Building the Geospatial Platform

National Spatial Data Infrastructure Advances

One of the most exciting and progressive advancements for the National Spatial Data Infrastructure is the recent call by the administration for the creation of a geospatial platform to promote the sharing of geospatial data, services, and applications to support all levels of government; the vision for this managed portfolio is for it to be

• Contributed to and administered by authoritative sources
• Hosted on a shared infrastructure
• Meeting the needs of government agencies and partners

The platform will provide the environment and leadership to drive technology investments and capabilities to maximize increasingly tight budget resources to meet growing public demands for services. The platform will leverage the expertise and data holdings of geospatial organizations and enhance the nation's development of and access to all things geospatial.

Geospatial platform conceptual model.

As the concept for the platform developed, the National Geospatial Advisory Committee (NGAC) provided feedback, comments, and suggestions. NGAC, which includes representatives from the private sector, nonprofit organizations, academia, and all levels of government, approved the following resolution in support of the platform earlier this year:

The NGAC endorses the Geospatial Platform concept model as described in the Platform Roadmap and encourages the Administration, along with federal agency leadership, to adopt, support, and implement this initiative in partnership with State, local, regional and Tribal governments.

Says Anne Hale Miglarese, NGAC chair, "The NGAC is highly encouraged that the administration has directed federal geospatial managers to develop a geospatial platform that incorporates common services, portfolio management, place-based initiatives, and an emphasis on addressing intergovernmental requirements. We look forward to continued collaboration on this important initiative."

The partner agencies of the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) and its stakeholders in government, academia, and the private sector are developing the foundational plans for the platform, which will promote information sharing throughout the geospatial and other communities and provide opportunities to conduct business in new and innovative ways.

"Coordinating the development and delivery of the nation's geospatial data and services is a complicated task," says Ivan DeLoatch, executive director of FGDC, "but the geospatial platform provides a means for us to work together as a community to provide these critical products and services."

Implementing the platform strategy will result in a set of future benefits where

• Commercial, academic, and nonprofit organizations, as well as all levels of government, work collaboratively with a common set of geospatial policies, procedures, standards, and data models; share common goals and objectives; and coordinate and leverage their efforts.
• Authoritative and interoperable geospatial information and tools are available, accessible, consistently delivered, and routinely used.
• Incentives are in place to ensure equitable technology cost sharing, cost-effective initiatives, continuous progress, and innovation.
• Economies of scale drive technology investments to help leverage increasingly tight budget resources in the face of growing public demands for services.

As a means to provide an organized approach to the development of this geospatial infrastructure, FGDC agencies have developed a high-level implementation plan, the Geospatial Platform Modernization Roadmap. The road map is available at geoplatform.gov. The key components are

• Common data, services, and applications—The platform will deliver trusted and registered geospatial data, services, and applications that are valuable to multiple agencies or customers to meet their business requirements.
• Shared infrastructure—The platform will promote and foster utilization of contemporary IT solutions (e.g., cloud computing) and shared investments across multiple partner organizations.
• Geospatial segment architecture—Platform components will be designed and deployed through a process-driven approach that can be readily used in solution architectures by partners collaborating on geospatial data and services.
• Collaborative governance—The platform will be managed in a collaborative manner, allowing partners and stakeholders to help shape its structure, functions, and capabilities.
• Portfolio management—The platform will support the prioritization, selection, and allocation of resources to maximize value in geospatial data, services, and applications.

Stakeholder Engagement

FGDC is seeking community input on the development of the geospatial platform. The outreach process includes use of a social media Web site—geoplatform.ideascale.com—to generate dialog and seek suggestions on how to improve the platform proposal. Comments can also be sent to geoplatformcomments@fgdc.gov. Following completion of the initial stakeholder engagement process in December 2010, FGDC will revise and update the implementation plan to incorporate feedback received from partners and stakeholders.

For more information about the geospatial platform, visit geoplatform.gov. To provide your input, you are invited to join in the conversation at geoplatform.ideascale.com.