ELEVATING
WISCONSIN’S
MAPPING
Collaboration between federal, state, local,
and private agencies paves way for high-
quality, countywide lidar data
By Jennifer Schmidt
T
he strength of a building lies in its foundation – or so the saying goes.
This isn’t just true in the construction world. The foundational elements of
geospatial information function much like that solid base holding and stabilizing the
load of the structure above it.
Wisconsin’s land information community tracks several key datasets – often referred
to as “foundational layers” – that serve as the basis and background for the various
geographical content found on maps. Orthoimagery and lidar (light detection and
ranging) are two essential base mapping layers, both forming the foundation from
which many additional datasets derive.
Say a municipality needs a map of buildings in its community, bodies of water within
its boundaries, or streets within the city limits – these two base layer datasets are
used to create all these other important datasets. And they can only be as accurate
as the base data they came from.
Ambitious initiative takes form
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) manages a national lidar program known as
3DEP (3D Elevation Program). The program was developed in response to increasing
14 | TRENDS
Ingenuity, Integrity, and Intelligence.