{"id":5296,"date":"2015-06-24T10:37:58","date_gmt":"2015-06-24T17:37:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/insider\/?p=5296"},"modified":"2015-06-24T10:37:58","modified_gmt":"2015-06-24T17:37:58","slug":"rip-up-those-old-paper-maps","status":"publish","type":"insider","link":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/insider\/rip-up-those-old-paper-maps","title":{"rendered":"Rip Up Those Old Paper Maps"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pop quiz! What\u2019s the difference between a paper GIS and a digital GIS display?<\/strong><\/em>
\n\u201cYou can fold the paper plot, but you can\u2019t fold the display.\u201d That\u2019s the most common answer. That\u2019s also the problem.
\nMany people still view GIS<\/a> displays as less convenient ways to see GIS plots. When I worked for a power company, we built special cabinets in the dispatch center just to hold our medium-voltage operating map sheets. That\u2019s because we\u2019d plotted our sheets on nonstandard sizes, so the standard file cabinets didn\u2019t work. When we converted from our old, hand-drawn operating maps to GIS maps, we just plotted the new map sheets to look exactly like the old ones. And we plotted them on the same size paper as the old paper maps. Why? So they could fit in our custom file cabinets. If we could have recreated coffee stains on the GIS plots, we would have. Everything\u2014the symbols, annotation, line weights, and of course plot sizes\u2014were the same on the new as on the old map sheets.
\n\"\"
\nOur underlying basemap grid was also a throwback to some arbitrary system from early in the previous century. Change it? Get out of town!
\n
\nThe Struggle to Change with Technology <\/strong>
\nWhy are we so in love with old map sheets? Because in such a dangerous business as utility operations<\/a>, the old map sheets work. We fear if we change, something bad will happen. Someone will blame us. We rarely reflect on the negative impact of keeping old processes and systems in place. Yet these impacts abound.
\nThe whole process of maintaining map plots, whether computerized or hand-drawn, is fraught with delays. A plot is a small snapshot of a utility system. It\u2019s time-stamped. Yet we know each hour of each day, someone is changing the system. A repairperson swaps a streetlamp. A technician replaces a gas valve. A construction crew sets a new pole. Utilities don\u2019t sleep.
\nCompleting each task like these and more requires the field worker to mark up the map sheet, send it to headquarters, and wait for someone to enter the change. The poor data-entry person might take a hundred change requests a day. When done, this person has to plot the new map sheet. The time from the original markup to getting a new map to the field worker\u2019s hands can take days, even weeks. In the meantime, everyone relies on outdated map sheets.
\nWhen I worked for a power company, I used to drive around with the troubleshooters. One, whom we\u2019ll call Paul, told me he never trusted the mapping department\u2019s maps. The maps were always wrong or outdated. So Paul kept a set of medium-voltage prints showing his territory. He pulled them out from under the seat of his truck one day to show me. Paul\u2019s maps had all kinds of notes and neatly drawn redlines. I asked Paul if we could give his maps to the mapping departments. He freaked out. Paul said he wished he\u2019d never shown me his stash.
\nSo I wondered: How many other workers hid their own markups under truck seats, in lockers, or stuffed under mattresses?
\n
\nAdopting a Modern Mapping Strategy <\/strong>
\nJust the other day, a utility consultant asked me about mobile GIS<\/a>. I asked him what his utility wanted to do with mobile GIS. The consultant looked puzzled and said the utility wanted to take GIS into the field. Obviously. They wanted mobile GIS.
\nBut I repeated my question.
\n\u201cYes,\u201d I said, \u201cbut what do they want to do<\/em> in the field with mobile GIS?\u201d
\nHe didn\u2019t understand.
\nMy assumption is this consultant\u2019s utility wanted to create GIS plots on mobile devices (e.g., laptops, tablets). Plots<\/em>. Get it? The suspense was killing me.
\n\u201cYes,\u201d I said once more. \u201cBut what specific work<\/em> will your field crews do with mobile GIS?\u201d
\n\u201cAll kinds of field work,\u201d he said. Then he gave in. He didn\u2019t know what kind of work specifically. But his utility needed field workers to access all the information in the GIS. That was the trouble: Nobody needs all the information in the GIS to perform a task.
\nSimply recreating a map sheet on a Galaxy or iPhone doesn\u2019t make the technician\u2019s job any easier or faster. Knowing a field worker is inspecting wood poles, on the other hand, we can serve him a web map that accesses all information about wood poles. His phone won\u2019t be inundated with information about underground transformers, for instance, from the utility\u2019s whole GIS. In the old days, you couldn\u2019t serve up targeted GIS information like this. Utilities had limited ability to maintain maps, so to stay efficient, they jammed maps with as much information\u2014about poles, transformers, and your cat\u2019s static electricity if they wanted\u2014on their limited map sheets. They didn\u2019t have the staff to maintain more targeted records. If you wanted to inspect a wood pole, you had to take out the whole big map and sift through the irrelevant data.
\nGIS lifts that burden completely.
\nToday, a utility can produce an infinite number of targeted information products on infinite scales with GIS. Each map can focus on helping a worker complete a particular task. GIS is no longer a plotting machine. It\u2019s an information system, a platform for collaboration, and a problem solver.
\n
\nRip Up those Paper Maps<\/strong>
\nPaper no longer restrains your GIS. Avoid approaching maps like that. As mapping professionals, we labor to get the right annotation font and angle. But who needs annotations anymore using modern technology? Just hover over a feature symbol on your GIS display and get all the information you need in a click or less. Need to change a map scale or pop-up information? No problem! Pan, zoom, click, and enter updated information in a few clicks, taps, or swipes. Not only are digital maps from a modern GIS platform more malleable. They also connect to your existing systems electronically. So your map no longer needs to be a static document that can\u2019t pull in the latest information from a work-order system, business-information system, or customer-information system. Maps that display on your smartphone or tablet can pull information from a GIS that integrates with data from anywhere inside or outside the company.
\nSo forget folding plots. Use GIS to serve targeted, focused, up-to-date information. Improving the work at hand starts with deciding how you look at the work at hand.<\/p>\n

—–<\/p>\n

To learn more about how Esri is a mapping platform, visit esri.com\/electric<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"sync_status":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","castos_file_data":"","podmotor_file_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[275862],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5296","insider","type-insider","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-industry-focus"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nRip Up Those Old Paper Maps<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/insider\/rip-up-those-old-paper-maps\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Rip Up Those Old Paper Maps\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Pop quiz! 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