Projects

The GeoTREE Center applies geospatial technologies to address real-world problems and challenges. The Center's staff, graduate and undergraduate students work with collaborators to develop project plans, carry out activities, and provide deliverables.

State Government Projects

  • Iowa Department of Agricultural land Stewardship (IDALS): The GeoTREE Center updated the old version of the Iowa LiDAR data dissemination application by adding access to the circa 2020 or more current LiDAR statewide data collection, and new modern data access mechanisms. The new and updated application enables access to raw LiDAR data and multiple derived elevation and other geospatial products for the whole state through Virtual Raster Table (VRT, story map on VRT) or Cloud Optimized GeoTIFF (COG) formats. These formats provide a seamless way to display data for the whole state and also allow for geoprocessing or analysis for smaller sections study areas. It can be accessed here LiDAR Project.

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  • Iowa High resolution Land Cover (HRLC) Mapping Project: This on-going project funded by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources is meant to update the previous HRLC mapping (2009). The project leverages aerial imagery, LIDAR, and other ancillary data sources along with state of the art GIS and Remote Sensing software to generate high resolution land cover data for the State of Iowa. The HRLC can be used by a variety of land management agencies, academics, and others for analysis and planning purposes. 

    Iowa HRLC

  • Iowa Department of Education: GeoTREE center developed a web mapping application for the Iowa Department of Education that enables location of community colleges, school districts and high schools respectively and the data exploration in relation planned, potential, present and future regional center locations. Iowa Department of Education Regional Center Study

     

  • Iowa Economic Development Authority - Iowa Energy Center: GeoTREE Center worked on two projects. The Iowa Solar Asset Mapping (ISAM) to produce a database of modeled solar radiation values leveraging on the Solar Radiation Modeling tools in ArcGIS Pro along with the most recent Iowa statewide LiDAR topography data and a public facing web mapping application/portal on top of that database. 

    Solar Asset Map of UNI

    The resulting database and application were titled the Iowa Solar Asset Mapping (ISAM) tool. The application has features for searching for addresses, interactively drawing an area of interest in order to derive statistics on the solar radiation modeling, and choice of base maps (imagery, streets). This project led to an update to previously modeled solar radiation data in 2016 based on more recently collected topographic data. Iowa Solar Asset Mapping (ISAM) Project. 

    The second project was Modeling urban Heat Patterns in the State of Iowa to comprehend urban heat patterns, provide proper planning for utilities and mitigate heat challenges and enhancing the overall quality of life for individuals and communities in Iowa, the GeoTREE Center conducted research to examine the pattern of temperature in urban areas, utilizing high spatial and temporal resolution methods across multiple different sized cities within the state of Iowa. Modelling Urban Heat Patterns in the State of Iowa.

    Afternoon Temperature of Burlington

    Fortepan USA Project

    Geo Tree Center collaborates with Fortepan USA, an open-source photo history platform that crowdsources digitized photographs of everyday U.S. life and reimagine better ways to organize, display, interpret, and share these historical photos with interested publics. Our activities involve coordinating Fortepan’s development, engineering Fortepan's back end, and adding new mapping capabilities, including augmented reality initiatives with geolocated historical photos in a 360º plane. Fortepan USA, Fortepan Fotosphere, and Fortepan MapView.

    FortepanUSA