OGC Multi-Hazard Mapping Initiative Addresses Interoperability”

March 25, 2002

Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC)

Wayland, MA -- How can emergency managers and planners improve their ability to access critical data needed to deal with natural hazards? The Open GIS Consortium's (OGC) Multi-Hazard Mapping Initiative Phase 1 (MMI-1) is tackling just that question in preparation for a public demonstration on March 29, 2002.Sponsored by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the initiative will develop and test an interoperable, standards based framework for the discovery and distribution of multi-hazard map data between federal, state, and local emergency management agencies.

Natural hazard maps and the base maps they depend upon are developed at all levels of government and in the private sector for a variety of purposes.Information sharing is hampered by the diversity of geographic information systems in use across organizations for hazard mapping.The MMI initiative will demonstrate how the Internet can be used as a medium to locate, retrieve and exploit multi-hazard map data from many different organizations regardless geographic location, the computing platform or software solution being used.This pilot will become an operational part of the OGC Network in April 2002.OGC members participating in this initiative include CubeWerx, Compusult, SAIC, ESRI, Harvard Design and Mapping (HDM) and MapInfo.

The Multi-Hazard Mapping Initiative demonstration will involve two fictional use cases, each focusing on different types of hazards. One scenario, based in California, uses for illustrative purposes the development of a 20-year land use plan.By combining information about land use, population, transportation and hazards data (including earthquake susceptibility, historical data on faults, tsunamis, and wildfires), the planner can evaluate where exposure to natural hazards might warrant further evaluation in the planning process.

The second scenario, located in North Carolina, will demonstrate the use of multi-hazard advisory maps to provide better information for a hurricane response plan for a three county region. A variety of geospatial data sets will be rapidly accessed from different organizations and combined with other critical information via the Internet to produce the maps.The demonstration will call upon data such as historic storm paths, flood maps, roads, hazard probability maps, and demographic information.

The MMI-1 demonstration will take place at the Rosslyn Spectrum in Rosslyn, Virginia.Doors will open at 12:00 EST with the demonstration starting at 1:00 EST.Those interested in attending should register at http://ip.opengis.org/mmi/mmi_reg.html. Directions to the Rosslyn Spectrum can be found at http://www.actorscenter.org/spectrum.html.Parking is limited, however there is ample public transportation available.

ABOUT CUBEWERX INC.
Founded in 1996, CubeWerx has been developing standard-based off the shelf software products (SCOTS) in response to Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) requirements for interoperable information infrastructures. CubeWerx is an innovative software company whose expertise includes development, marketing and selling of Web Services and Spatial Warehousing software products. These products and other location-based software product components support the most demanding requirements for the integration, access, and management of very large volumes of Spatial Data over the web. CubeWerx products such as CubeXPLOR, CubeSERV and CubeSTOR were developed using open and interoperable specifications from the Open GIS Consortium. These products allow organizations responsible for Geospatial data to respond to their most demanding client requirements and offer them on-line Web services in a multi-vendor products environment. More information on CubeWerx is available on the Internet at www.cubewerx.com.

For more information please contact:
Edric Keighan (CubeWerx)
Tel.: (819) 771-8303 x207
E-mail

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