Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology is increasingly being used by local governments across the United States, but each community captures different information and uses different scales or values.  This make comparing or merging data difficult, time consuming, and discourages neighboring or overlapping governments from using GIS technology in cooperative planning.

 

NRPA, historically, has been a source for standards related to park planning and assessment.  With support from the American Park and Recreation Society Branch, NRPA is undertaking a project to develop standards and guidelines related to the information captured in GIS databases for local government parks, trails and recreation facilities.  Further, NRPA will seek to have these adopted as standards by the Federal Geographic Data Committee.

 

The benefits of capturing consistent information on park and recreation resources in GIS databases will have several implications over time.  Most immediately, they will support regional planning by allowing neighboring or overlapping governments to merge and compare data with greater ease.  Use of these standards by states to developm a state-wide GIS that includes state, county and municipal parks, trails and recreation facilities would make the inventory portion of the Statewide Comprehensive Outdoor Recreation Plan (SCORP) and snap to produce and be available to support the Land and Water Conservation Fund state-side grant process.  In the future, the community data could be uploaded to a national dataset, similar to the National Atlas, allowing individuals to customize how they view the information on a particular area.  A national dataset would allow the calculation of the total footprint of public parks and recreation in the United States, key statistics that can be leveraged to support national legislative issues.

 

 

Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC)

Interagency National Trail Data Content Standards Project Information (FGDC Site | NPS Site)

National Atlas; The National Map

Parkinfo.org (currently California only)

Rec-Finder (Kansas only)

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