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Montgomery County, Iowa
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County GIS Flights

Schneider GIS Flight
  • In the Fall of 2004 Montgomery County partnered with Schneider Corporation to have aerial photography taken of the entire County.
  • The photography consists of orthoimagery (straight down view) of the County landscape.
  • This imagery has served as the primary imagery data for Montgomery County's GIS system and can be utilized by the public in the form of property information lookups and interactive mapping.
  • To access this orthoimagery go to www.montgomeryassessor.org, select view map, and activate the urban imagery and rural imagery layers on the right-hand side of the screen. Once the imagery is activated you can zoom in on the map to view the areas you're interested in.
Pictometry GIS Flight
  • Beginning in the year 2008 Montgomery County partnered with the City of Red Oak and Pictometry International to have aerial photography taken of the entire County.
  • The photography consists of oblique imagery of the County landscape and structures. The imagery is very high quality and was taken at an agle so it gives a more realistic view of the landscape. Buildings and structures can be measured and viewed from all sides.
  • This imagery will serve Montgomery County and the City of Red Oak as we move our GIS into the future and begin taking advantage of the many benefits provided by this data.
  • The imagery is now available for the public to view on Microsoft's Bing Maps website. Click here to download a video showing how to access the imagery. (If you want to download the video to your computer, right-click the link and select "Save Target As".)
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Glossary of GIS Terms:

Below is a list of common terms you may hear associated with GIS systems and their meanings.

ESRI
Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) is a company that designs and develops the world's leading geographic information system technology. Many of the GIS technologies used by Montgomery County are products by ESRI.
Geodatabase
A geodatabase is a database designed to store, query,and manipulate geographic information and spatial data. A geodatabase can store records that associate the location of an object as well as the objects attributes.
Geospatial Data
Geospatial data is the data or information that identifies the geographic location of features and boundaries on Earth. Geospatial data is usually stored as coordinates and topology and this data can be mapped. The data is often analyzed and manipulated through a GIS.
Google Earth®
Google Earth is a large Geographic Information System and virtual globe. It maps the Earth by the superimposition of images obtained from satellite imagery and aerial photography. It is available in a free version and a paid version.
GPS
The Global Positioning System (GPS) is a space-based radionavigation system that provides reliable positioning, navigation, and timing services to civilian users on a continuous worldwide basis -- freely available to all. GPS provides accurate location and time information for an unlimited number of people in all weather, day and night, anywhere in the world.
The GPS is made up of three parts: satellites orbiting the Earth; control and monitoring stations on Earth, and the GPS receivers owned by users. Individuals may purchase GPS handsets that are readily available through commercial retailers. (GPS.gov)
LIDAR
Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) is an optical remote sensing technology that measures properties of scattered light to find range and/or other information of a distant target. Similar to RADAR technology LIDAR uses light laser pulses instead of radio waves to measure the range to an object.
The Iowa DNR is currently using LIDAR to map the state of Iowa. (Iowa DNR LIDAR Project)
Microsoft Virtual Earth®
Microsoft Virtual Earth is a geospatial mapping platform produced by Microsoft. It allows developers to create applications that layer location-relevant data on top of the Virtual Earth map imagery.
Oblique Imagery
Oblique imagery is aerial photography that is captured at approximately a 45 degree angle with the ground. The angle of oblique imagery allows viewers to see and measure not only the top of objects but the sides as well. Oblique imagery more closely resembles how people normally view their landscape compared to traditional orthagonal (straight down) imagery.
Orthoimagery
Orthoimagery combines the image characteristics of an aerial photograph with the geometric qualities of a map. Unlike a normal aerial photograph, distortion and relief displacement is removed so ground features are displayed in their true planimetrically correct position. Orthoimagery supports making direct measurements of locations, distances, angles, directions, and areas while offering a realistic visualisation of the landscape. Orthoimagery gives us a perspective looking straight down.
Pictometry
Pictometry International is a GIS company that provides detailed aerial photography. Their oblique photographs show buildings, infrastructure, and land from all sides. Pictometry also shoots ortho photography giving a straight down view of the landscape. Their software allows a variety of measurements to be taken directly from the image, including height, distance, area, elevation and bearing. Its images can be overlaid with shapefiles and other GIS information.
Beginning in 2008, in a joint project between Montgomery County and the City of Red Oak, Pictometry began taking aerial images of the entire County. The project is expected to be completed in the Spring of 2009.
Schneider
The Schneider Corporation is a company that provides GIS solutions to municipal, county and state government agencies. Montgomery County partners with Schneider to provide the ArcIMS GIS web site which contains real estate tax information, appraisal information, and interactive mapping. You can visit the web site at www.montgomeryassessor.org
Shapefile
A shapefile is a popular geospatial vector data format for GIS software. It is developed and regulated by ESRI. Shapefiles spatially describe points, polylines, and polygons. These, for example, could represent water wells, rivers, lakes, or road signs just to name a few. It is possible to read and write shapefiles using a variety of free and paid software programs.
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Links to Public GIS Data
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