Improving local access to Sierra Nevada Ecosystem Project data

It is now an axiom, developed through many activities in California including the Sierra Summit and subsequent forums, the California Biodiversity Council and local forums, and the public workshops associated with the Sierra Nevada Ecosystem Project (SNEP), that improved access to existing information will enhance public and agency natural resource management. This project implements this concept by making SNEP data available to the widest possible range of stakeholders in the Sierra Nevada.

SNEP produced substantial data files, records, digital data, and other information. Much of this information has been transferred to the Alexandria Project at UC Santa Barbara and put on line through their web site. SNEP's Final Report to Congress on the Status of the Sierra Nevada can be found on California Environmental Resource Evaluation System. Frequent contact with this site has resulted in users looking to the database at Alexandria for data files and related information. However, the Congressional charge to SNEP did not include or fund provision of data.Therefore much remains inaccessible on the SNEP server at UC Davis and on the hard disks of individual SNEP researchers. This project will complete the transfer of data and analyses to accessible sites, develop products and interfaces to facilitate access by the public and others, and form a framework for addition and expansion of these data and analyses through other activities.

The demand for information on the Sierra has been a recurrent theme heard at public forums throughout the Sierra since the delivery of the final report to Congress. A complete and easily understood database from SNEP will satisfy the existing need for access to data. Several kinds of users will benefit from SNEP data, such as scientists and managers who want original data for assessment and analysis of natural resources, managers and planners who want data and maps for evaluation and development of local and regional plans, and many others who want copies of data or GIS products to compare with other information or to examine SNEP information in more detail. A more accessible database may ultimately improve the quality of data generated on a regular and routine access by public agencies of the state and nation. Data collected by state agencies, the US Forest Service, and others form the basis for many of the SNEP GIS maps and products. More frequent use of SNEP products in resource-decision making will likely translate into demands for better and more frequently updated base data collected by other agencies.

FRAP will fund the Water and Wildland Resources Center of UC Davis to

• organize, modify and explain data in the Alexandria data site in order to make locating and using the information easier
• prepare data currently stored on the SNEP server or on researchers' computers for transfer to Alexandria
• document working directories that SNEP results can be replicated by other researchers
• prepare graphics files for easy browsing and downloading
• update the CERES SNEP page
• equip regional GIS centers in Quincy and Mammoth Lakes
• develop a sample sub-regional summary of SNEP results
• evaluate the utility of particular data types and scales for different users.

PROJECT DETAILS

Project Workplan: an agreement between FRAP and the Water and Wildland Resources Center of UC Davis

Project Progress Reports

FOR MORE INFORMATION

Contact Greg Greenwood via e-mail at Greg.Greenwood@fire.ca.gov or by phone at (916) 227-2655

Last edited on May 12, 1997 by Greg Greenwood