Ken Snyder

<html><br /> <br /> <head><br /> <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1"><br /> </meta></head><br /> <br /> <body bgcolor="#ffffff"> Here is a neat example of how visualization tools are helping improve the planning process for communities. It's an example we came across while researching tools for a chapter we are writing for the APA. <br><br /> <br /> <p>The City of Vail, Colorado offers an example of 3D visualization tools being used to improve the design review process. The city requires developers to submit a 3D model &#150; preferably a virtual model &#150; for design review. The virtual model is then placed in a 3D model, created by Winston Associates (www.winstonassociates.com), of the mountains, roads and ground plain to make it possible to explore the impacts of new buildings in the context of their surroundings. This technique was beneficial in getting an initially wary community behind a recent affordable housing project. Winston Associates worked with the developers to generate a 3-D model in 3ds max (formerly known as 3D Studio Max) and then placed the housing model into the site model. Using the model they demonstrated how the housing development would look from different vantage points such as the highway. In addition, the model proved to concerned neighbors that the development could not been seen from their homes. The project is currently under construction. <br><br /> </p>

I have been struck lately by the progress of several projects using non-ESRI based GIS planning support systems and how often the decision to move away from ESRI has been that PC based ArcGIS cannot handle the large data sets for real-time scenario analysis.<br /> <br /> I just saw a beta demonstration of a wildfire mitigation application developed by the University of Colorado's Planning department that uses a combination of open source GIS, SQL server, and Perl coding to help cities and counties look at alternative growth futures and how they impact fire mitigation.

I recently downloaded and played around with a neat 3D modeling tool called <a href="http://www.sketchup.com">Sketchup</a>. @Last Software's SketchUp is a 3D modeling package intended to be used by architects and designers who need to quickly outline 3D ideas, but don't care for the difficulty of a CAD program, or the advanced features of a high-end 3D modeler. <br /> <br /> SketchUp's toolset is fairly simple, offering a Photoshop-like, two-column tool palette. SketchUp has also a very helpful grid guidance system, with multiple colors to guide you through the 3D orientation plans.

<p>Reason magazine did a very provocative this month &#150; for each of their 40,000 subscribers they printed a customized cover including an aerial photo of their house. The magazine headline started with the homeowner's name in big orange letters followed by the subtitle &quot;They Know Where Your Are!&quot; Click <a href="http://www.placematters.us/Graphics/reason.jpg" target="_blank">here</a> to see the cover of the issue mailed to my neighbor &#150; my house is 2 houses to the right. <br><br /> <br><br /> On the inside cover, the Editor's Note includes several local facts embedded into the text &quot;&#133;as a telecommuter I don't envy your area's average commute of 27.