlt l'lnEI:TIIIt mtE te 

1111 l£1tR CELL Sl2E 

L...LIL..""'.-.L.. LAND AUAILABLE 

MINING & EXPLDRATIDN 

FEDERAL LAND SLIGHTLY & MODERATELY 

RESTRICTED TD MINING & EXPLDRATIDN 

• FEDERAL LAND UNAVAILABLE DR SEUERELY 

RESTRICTED FDR MINING & EXPLDRATIDN 

• PAST MINERAL PRDDUCTIDN AREAS DN AUAILABLE LAND 

• PAST MINERAL PRDDUCTIDN AREAS DN 

SLIGHTLY & MDD. RESTRICTED LAND 

• PAST MINERAL PRDDUCTIDN AREAS DN 

UNAUA I L • & SEUEREL Y RESTRICTED LAND 

Figure 8. Mineral availability on Federal mineral lands and past mineral production areas of the Silver City, N. Mex., 

1 :100,000-scale quadrangle. Data are from the Bureau of Mines' Inventory of Land Use Restraints Program. Restrictions 

are from master title plats and agency management plans. Mineral areas are based on mine and deposit locations. White 

areas are non-Federal land, black lines are township boundaries, and red lines delineate high mineral areas. 

Alaska were developed. Individual data files in digital form 

are being used by Alaska government agencies for land 

resource management. The data base can be enhanced as 

more data become available. 

2. A digital format for USGS mineral assessment data 

was established, and data from all published AMRAP maps 

and two CUSMAP maps have been digitized. Because of 

the FLIS program, new Alaska mineral occurrence data 

have been added to the USGS MRDS at an accelerated rate. 

3. Procedures for accessing Alaska ALMRS data and 

incorporating them into a raster and a vector GIS were 

established. 

4. A procedure was developed to convert (a) parcellevel digital tabular land status data (in the contiguous 48 

States) referenced to legal land descriptions to (b) sectionlevelland status data referenced to geographic coordinates. 

The procedure was used to convert land status data from the 

BOM ILURP. 

5. A vector GIS and a raster GIS were evaluated, and 

spatial analysis requirements for a FLIS were documented. 

Land use and land cover data generalization strategies for 

grid cell to polygon conversion were studied, and results 

were documented. 

6. The BOM and the USGS have entered into 

cooperative agreements in several areas, largely because of 

strong FLIS and ILURP working-level relations. The FLIS 

and ILURP cooperative work underway will continue 

beyond the FLIS program. 

Conclusions, Issues, and . Recommendations 13 
7. The FLIS program demonstrated to the BOM 

ILURP how GIS technology can be used in the BOM 

statewide mineral availability studies. 

8. Data bases were developed for the Medford, 

Oreg., and the Silver City, N. Mex., quadrangle areas. 

These bases served as key components of USGS demonstrations of GIS capabilities at the USGS National Center 

and the EROS Data Center. 

If the goal of a future Federal Government program is 

to develop an operational nationwide natural resource data 

base, then specific and preliminary steps should be taken to 

achieve that goal. ( 1) The need for such a system should be 

documented and supported by a Congressional mandate that 

identifies the funding source and the participating agencies; 

(2) the administrative responsibilities and the cooperation 

between and within agencies should be approved and 

documented in advance; and (3) a detailed system design 

study should follow and include the definition of specific 

user needs, GIS functional requirements, data sources, 

input data types, data formats and resolution, data volume, 

data output, frequency of system use, system security, 

processing efficiency, quality control, and interfaces to 

other systems. The study also should include an implementation plan for system integration, data base assembly, and 

system testing. A maintenance plan designating system 

location, facilities, management, personnel, user services, 

and user costs also should be included in the design study. 

Past USGS FLIS program experiences indicate that 

the system will require (1) automated capabilities to access 

rapidly and integrate digital data from other agencies; (2) a 

resident data base and a network of data bases permitting 

interactive query with almost immediate output; (3) vector 

and raster capabilities, preferably in a common system 

environment, directly tied to a sophisticated data base 

management system; and (4) capabilities and data base 

structures for large-volume data storage and processing. 

Data availability is currently the most limiting factor 

to system development, and interagency agreements for 

data collection and sharing are essential. Digital data 

sharing will be facilitated by the establishment of data 

standards. Key data sources will be the BLM ALMRS and 

the USGS and the BOM mineral data. Other data sources 

should be developed, such as the U.S. Forest Service Land 

Ownership Management System, the BOM Mineral Availability System, and individual State data bases. 

Because the system users will be high-level government policymakers concerned with national issues, more 

research on data aggregation and generalization is needed. 

If a national natural resource FLIS ever is to be developed, 

it should be managed by those who routinely interact with 

the major user group. For example, if Congress is the user, 

then the designers and the operators of the FLIS should be 

at a Government level that can associate with Congress. 

Finally, the USGS should consider expanding its 

mission of providing national digital cartographic information to include mineral, certain types of land status data, and 

perhaps other natural resource data. The availability of 

these data from the National Digital Cartographic Data 

Base, in a standard digital format, could fulfill many 

national resource policymaking requirements. 

REFERENCES CITED 

Arctic Environmental Information and Data Center, 1982, 

Mineral terranes of Alaska: Anchorage, University of 

Alaska, scale 1:1,000,000, 6 sheets. 

Arndt, R.E., 1987, Implementing a Federal Land Information System: Proceedings, American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, Fall Technical 

Meeting, Reno, Nevada, p. 27-31. 

Calkins, J.A., Kays, Olaf, and Keefer, E.K., 1978, 

CRIB-The mineral resources data bank of the U.S. 

Geological Survey: U.S. Geological Survey Circular 

681, 39 p. 

Cohen, Jacob, 1960, A coefficient of agreement for nominal scales: Educational and Psychological Measurement, v. 20, no. 1, p. 37-46. 

Domaratz, M.A., Hallam, C.A., Schmidt, W.E., and 

Calkins, H.W., 1983, Digital line graphs from 

1:2,000,000-scale maps: U.S. Geological Survey Circular 895-D, 40 p. 

Kleckner, R.L., 1984, The Federal Mineral Land Information System: Annual Meeting of the American Society 

of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, Washington, 

D.C., March 1984, Proceedings, American Congress 

on Surveying and Mapping, Falls Church, Virginia, p. 

20-26. 

Mayers, M.G., Fosnight, E.A., and Sturdevant, J.A., in 

press, A study of four raster-based data generalization 

procedures, in Selected papers in the applied computer 

sciences: U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin 1841. 

Monmonier, M.S., 1974, Measures of pattern complexity 

for choropleth maps: American Cartographer, v. 1, no. 

2, p. 159-169. 

Nichols, D.A., 1981, Conversion of raster coded images to 

polygonal data structures: 7th Annual William T. 

Pecora Memorial Symposium, Sioux Falls, South 

Dakota, Proceedings, Benjamin F. Richardson, ed., 

Falls Church, Virginia, American Society for Photogrammetry, p. 508-515. 

Rosenfield, Azriel, 1978, Extraction of topological information from digital images: 1st International Advanced 

Symposium on Topological Data Structures for Geographic Information Systems, Proceedings, Geoffrey 

Duton, ed., Harvard, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, v. 6, p. 790-805. 

Shasby, M.B., and Carneggie, D.M., 1986, Vegetation and 

terrain mapping using Landsat MSS and digital terrain 

data: Photogrammetric Engineering and Remote Sensing, v. 52, no. 6, p. 779-786. 

Singer, D.A., and Ovenshine, A.T., 1979, Assessing 

metallic resources in Alaska: American Scientist, v. 

67, no. 5, p. 582-589. 

14 Toward a Federal Land Information System: Experiences and Issues 
Singer, D.A., Page, N.J, Smith, J.G., Blakely, R.J., and 

Johnson, M.G., 1982, Mineral resource assessment of 

the Medford 1°X2° quadrangle, Oregon: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 82-1037, 2 p. and 2 

maps. 

Sturdevant, J.A., Batten, L.G., Cameggie, D.M., Meyer, 

David, Johnson, Jay, and Walker, Kim-Marie, 1986, 

The Alaska Federal Land Information System: American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 

Fall Technical Meeting, Anchorage, Alaska, 

Sept.-Oct. 1986, Proceedings, Falls Church, Virginia, 

American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote 

Sensing, v. 52, no. 6, July 1986, p. 791-799. 

Sturdevant, J.A., and Kleckner, R.L., 1984, Spatial 

analysis requirements for a Federal Mineral Land 

Information System: William T. Pecora Memorial 

Remote Sensing Symposium, 9th, Sioux Falls, South 

Dakota, 1984, Proceedings, Silver Spring, Maryland, 

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 

Inc., ISBN 0-8186--0588-X, p. 168-173. 

U.S. Bureau of Land Management, 1983, The Alaska 

automated land records system briefing book: U.S. 

Bureau of Land Management, Alaska State Office, 35 

p. 

U.S. Bureau of Land Management, 1984, Automated land 

and mineral record system: U.S. Government Printing 

Office, 1985/578-612/25180, 31 p. 

References Cited 15 

SELECTED SERIES OF U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY PUBLICATIO~NS 

Periodicals 

Earthquakes & Volcanoes (issued bimonthly). 

Preliminary Determination ot Epicenters (issued monthly). 

Technical Books and Repons 

Professional Papers are mainly comp-ehensive scientific reports of 

wide and luting interest and importance to professional scientists and engineers. Included are reports on the results of resource studies and of 

topographic, hydrologic. and geologic investigations. They also include 

collections of related papers addressing different aspects of a single scientific topic. 

Bulletins contain significant data and interpretations that are of luting scientific interest but are generally more limited in scope or 

geographic coverage than Professional Papers. They include the results 

of resource studies and of geologic and topographic investigations; u well 

u collections of short papers related to a specific topic. 

Water-Supply Papers are comprehensive reports that present significant interpretive results of hydrologic investigations of wide interest 

to professional geologists. hydrologists, and engineers. The series covers 

investigations in all phues of hydrology, including hydrogeology, 

availability of water, quality of water, and use of water. 

CIJ'culars present administrative infonnation or important scientific 

information of wide popular interest in a format designed for distribution 

at no cost to the public. Information is usually of short-term interest. 

Water-Resources Investtaatlons Reports are papers of an interpretive nature made available to the public outside the formal USGS publications series. Copies are reprociuced on request unlike formal USGS 

publications, and they are also available for public inspection at 

depositories indicated in USGS catalogs. 

Open-FOe Reports include unpublished manuscript reports, maps, 

and other material that are made available for public consultation at 

depositories. They are a nonpennanent form of publication that may be 

cited in other publications u sources of information. 

Maps 

Geoloclc Quadran1le Maps are multicolor geologic maps on 

topographic bases in 71/2- or IS-minute quadrangle formats (scales mainly 1:24,000 or 1 :62.500) showing bedrock. surficial, or engineering geology. Maps generally include brief texts; some maps include structure 

and columnar sections only. 

Geophysical Investlptlons Maps are on topographic or planimetric 

bases at various scales; they show results of surveys using geophysical 

teclmiques. such u gravity, magnetic. seismic, or radioactivity, which 

reflect subsurface structures that are of economic or geologic significance. 

Many maps include correlations with the geology. 

Miscellaneous Investlptlons Series Maps are on planimetric or 

topographic bases of regular and ilregular areu at various scales; they 

present a wide variety of format and subject matter. The series also includes 71/2-minutequadrangle photogeologicmaps on planimetric bases 

which show geology u interpreted from aerial photographs. Series also 

includes maps of Mars and the Moon. 

Coal Investilatlons Maps are geologic maps on topographic or 

planimetric bases at various scales showing bedrock or surflcial geology, stratigraphy, and structural relations in certain coal-r~?urce ar-:as· 

011 and Gas Investlptlons Charts show stratigraphic information 

for certain oil and gu fields and other areu having petrole\U'Il potential. 

Miscellaneous Field Studies Maps are multicolor or black-andwhite maps on topographic or planimetric bases on quadrangle or irregular areas at various scales. Pre-1971 maps show bedrock geology 

in relation to specific mining or mineral-deposit problems; post-1971 

maps are primarily black-and-white maps on various subjects such as 

environmental studies or wilderness mineral investigations. 

Hydrologic Invest~Katlons Atlases are multicolored or black-andwhite maps on topographic or planimetric bases presenting a wide range 

of geohydrologic dataofboth regular and irregular areu; principal scale 

is 1:24,000 and regional studies are at 1:250,000 scale or smaller. 

Catalogs 

Permanent catalogs, u well u some others, givin& comprehensive listings of U.S. Geological Survey publications are available \Dlder 

the conditions indicated below from the U.S. Geological Survey, Books 

and Open-File Reports Section. Federal Center, Box 25425, Denver, 

CO 80225. (See latest Price and Availability LisL) 

"Publk:atlons of the Geoqlcal Survey, 1879-1961" ~y be purchased by mail and over the co\llllel" in paperback book foqn and u a 

set of microfiche. ! 

"Publications of the GeoiO(IIcal Survey, 1961-1970"ly be purchased by mail and over the couriter in paperback book fo and u a 

set of microfiche. 

"Publications ofthe U.S. Geolopcal Suney, 1971-1 1" may be 

purchased by mail and over the counter in paperback bookl form (two 

volumes, publications listing and index) and as a set of mi~fiche. 

Supplements for 1982,1983, 1984,1985,1986, andfor~ubsequent 

years since the last permanent catalog may be purchased by mail and 

over the counter in paperback book form. ± 

State catalop, "List of U.S. Geological Survey . logic and 

Water-SupplyReportsandMapsFor(State),"maybepUICh 1 bymail 

and over the counter in paperback booklet fonn only. I 

"Price and AvaHabWty List of U.S. Geotock:al :bUcatlons," issued amually, is available free of charae in booklet fonn only. ! 

Selected coplesot a monthly cataJoc "New Publications! of the U.S. 

Geological Survey" available free of charge by mail ormay_~_obtained 

over the COlDlter in paperback booklet fonn only. Those ~g a free 

subscription to the monthly catalog "New Publications cf the U.S. 

Geological Survey" should write to the U.S. Geological S~ey, S82 

National Center, Reston. VA 22092. : 

i 

Note.-Prices of Government publications listed in o~ catalogs, 

amouncements. and publicatio.ns may be incorrecL Therefore. the 

prices charged may differ from the prices in catalogs, anno1fncements, 

and publications.