Digerud online GIS: developing an online community GIS resource in the Frogn municipal district of Norway

Abstract

An increasing community demand for accurate, user friendly and easily accessible geographic information has lead to the development of online resources to aid in the decision making process (Craig et al, 2002, Green et al, 2002, Peng et al 2003). These resources such as interactive maps are often used as tools to plan and review imperative and non-imperative requirements of community life. The results of this study demonstrate that it is possible to access, retrieve and convert spatial data to an acceptable format for use in an Internet-accessible and community-based geographic information system (GIS) for the settlement of Digerud in Norway. An Internetbased GIS was placed on a university supplied public access server and known subjects with links to the Digerud district were approached and invited to participate in given geographic identification and measurement tasks on the Digerud GIS online applet. Following the completion of the measurement tasks the participants were surveyed in order to assess ease of use and asked to provide comments on their interaction with the program. The outcome of this study demonstrates the feasibility of such a system and that Digerud online GIS has the potential to develop as a tool for the people of the Digerud and neighbouring communities for use as either an imperative (e.g. socio-economic) or non-imperative (e.g. recreational) geographical information package.