The New Year
Plans for the National Atlas in 2012 include the rollout of new basic
cartographic data, a more user-driven approach to making decisions
on our products and services, and the release of new maps and articles.
New Basic Map Data and More
Years of work have gone into the compilation of new, tightly integrated
basic map data (boundaries, transportation, surface waters, etc.)
at a scale of 1:1,000,000. We'll deliver these to you later
this year. This is a major update and upgrade
- that is more detailed,
- that aligns with similar data from Canada,
- that features fully networked surface waters (more on this another time), and
- that serves as the data we'll use to design an entirely new base map of the country.
This last point is important for us. Rather than work on any new Wall Maps this year, we will prepare a new base map of the United States at one million scale. This will be made available to you in our viewers, in our maps, in digital graphic files, and as services you can use in your own applications.
We are working on other basic datasets this year including boundaries of Federal lands and Congressional District boundaries that change as a result of the 2010 census. Of course we will also work with National Atlas partners to provide accurate and authoritative thematic information, maps, and data. Coming up soon you'll have diverse new map layers on Federal expenditures, voting registration, reproductive health, revenues from gambling, and more. We're also updating selected map layers.
The best way to keep track of changes to nationalatlas.gov is to follow
us on Twitter.
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For Professional Users
For professional users of our Web Map Services (WMS), we've already updated our
service to support graphic queries. We are also interested in knowing more
about your interest in National Atlas feature and coverage services. Are you
already using these from other sources? If so, we’d like to learn more
about your current applications for feature or coverage services. Please drop
us a line at atlasmail@usgs.gov.
As of this month, we have stopped supporting the Spatial Data Transfer Standard Topological Vector Format (SDTS-TVP). SDTS transfers of vector data are no longer available from nationalatlas.gov. We have also reduced our number of Raw Data Documentation report formats from five to three.
If you plan to attend the ESRI Federal GIS Conference in Washington, D.C. (February 22-24), please stop by the National Atlas exhibit in booth 208. Also, please take a few minutes to participate in our user survey on GIS data and services.
For All National Atlas Users
We'd also like to ask your help in another way. You can influence our decision-making
on National Atlas products and services. This year we'll be asking you to tell
us about how you use all of our products and services and for your suggestions
on how we could improve our offerings. We're looking for volunteers who will
help us do this. If you are willing to be considered as a participant in one
of our upcoming surveys, please visit our Contact
Us page and leave your email address. Thank you.
