Marine Resources Assessment for the Marianas Operating ... - SPREP

AUGUST 2005 FINAL REPORT
Bibliography, WhaleNet, InnerCity Oz, the National Sea Grant Library, Ingenta, AVISO, the
International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN);
International agencies and commissions: International Whaling Commission (IWC), United Nations
Environment Programme (UNEP), Pacific Regional Environment Programme (formerly known as the
South Pacific Regional Environment Programme [SPREP]);
U.S. federal agencies: DoD; DoN: Naval Facilities Engineering Command, Pacific; DoN: Naval Pacific
Meteorological and Oceanography Center, Navy Exchange Dive Center Guam; Marine Mammal
Commission (MMC); Minerals Management Service (MMS); National Aeronautic and Space
Administration (NASA); National Park Service (NPS); NOAA Fisheries: Pacific Islands Regional Office
(PIRO), Office of Protected Resources, Office of Habitat Conservation, Southwest Fisheries Science
Center (SWFSC), PIFSC; NOAA: National Ocean Service (NOS), Sustainable Seas Expedition,
National MPA Center, National Marine Mammal Laboratory (NMML), Western Pacific Regional
Fishery Management Council (WPRFMC), National Data Buoy Center; USFWS: Refuges Division,
Ecological Field Services Office, Guam National Wildlife Refuge;
U.S. commonwealth and territory agencies: Guam Bureau of Statistics and Plans, Guam Division of
Aquatic and Wildlife Resources (DAWR), Guam Environmental Protection Agency, CNMI Coastal
Resources Management Office, CNMI Division of Fish and Wildlife (DFW), CNMI Division of
Environmental Quality; and
Local dive shops and tour operators: Dive Rota, Micronesian Divers Association, and Guam Tropical
Dive Station.
1.4.2 Spatial Data Representation⎯Geographic Information System
The geographical representation of marine resource occurrences in the Marianas MRA study area was a
major constituent of this MRA report. The marine resources data and information accumulated for this
project were accessed from a wide variety of sources, were in disparate formats, covered a broad range
of time periods, and represented differing levels of accuracy as well as quality assurance. The spatial or
geographical component that was common to all data sets allowed the widely dissimilar data to be
visualized in a meaningful manner. Without this common data characteristic, graphical display of such
disparate data would have been difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.
A GIS was used to store, manipulate, analyze, and visualize the spatial data and information accumulated
for the study area. For this project, Environmental Systems Research Institute, Inc.'s (ESRI) ArcView ®
version 3.2 GIS software was used to create the majority of map figures and ArcView ® version 8.2 was
used to create the metadata as well as some features of the three-dimensional map figures. ArcView ®
was chosen for this project due to its widespread use, ease of operation, and its ability to create multiple
views and layouts within the same project file.
The geographic locations of important marine resources in the study area were derived from four types of
sources (in order of reliability): source data, scanned source maps, source information, and information
adapted from published maps. The “source data,” which include geographic coordinates and GIS
shapefiles, were first scrutinized for data quality. If the data were in coordinate form, they were then
converted to decimal degrees, if necessary, and text fields were renamed or added for ease of
manipulation. Once standardized, the source data were imported into the GIS software. Some of the data
were only available as graphical representations or “source maps.” These data were scanned, imported
into ArcView ® , and geo-referenced using the Image Analysis extension, with significant information being
digitized into a shapefile format. Materials acquired as Adobe ® Portable Document Format (PDF) files
were also treated as scanned source maps (i.e., they were geo-referenced and pertinent information was
digitized), since they were already in a digital form. A third type of source, “source information,”
encompasses information that was neither taken from a scanned map nor was available in coordinate
form. For example, maps displaying non-coordinate data, information given via personal communication,
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