Impervious
Surface Research
Through
the work of NEMO, the Center for Watershed Protection and others, the
importance of impervious surface as an indicator of water quality degradation
has become widely accepted. More communities are now interested in
identifying
where these surfaces are located in their town or watersheds, so they
can begin to develop strategies to minimize the effects of development
on their water resources. A collaborative of UConn's Geospatial Technology
Program, the National NEMO Network and NOAA Coastal Services Center
has addressed this need by developing an “add-on” module
for a commonly used GIS software package. Called the Impervious Surface
Analysis Tool (ISAT), it helps communities estimate levels of imperviousness
through the use of land cover coefficients. Since these coefficients
vary considerably from region-to-region and state-to-state, a workshop
was held in October 2002 to train Network members in the use of ISAT,
and to develop standard protocols for the development of local coefficients.
This information will be compiled by the Network Hub and represent
the
first time a unified, nationally derived set of coefficients has been
assembled. The use of the Network to test and collect scientifically
relevant information is a model for future collaborations.
Read more in our Project Profile #2
A
Tool to Estimate the Impacts of Development on Water: ISAT
(pdf 157 KB)
