Welcome to the North Carolina Geographic Information Coordinating Council

The Stream Mapping Advisory Committee was constituted in 2005 to provide input on technical and policy issues for the implementation of the North Carolina Stream Mapping Project. The North Carolina Stream Mapping Project follows a stakeholder developed implementation plan created at the direction of the General Assembly to improve the mapping and digital representation of surface waters for North Carolina. The project utilizes the National Hydrography Dataset data model, and data produced by the project will be available through this national resource. The project will benefit business processes and decision making by state agencies, local governments, stakeholders in the private sector, and general public. The project leverages the State’s investments in statewide elevation data (using LIDAR technology) and the digital aerial imagery resources of counties and the state.

CGIA is the lead agency for facilitating the Stream Mapping Advisory Committee and regularly reports on progress and issues. At the February 2009 Statewide Mapping Advisory Committee (SMAC), the Stream Mapping Advisory Committee was formally recognized as a working group of the SMAC.

Two Tasks
The Stream Mapping Advisory Committee has two immediate tasks.

• Address the relationship between feature names assigned for surface water features from the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) and names maintained by the Division of Water Quality (DENR-DWQ). The Stream Mapping Advisory Committee will draft a white paper to clarify the issue.
• Develop recommendations for the future relationship between the North Carolina Stream Mapping Project and the maintenance of the watershed boundary dataset (WBD). The WBD is jointly maintained nationally by the US Geological Survey (USGS) and the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS). Beginning in the fall of 2008, USGS and NRCS began the technical integration of WBD into the NHD. The integration of the two datasets will help reconcile water features at watershed boundaries, and provide a common environment for the ongoing maintenance of both datasets. Recommendations from the Stream Mapping Advisory Committee will be presented as a draft white paper to the Statewide Mapping Advisory Committee.

[Membership list currently under construction]

The current facilitator for the Stream Mapping Advisory Committee is Joe Sewash (919.754.6590).