Coastal ecosystem decision‐support GIS: Functions and methodology

Abstract

To solve coastal resource and environmental issues and handle complex spatial data and information effectively and efficiently, a coastal ecosystem decision‐support geographic information system (GIS) is being developed at the Southern Science Center of the U.S. National Biological Service. With three subsystems, natural resource management, environmental impact assessment, and data and information handling, respectively, the multifunctional system is designed to provide decision makers with tools to integrate and organize various environmental data and information for analytical modeling, spatial query, and graphic visualization. The multiple integration approach was employed in this system's development based on a commercial GIS, which includes subsystems integration, environmental data integration, decision‐support functions integration, and analytical model integration.

Keywords:

• GIS
• spatial decision support
• analytical modeling
• coastal ecosystem
• ecosystem management

Notes

Formerly the National Wetlands Research Center, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.