Superintendent, Joint Services CADD/GIS Center

718 Civil Engineer Squadron

Kadena AB Okinawa, Japan

Telephone: 011-81-611-734-0127

GIS Program Manager, Joint Services CADD/GIS Center

718 Civil Engineer Squadron

Kadena AB Okinawa, Japan

Telephone: 011-81-611-732-7067

Managing 43 U.S. military installations on the island of Okinawa, Japan totaling 55,000 acres, approximately 50,000 military personnel and nearly 10,000 buildings, requires an extensive and complex infrastructure and management support system. A typical military installation although smaller in scope rival or exceed many cities and local governments in infrastructure complexity. U.S. military installations are responsible for all aspects of managing a community such as: security, fire protection, planning, housing, construction, services, environmental, aircraft operations, naval operations, to name a few. The hosting military installation bears the enormous responsibility in the planning, management, and maintenance of the military community and military operations that comprise most defense installations.

In an effort to provide a more effective system of installation management the U.S. Air Force, Army, Navy and Marines have combined resources and efforts toward the implementation of a Joint Service Enterprise Geospatial Information System (GIS). The collaboration of this effort resulted in the establishment of the Joint Services Computer Aided Design and Drafting (CADD/Geospatial Information Systems Center located on Kadena Air Base, Okinawa, Japan. This center is dedicated to the development, implementation, and sustainment of a GIS that will serve not just an organization or single installation but will eventually support the 43 U.S. military installations on the island. This is the first Joint Service enterprise GIS effort of its kind and will pave the way for future US Military Joint Service GIS efforts.

 The mission of the center is to provide precision installation mapping, facilities and environmental management, and to support related initiatives by US Forces Japan throughout the Pacific Region. The center is also providing resources and training needed by personnel to become familiar with the use and management of desktop CADD and GIS software tools for a broad range of facilities, operations, engineering and support applications. The center and it resources are available to all services.

The objective of the center is to plan, develop, and implement an effective and sustainable GIS. The first priority for the system is to provide commanders with a concise decision support tool that provides fast access to critical base-wide data sets. Integrated metadata will be easily accessible to the assess the accuracy and integrity of the resulting GIS analysis or products to support informed decision making.

 The second priority is to provide operational and support functions with application tools for optimizing airfield and base operations, base planning, facilities maintenance and management, environmental analysis and resource management. Application tools will be brought to individual workcenters by providing quality data with custom capabilities to use that data. The effect of these improvements will result in easier access to information, better decisions, better planning, and elimination of duplicate efforts.

 The Joint Services CADD/GIS Center is composed of a Joint Executive Steering Committee and a Joint Service Technical Advisory Group. The joint technical and executive groups combined with a strong lead advocate support are crucial to the success of the Joint Services CADD/GIS Center. Each of the services have many procedures and business processes in common as well as those that are unique to a particular service. The multi-service aspect of the working and executive groups have been the key to recognizing and overcoming some of the fundamental differences between the services and leveraging benefits from the common areas and in the adoption of agreed upon standards. This open architecture system based on accepted standards is a major step towards commonality and compatibility of spatially related databases between the services. These groups consist of a least one representative from each service or DoD element.

The Joint Executive Steering Committee is comprised of senior military engineers representing installation management functions from each service. The roles of the Joint Executive Steering Committee are to: Evaluate and establish priorities related to CADD/GIS development; Procure resources; Provide guidance to the Center and approve corporate strategic plans, implementation plans, proposals and products developed for the program; Ensure GIS development activities are focused on meeting installation mission, goals, and objectives; Provide resources and staffing for the development and operation of a GIS; Provide outreach to installations, their commanders, and their staffs; Evaluate and act on recommendations from the Joint Technical Working Group as needed.

The Joint Technical Working Group includes technical staff members from each service or DoD element. The Working Group is responsible for representing the technical needs of users and for providing functional insight into geospatial business management and information needs. The roles of the Joint Technical Working Group are to: Prepare plans, determine resource requirements, establish schedules, track expenditures, and develop and produce spatial data products; Develop training plans and ensure training is readily available to end-users; Establish Task Groups, Work Shops, and Focus Groups, to accomplish specific tasks, achieve short term goals and promote awareness and knowledge of CADD/GIS capabilities (these groups are formed, disbanded, or combined as required); Report program status, and provide recommendations to the Executive Steering Group. Members are the appointed representatives of the Joint Service Executive Steering Group. These individuals represent their components and/or installations and perform the detailed planning of CADD/GIS activities.

 The Center’s first project is the aerial surveying and photogrammetric mapping of all major military installations on Okinawa. Through this project, the joint service partnership has already saved hundreds of thousands of dollars by combining resources and avoiding duplication of effort in the acquisition and development of base mapping between multiple installations. In an effort to guarantee data sharing and system interoperability, map products will be developed based on the Tri-Service Spatial Data Standards (TSSDS), and current DoD, Federal Government, and industry standards. In addition, the Joint Services have agreed on the use of the same map projection, scales, survey control network, and use of "commercial off-the-shelf" (COTS) software. This aerial photo, precision mapping, and enhanced island-wide survey ground control is a critical component of the enterprise GIS because it will form the common foundation upon which all initial and future spatial data will be built. By building this common foundation, the joint service partners will reap long term cost savings and benefits through data sharing, joint application development, and improved communication and project coordination.

 The enterprise GIS will also address appropriate database structure and systems architecture. End-users will be empowered with desktop access to enterprise-wide facilities and environmental data. In order to design the most effective network configuration to support the dissemination of GIS and mapping data across multiple installations, close coordination with communications groups representing each service is essential.

 A scalable database server at the Joint Service Center, under the supervision of the GIS Coordinator, will serve current base maps, orthophotos, imagery and other multimedia files, and related data across local and wide area networks to remote customers. All relevant data sources will be considered for inclusion into the GIS to accommodate the requirements of end-users across the organization. The work centers that own specific data will be responsible for maintaining those databases. Multiple databases are stored in a centralized location rather than being stored as fragmented compartments of data scattered throughout an organization. This master data source concept streamlines access to the data, reduces duplication of effort, and enables data sharing. Current as well as archived data and corporate knowledge remain at the organization during personnel changeovers.

 The system will be customized to support various users and unique business processes across a broad range of applications such as…emergency services, explosive ordinance disposal, security, real estate, environmental, natural resources management, energy management, housing, logistics, flight operations, and many others. While many users will access similar or related databases they all have a unique use for the data. Extensive use of a graphical user interface, customized to a specific users needs, will simplify the controls for the user and add custom features designed specifically to support unique work center requirements. Custom queries that access multiple data bases will also be created for individual work centers. This customization feature minimizes training requirements and simplifies the software, allowing personnel to focus more on accomplishing tasks and spend less time trying to manipulate the software. Digital floor plans, manhole books, as-built drawings, photographic images, sound files, documents and spreadsheets, and related files can then be easily linked to and retrieved from map features. While the efforts thus far have been primarily focused on facilities and infrastructure the system will also fully support mission components when ready.

 In conjunction with the new base mapping program each service has initiated the development of a Corporate Strategic Plan and a detailed GIS Implementation and Adoption plan. Planning includes the identification of corporate goals, objectives and strategies, evaluation of existing data, detailed business process and workflow assessments, analysis of costs, system design and architecture, data management and quality assurance, GIS education and training, system sustainment, and incorporates the concept of Installation Lifecycle Management (ILM). Business processes will be closely evaluated, assessed and prioritized during the planning and implementation process.

 The Joint Service CADD/GIS Center is truly a collaborative effort in the interest of cost effectiveness and a unified adoption of accepted standards to build an enterprise geospatial information system that ultimately supports the military mission, goals, objectives and vision of the Joint Warfighter.

Craig A. Fones, SMSgt, USAF

Superintendent, Joint Services CADD/GIS Center

718 Civil Engineer Squadron

Kadena AB Okinawa, Japan

Telephone: 011-81-611-734-0127

Jeffrey Nejedly, GS-12, USAF

GIS Program Manager, Joint Services CADD/GIS Center

718 Civil Engineer Squadron

Kadena AB Okinawa, Japan

Telephone: 011-81-611-732-7067