Tech View: Geospatial confab draws diverse map tech pros

I don’t have a favorite child, and I certainly wouldn’t be able to choose a favorite technology, but I will admit to having a lifelong affection for GPS, maps and geolocation apps.

At one end you have treasure-hunt geocaching (featured in this paper 20 years ago), check-in classics like Foursquare and Gowalla — a personal favorite that’s planning a comeback this year — and out-and-about games like Ingress and Pokemon Go.

At the other end of the spectrum, you’ll find serious professionals in geographic information systems, or GIS, focused on “location intelligence” and “spatial analytics,” and using tools ranging from drones and satellites to long-range, low-power networks and sprawling galaxies of Internet of Things devices.

It was the kind of tech that lured me into my first startup in 2015, Smart Yields, where we dreamed of blanketing farms with sensors and giving farmers hyper-local data on climate and soil conditions to optimize operations. We’ve since pivoted from hardware to software, but I think the best parts of our app are still the maps.

Indeed, I’ve learned that geospatial technology has a role in nearly every industry. When I interned at the Board of Water Supply in high school, we plotted meter locations. I spent 15 years in real estate tech, where tools and applications evolved at an incredible rate. Even personal passion projects like tracking COVID-19 cases revolved around translating flat government data into compelling maps.

If you have any doubt that adding a geospatial component to your business or project will make it better, have I got an event for you. Next week you can learn about and connect with geospatial businesses of all sizes — from global giant ESRI to local startup Mappy — at the biennial Pacific Rim Geospatial Conference.

Taking place March 16 to 17 at the Ala Moana Hotel, the conference is jointly organized by the nonprofit Hawaii Geographic Information Coordinating Council, the Hawaii Land Surveyor Association and the latter’s Alaska counterpart.

HIGICC board member Craig Clouet, whose day job is GIS project manager at engineering firm Dudek, was there when the group started 21 years ago.

“Way back in the day, getting data was so hard and it cost millions of dollars,” Clouet said. “It was the federal government and the U.S. Geological Survey that first tried to get everyone on the same page — data sharing agreements and formats that everybody can use.”

Current HIGICC President Michael Wahl, who is a GIS specialist at the Hawaii State Historic Preservation Division, says things have changed dramatically and that today there are countless opportunities to build with geospatial data and tools.

“Our membership represents a lot of different industries in GIS, and we have such great legacy knowledge about the data that’s out there,” Wahl said. “If you have an idea or project, you can come and ask us questions — we’ve all been there at the beginning.”

And a huge focus of HIGICC is workforce development, inspiring the next generation of map addicts with student memberships, internship matching and scholarships.

“We have scholarships for students — every year they can come and present their project, and we’ll give them money to keep doing GIS,” Wahl said. “We’re very pro-student and trying to promote GIS so that we can all use it for the benefit of everyone.”

“One student a couple of years ago from Leeward Community College was working on mapping food deserts,” Clouet recalls. Wahl adds, “Another scholarship recipient was mapping Big Island cultural resources, including medicinal plants used traditionally by Native Hawaiians.”

Both note that drones, ocean mapping and artificial intelligence are drawing interest from the younger set. But there’s still demand for the classics: Hawaii has seen only 14 new licensed surveyors in the past three years. The shortage is even worse in other states.

“Surveyors are doing the legal part of property ownership, and then on the engineering side, the GIS people were doing the remote sensing and the environmental part of it,” Clouet said. “So, it’s really nice to be able to bring those together.”

“We get together, and we talk about the different projects that we’ve been working on and see what’s new in the mapping world,” Wahl adds. “It gives us a chance to really connect. I met a lot of people seven years ago that I still talk to today.”

Conference registration rates range from $60 for students to $350 for nonmembers. For more information, visit PacificRimGeospatial.com.

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Ryan Kawailani Ozawa publishes Hawaii Bulletin, a free email newsletter covering Hawaii’s innovation ecosystem, at HawaiiBulletin.com.