Final Project & Report

You can work on a final project either independently or on a team. Teams must elect a team leader. Teams submit a single report repsenting the work of the team. The team leader submits a report on the work of the team members (grades them if you will), so all team members should contribute equally.

The final project will consist of:

1. Defining a problem related to civil engineering for which GIS can be used.
2. Developing a GIS based methodology to solve the problem.
3. Collecting geospatial data from analog maps, digital maps, spread sheets, databases,  literature, etc.
4. Compiling a GIS geospatial database using standard shape files, event themes (using spatially referenced tabular data) from database or text files, or scanned paper maps georeferenced to your project.
5. Creating a final, cartographically correct, output(s) to hand-in.
6. Creating metadata.
7. Documenting your project in a final technical report (5 pages double spaced maximum for individual student projects or 5 pages per team member - up to 20 pages maximum - on team projects)  (discuss data collection, techniques used, problems, how GIS may help the problem, etc.) Each team member should contribute equally, however the final report is to be a collective team effort. Only 1 paper per team needs to be turned in.
8. Giving a brief demonstration in class.

If little information/data is available on your topic of interest, create the best GIS database you can with the limited data set if possible (it may not be possible in all cases). Document the problems in your technical paper and identify solutions - i.e. how can more data be created. You should also discuss how the use of GIS could affect your problem in the future, if data were to become available. The final project grade will be based on (1) GIS database design and use, (2) use of cartographic principals, (3) metadata creation, (4) creativity, and (5) following the directions set fourth here.

Please format the paper as follows (use the following headings and use other subheadings as necessary):

Introduction
Objectives
Discussion (include data collection, problems and problem solutions, data useage for  solutions related to objectives, etc.)
Results
Conclusions
References (at least 2 from peer reviewed journals)

Include cartographically correct (review lecture notes for weeks 1 & 2) maps that you generate as referenced (Figure1, Figure 2, etc) figures either in the text or at the end of the report. If placed in the text, put the figure after the reference either at the end of the page or at the beginning of the next page depending on room.

For citations/references use an accepted style from an engineering journal.

Class presentations should be in a Powerpoint format, save them on a Flash Drive and use the Instructor's computer. Here is an example of a Final Project Paper. In this paper the "metadata is embedded into the paper, but it can be added as an appendix.

Past Topics for Ideas
       1. Emergency Evacuation Plan

       2.    Yearly Precipitation Comparisons

       3. UTA Rights of Ways

       4.   Bering Land Bridge – Sea Level Changes

       5.   Hydrologic Modeling

       6. Effects of Storms

       7.   CPT Subsurface Investigation

 8. Airport Pavement Management

9. Campus Vegetation

10. Transportation Planning

11. Hiking Trails

12. Water Quality/Contamination

13. Reservoir Construction Effects

14. TDS Balance in Lakes

15. Transportation Infrastructure Inventory

16. Accidents

17. Building Invertory

18. Wetlands

19. Geologic Hazards

20. Ski Resort Lift Design

21. Residential Development

22. Watersheds

23. Groundwater Contamination

24. Endangered Species

25. Pipeline planning