We're interested in helping the public better understand those connections by looking at watersheds. The index examines a variety of indicators, or data layers, to determine the relative health of rivers, lakes, streams, wetlands and coastal areas as well as whether activities on surrounding lands are putting them at risk. IWI is a result of EPA's partnerships with several federal, state and nongovernmental organizations. An updated IWI will be available on the site in September 1999. According to Klima, one of the most popular site areas is the Locate Your Watershed feature, which offers users a variety of methods to search and access personal watershed data.
Users can locate watersheds by using state maps or by name, place or other means.
The site now has county maps, metropolitan area maps and American Heritage Nominees maps, and a state level of the IWI is available for more localized analyses. Site visitors are welcome to add information, including additional environmental Web sites, announcements for the site's News Flashes page, state and tribal information, and comments about the site. Users also can add services to the American Heritage Rivers Services page, watershed groups to the site's Adopt Your Watershed page and maps to the site's Map Library. The site is updated continuously and has experienced a healthy growth rate, receiving 1.6 million hits in May 1999, compared to 30,000 hits in October 1996. GEO Asia Pacific Copyright 2001 by Adams Business Media .