GIS 5050 Week 4 - Vector Analysis

 


Week 4 introduced students to Vector Analysis. Again, this lab was broken up into two parts. The first part of the lab helped students become familiar with geodatabases, spatial queries, attribute queries and proximities, all of which would be handy in the second part of the lab. I particularly enjoyed learning about the difference between a geodata base and a shapefile, and being introduced to the vast benefits of using a geodatabase, in particular the benefits in data management. 

The second part of the lab taught students how to utilize various analysis tools such as buffer (compound and variable), union, intersect and erase. It also introduced concepts such as adding a field, calculate field and calculate geometry. All of these tools and concepts were used to determine potential camp sites in the De Soto National Forest, found near Hattiesburg, Mississippi (see map above).  Potential Camp Sites  needed to be within 150 meters of a lake or 500 meters of a river, within 300 meters of a road and not be located in conservation area. My results, displayed as Possible Camp Sites in the legend, shows the area (size) in hectares and consists of 5 groups divided based on equal interval. The yellow shades show the smaller areas while the green shades show the larger areas.

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