Analyze the extent of the Great Flood of 1993

For this project I overlaid the parcels and 1993 flood shapefiles. This allowed me to do an analysis of the economic loss from the flooding. I selected and created a new shapefile of all the parcels that were flooded. I then used the attribute field TOTALVAL, which was the total value of a parcels land and building, to create a visual representation of the damage. By using graduated colors and breaking the TOTALVAL attributes into 5 classes, I created a map that showed economic loss of parcels by colors. I had some trouble with deciding on how to classify the data. I decided that creating 5 classes would be the easiest way to show the difference in economic loss of the flooded parcels. When I had more than 5 colors, I found it hard to see where the numerical change was in the graduated colors.

Determine flood hazards for parcels in Manhattan, Kansas

In this analysis of flood hazards I overlaid the parcels shapefile over the 100 and 500 year floodplain shapefiles. After finding which parcels were at risk of flooding, I created a report that would show insurance companies the percentage of risk for these selected parcels. I then created a map layout after completing the analysis and report. I enjoyed creating a manual extent circle in the second layer of the map layout. This was the first time I used the drawing tool to create an extent circle. I know it is not as accurate as creating a true extent circle, but I found it to be a lot easier and quicker.

Infrastructure and health facility flooding on Mississippi Coast

This is the map I created for the infrastructure and health facility flooding in the three counties or deliverable 4. This map shows the flooded land in Hancock, Harrison, and Jackson County. It also has roads, railroads, and hospitals layers. I had some difficulty pulling the major highways and interstates out the road layer. There were 39,972 records in the attributes of the road layer. I used select by attributes for the field "Pretype" in the road layer. I selected USHY, HWY, I, and STHY and created a new road layer. This took a long time to process because there were so many records. I did not use the elevation layer in this map because there were so many other layers being used and I wanted to keep the map simple. I used a bright color for the flooded land to make the highways, churches, and hospitals stand out over the layer.

Mississippi Gulf Coast

This is the map I created for the Mississippi Gulf Coast or deliverable 1. This map shows the bathymetric and land elevations for the three coastal counties. I used the blue to represent the lower pixels and light green to represent higher pixels in the elevation. I have also in the past used hill shades to accent the deeper water channels on other maps. I did not use it in this map, but I think it would really visually bring out the depth of water running through the counties. I used small buildings to represent the places layer. I had some issue finding the scale that I liked on this map. From a larger scale of the map it showed more area of the counties, but made it hard to see the details of the rivers and places. I decided to zoom in on the counties to show the details of the coast and wetlands. I used a second layer to represent the full extent of the map.

Chris Helt Introduction

Hello everyone. My name is Chris Helt and I am very excited about continuing my education in GIS. I was an environmental scientist for seven years. My interest in GIS technology and applications were developed in various land management and restoration projects. Since then I have become a middle school science teacher. I am working on a Masters in Teaching along with this certificate program. In my spare time I enjoy traveling, photography, and fly fishing with my wife.