GIS Data Automation Services for Baltimore City

Client: City of Baltimore

Location: Baltimore, Maryland

Services: Geographic information systems

As part of a $20 million initiative to develop a comprehensive Geographic Information System (GIS) for public utilities, the City of Baltimore Department of Public Works (DPW) selected KCI Technologies, Inc., to develop a database for the stormdrain and sanitary sewer portion of the project. The City currently maintains more than 50,000 stormdrain and sewer documents, some of which date from the 1800s and all varying in readability and accuracy.

Phase I: Record Conversion—KCI staff scanned and inventoried more than 43,000 documents in less than four weeks in the DPW’s office. KCI’s ability to perform this phase on site addressed the City’s concern for security, ensured uninterrupted access to records, and helped the project team complete the task in one-third of the allotted time and considerably under budget. The approach also enabled KCI to provide practical work experience for several engineering students attending local colleges.

Phase II: Database Design, Population & GIS Conversion—KCI field crews walked every City block to identify all storm water and sanitary sewer surface features. The task involved mapping more than 1,000 miles of stormdrains, 1,400 miles of sanitary sewer lines, and connections to thousands of businesses, residences, and other structures.

KCI employed a dedicated Windows NT server and 18 GIS workstations to meet the project’s computer data storage requirements. The project team digitized the subsurface features onto digital planimetrics and compared the plots to the City’s official record plats. KCI then transferred data from the plats into a customized Microsoft Access database and created an ARC/INFO-GIS plot showing the digitized information and text attributes from the database—all in keeping with the City’s drafting standards. KCI customized MicroStation palettes and developed unique ARC/INFO programs as part of a comprehensive QA/QC process, which ensured consistency, increased efficiency, and minimized training time. In seven months, the GIS staff entered more than one-half million database entries (including 54,000 inlets and 62,000 manholes) and submitted more than 2,000 40-scale maps.

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