Infrastructure Engineering - Research Publications

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    Spatial data infrastructures: concept, SDI hierarchy and future directions
    Rajabifard, A. ; Williamson, I. P. ( 2001)
    The world as we know it is changing. Economies world wide are undergoing a process ofprofound and continuing structural change, and the global village is becoming a reality driven byIT and communication technologies. With this in mind, many countries believe that they canbenefit both economically and environmentally from better management of their spatial data assetsby taking a perspective that starts at a local level and proceeds through state, national and regionallevels to global level. This has resulted in the development of the Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI)concept at these levels.SDI is fundamentally about facilitation and coordination of the exchange and sharing ofspatial data between stakeholders from different jurisdictional levels in the spatial datacommunity. Understanding of its role and nature are important to the acceptance of the conceptand its alignment with spatial industry objectives.The aim of this paper is to present the nature and concept of spatial data infrastructures,including the SDI hierarchy, which have helped to build understanding about the importance ofthe relationships within different levels of SDIs to support the interactions and partnerships of thespatial data communities. Moreover, the paper will highlight the importance of sharing andunderstanding its special social system, followed by a discussion of the future direction of SDIs. Itis argued that by better understanding the future direction of SDIs, any SDI development can gainsupport from a wider community of both government and non-government data users andproviders.
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    The Cultural Aspects of Sharing and Dynamic Partnershipswithin an SDI Hierarchy
    Rajabifard, A. ; Feeney, M-E. F. ; Williamson, I. P. ( 2002)
    The need to create multi-participant, decision-supported environments to address the issues of sustainable development and improving the quality of life creates a growing need to organise data across disciplines and organisations through different forms of spatial data infrastructure (SDI). This infrastructure is fundamentally a concept about facilitation and coordination of the exchange and sharing of spatial data between stakeholders from different jurisdictional levels in the spatial data community. The concept is well explained as an integrated, multi-levelled hierarchy of interconnected SDIs based on partnerships at corporate, local, state/provincial, national, regional (multi-national) and global (GSDI) levels. The creation of such an infrastructure and understanding the role of dynamic partnerships within an SDI hierarchy are essential to develop any SDI initiative. This paper reviews the nature and concept of SDIs, including the SDI hierarchy, which has helped to build understanding about the importance of the relationships within different levels of SDI, to support the interactions and dynamic nature of partnerships between spatial data communities. The role that human nature plays in any endeavour based on interaction and sharing makes cultural and social factors within a business environment important to the acceptance of the SDI concept and its alignment with spatial industry objectives. Further, the importance of establishing a culture for sharing as well as understanding the dynamic partnerships necessary to support such a culture is highlighted, and three classes of factors influencing SDI development are identified. It is argued that the adoption and implementation of these factors and selection of a proper model for SDI development can assist SDI coordinating agencies to overcome the problem of low participation and speed up the progress in the development of SDI initiatives.