The Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center Internet GIS Web Site

Nancy Lee DeWitt
The University of Texas at San Antonio

Stephen C. Brown
The University of Texas at San Antonio

Abstract
The Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center is one of the first nature centers in the United States to provide a virtual tour of its facility via an Internet GIS. Visitors to the Web site can experience changes in wildflowers year-round as well as explore ongoing research at the center. The center's Internet GIS Web site is particularly useful for teachers preparing their students for field trips to the center or who are following up on a field trip. This presentation explains how the site was developed using ArcIMS, technical difficulties that were encountered, expansion plans, and public response to the Web site.

The analysis of spatial data has long been an applied science in the education of individuals about where they are, where they need to be, and the environments they may encounter. With the advent of GIS (Geographic Information Systems) technology, this process has been enhanced with the use of computing power. An individual can not only view spatial data but also manipulate it. The more data a GIS has the smarter the GIS is. Questions about "what if" can now be put to the test. This is an ideal format for teaching problem solving, prediction, reasonableness, and system interrelationships to students. By creating a GIS that supplies spatial data about a student's environment the students can begin to learn how to "think" about the world around them. The problem with this idea has been the price of the software required to do spatial data analysis is cost prohibitive. School districts notoriously have very little discretionary funds with which to purchase new and innovative programs. Herein lies the beauty of Internet GIS software. The Internet allows every person with a computer access to data that is "served" out on the Internet. Internet GIS software converts spatial data into a format that can be "served" out on to the Internet. Therefore only one piece of GIS software must be purchased, not hundreds and yet every student/everyone that has access to a computer can analyze spatial data in this way.

The Lady Bird Johnson National Wildflower Center has been gracious enough to allow an extensive study of their lands, facilities, and the research being conducted there. An educational Internet served GIS using ArcIMS was created to demonstrate the wealth of information contained at the Wildflower Center. A collection of 6 maps were generated and organized under 3 categories or umbrellas:

1. Texas Ecology - This umbrella would include 3 maps each depicting ecological regions of the depicted area.

a. State of Texas map will include layers covering the:
-Major Ecological Regions
-Minor Ecological Regions
-Major Vegetation Type Distribution
-Soils Distribution v. Hydrology

b. Hays and Travis Counties
-Major Ecological Regions
-Minor Ecological Regions
-Major Vegetative Type Distribution
-Soils Distribution
-Hydrology

c. The Lady Bird Johnson National Wildflower Center
-Major Ecological Region ii. Minor Ecological Regions
-Major Vegetative Type Distribution
-Soils Distribution
-Hydrology Geology

Within the Ecological category, the major ecological regions and minor ecological regions were hot linked to corresponding information sites at the Texas Parks and Wildlife website. The vegetative layer, soils layer, and hydrology layer were all equipped with the capacity to 'hotlink' to photographs or other information should the Wildflower Center deem it appropriate. This was accomplished by customizing the website using the HTML viewer.

2. Wildflower Center Trails and Facilities - This umbrella consists of 2 maps depicting the trails available to the public and the extensive gardens and facilities available to the public:

a. The Trail Map includes a map layer for each of the trails with photographs hot linking the user to photographs of that specific trail. This creates a virtual trip down the trail. The ability to expand this capability was built into the system.
-Grounds & Facilities
-Forest Trail
-Hill Country Trail
-Outer Forest Trail
-Roads & Fences

b. The Garden Map contains one layer of the gardens and facilities found at the Wildflower Center. Each area was hot linked to photographs of that area and information regarding the plants located in that area or services offered by that facility. The layers included are:
-Gardens
-Buildings and Facilities

3. Native Plant Research and Land Restoration - This umbrella includes all the spatially analyzed research being conducted at the Wildflower Center. Each layer has the capability to link to photographs of before and after treatment scenarios in addition to descriptions of the processes the scientist are researching at the Wildflower Center.

a. Research Map layers include:
-Grounds
-Fences & Roads
-Savannah Areas
-Research areas
-Crawford Transects
-All Oak Trees
-Geology
-Soils

Included on each page of the mapped information was a hyperlink button that connected the entire page to other areas on the Internet. One button links to a tutorial on how to use a GIS website and another button connects to a site that will store curriculum for school age children. An example of applicable curricula for each map targeting 8th grade science students was included in the site. A third button links the user back to the original National Wildflower Center web page. Other buttons can and will be configured to serve the needs of the Wildflower Center.

The result of this effort is an interactive Internet distributed GIS for the Lady Bird Johnson National Wildflower Center that encompasses many different interests for many different users: Educational needs for students studying ecology in Texas. Planning field trips to the Wildflower Center can be done virtually prior to the actual excursion. Individuals with special needs are able to locate specific facilities to make their visit more pleasant and organized. People interested in land use planning and management will be able to view research being conducted at the Wildflower Center over time. This project is only the very beginning of, what could be, an enormous clearinghouse for spatial data information involving ecology, native plant preservation and management, land use management and land restoration.

Nancy Lee DeWitt
The University of Texas at San Antonio
Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences
6900 N. Loop 1604 West
San Antonio, Texas 78249-0663
210-458-4956
nldewitt@dcci.com

Stephen C. Brown
The University of Texas at San Antonio
Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences
6900 N. Loop 1604 West
San Antonio, Texas 78249-0663
210-458-4956
sbrown@utsa.edu