NCRST-E Briefing: Corridor Planning and Environmental Assessment

1. NCRST-E Briefing: Corridor Planning and Environmental Assessment Joint Program Oversight Committee Meeting October 25, 2002

2. NCRST-E Research and Directions • Mississippi Gulf Coast: Multiple Research and Support Areas • Land Use and Land Cover Change: Multi-Scale Research • Air Quality Research: New Sensor and Modeling Technologies • Wetlands Mapping: Multi-Location Research and Outreach • Computational Mapping: IT, CE, and Geospatial Research (as well as important standards-based approach to implement) • Corridor Planning: Workshop and Research Formulation • NCRST-E Taps • Veridian • Virginia DOT • Washington DOT

3. MS Gulf Coast MS Gulf Coast Research Activities NCRST-E is conducting an assessment of land cover and land use change in the Mississippi coastal corridor with the purpose of identifying changes due to transportation and land development. New techniques for classification and analysis were developed.

4. MS Gulf Coast Mississippi Gulf Coast:Land Use and Land Cover Change

5. MS Gulf Coast Mississippi Gulf Coast: Assessing Urban Growth Within Sensitive Coastal Environmental Systems

6. MS Gulf Coast Mississippi Gulf Coast: Determining Patterns of Growth and Quantifying Change and Development For Bay St. Louis, Biloxi, and Pascagoula, change is highlightedfor the period from 1991 to 2000.

7. MS Gulf Coast Mississippi Gulf Coast: Supporting the CSX Railroad Relocation EIS Study

8. LULC Change NCRST-E is Studying Land Use and Land Cover Change at Regional, Watershed, and Coastal Levels NCRST-E is investigating land cover and land use change and impacts of change and developmentat various scales and inmultiple settings.The research is providingimproved understandingabout environmental andhydrologic impacts of transportation development.

9. Air Quality NCRST-E is Studying Transportation Impacts on Air Quality by Using LIDAR Technology The NCRST-E air quality project is focused on the adverse effects of air pollutants. The primary objectives of this project are: (1) developing guidelines on the use of remote sensing Differential Absorption LIDAR (DIAL) for real-time measurement of air pollution resulting from highway traffic and (2) an air quality model for prediction of air pollution considering the impact of highway traffic, land use, terrain type, and climatic factors.

10. Wetlands NCRST-E is Developing New Geospatial Applications and Processing Algorithms for Wetlands Assessment • The assessment of vegetation, soils, and hydrology forms the basis of standard wetlands field assessments. • Determining how those assessmentsare made facilitates the development of surrogate processes using RS and geospatial technologies to producesimilar results. Research Results: • Pecora PaperPoster SessionWorkshop Hydrology Soils Vegetation

11. Wetlands Hyperspectral Image and LIDAR Data forWetland Identification, Mapping, and Analysis Randolph County, North Carolina Hyperspectral image data were collected andclassified to obtain classes that closely resembled those used in NWI surveys. LIDAR was used for terrain and hydrologic analysis.

12. Wetlands Hyperspectral Image and LIDAR Data for Wetland Mapping and AssessmentEddyville, Iowa For a new bypass project, the Iowa DOT determined that there were landscape features that gave rise to wetlands in an area where they have planned an alignment. With involvement of NCRST-E high spatial resolution hyperspectral image data will be used to identify areas where wetland vegetation occurs.

13. Wetlands Wetlands AssessmentAlgorithm Development Quantitatively assessing the likelihood of wetlands occurrence requires that vegetation classes be stratified and clarified then ranked, combined, and assessed in the context of hydrology and soils for the area. To accomplish the contextual analysis, data analysis steps and products are grouped into vegetation and non-vegetation information groups. Soils and hydrology information products combined to contribute 30 possible points and the vegetation information products combined to contribute 30 possible points.

14. CME Computational Resources for Geospatial Data and Information Use, Distribution, and Management In a peer review meeting of the TRB statewide GIS committee a consistently echoed theme was the need for improved access and distribution of standard, consistent data sets that are useful for transportation planning and assessment as well as early phases of design. NCRST-E is working to develop technology for Computational Mapping Engines and Distributed Geospatial Data Libraried that will allow agencies to …. View Data in a Map….. Select Areas of Interest.... Refine the Area of Interest....

15. CME Computational Resources for Geospatial Data and Information Use, Distribution, and Management AND …. Create Consistent CUSTOM Geospatial Image Products that meet the needs of transportation agencies!

16. CME Computational Resources for Geospatial Data and Information Use, Distribution, and Management The CME is a technology that hides the complexity of data storage, management, and processing from the user and provides a web-based method of access to computational resources that replace traditional image processing workflows ….. Web Access to Data and Methods…. AND Computational Workflows!

17. GICAP 2002 NCRST-E Research Formulation:Corridor Planning and Environmental Assessment NCRST-E held a workshop (GICAP 2002) to address the challenge of using remote sensing and geospatial technologies for corridor planning and assessment activities. Topics and presentations ranged geographically and by transportation modes including such diverse areas as the Alaska Natural Gas Pipeline, the Virginia Base Mapping Project, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast CSX Railroad relocation project.

18. TAPs New Technology Application Projects There have been new TAP’s selected, three of which have been associated with the NCRST-E: • Veridian • Virginia DOT • Washington DOT

19. New TAP linked to NCRST-E Virginia DOT; Dan Widner widner_dk@vdot.state.va.us 804 - 786 - 6762 Washington DOT; E. LanzerLanzerE@WADOT.WA.GOV 360-705-7476 Veridian; John Albasini John.Albasini@veridian.com 228 - 688 - 1504 Designated RSPA contact Aviva BrecherAviva.Brecher@volpe.dot.gov 617 - 494 - 3470 Chip Wood Chip.Wood@ost.dot.gov 202 - 366 - 5911 TAPs TAP’s, NCRST-E, and RSPA ContactsIncreased Coordination Roles

20. TAPs Regional Database Development for Transportation Planning

21. TAPs Proposed Remote Sensing/GIS Solution Paradigm 1. Change detection analysis for updating landcover/ landuse 2. Sharing of data across the Internet via an Internet Map Server (IMS) 3. GIS based planning tool for automatic calculation of environmental impacts, creation of impact matrices and development of alignment mapping.

22. TAPs PROJECT TITLE: Automating Wetlands Identification to meet Federal Reporting Requirements Objective: Integration with existing GIS architecture to streamline the process for planned road construction projects

23. TAPs Remote Sensing and the Planning Process Remotely sensed wetlands data can be introduced early in the planning process Benefits include: • Incorporation with other available GIS data layers • Good preliminary indication of potential impact • Provides an accurate guide to field reconnaissance and survey

24. Washington DOT The project goal will demonstrate the use of commercial software and remotely sensed data to produce information products that streamline the environmental analysis process for transportation project planning. This project is developing land use land cover data using remote sensing technologies in concert with other digital geospatial resources and methods for the same I-405 corridor, then applying that information to appropriate environmental impact statement topics to determine benefits as compared to traditional environmental assessment methods already performed.