GEOG 121 Project 2b:
Integrating GPS and GIS


Robert Drone
 

 
This is my GPS-created map of the west side of the Penn State campus.  All seven pushpins are locations where I took geographic coordinate readings with my GPS receiver.  The first pushpin, farthest to the north, is at the western entrance to the Kern Building.  The second pin, right below that, is at the Nittany Lion Shrine on Curtin Road.  The third pin, south-southeast of pin 2, is in between part of Recreation Hall and a frat house.  The fourth pin, to the east-southeast of pin 3, is at the front of the Hosler Building (the side that faces Pollock Road).  The fifth pin is southeast of pin 4, right down Burrowes Rd., at the entrance to the Deike Building, home of the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences.  The sixth pin, continuing down Burrowes Rd., is at the front of the Reber Building.  The seventh and last pin lies directly west of pin 6 at the Walker Building, home of the Geography Department.  

This was an interesting assignment.  At first I thought we had to go to prearranged places to mark them, but then I learned that we could go anywhere on the southwest side of campus.  This made things much easier but a little less fun because I would have liked to have gone exploring to prearranged points.  Anyway, I had some problems trying to figure out how the GPS receiver worked, but once I found out that all I really needed to do was push two buttons, it made things a lot simpler.  So I traveled down Burrowes Rd., like I do almost five days a week, and started marking locations on my way to the Walker Building.  Once I made it there, I was done, and then it was a simple matter of downloading the coordinates onto a computer.  Then, using that information, I made this map.

This experience comes with an interesting story.  My third pushpin is between Rec Hall and a frat house, but that is not where I was standing when I inputted the coordinates.  I had gone into the Waring Commons Building, which is across the street from pin three to the northeast.  I discovered that I could not get a signal inside the building, so I went outside to the front steps of the building.  That is where I marked the coordinate, not where the pin is on the map.  What could cause this to happen?  I was right next to the Waring Building, and that area is surrounded by trees.  Also, it was cloudy out because we had heavy rain the two previous days, and we know that the receivers are not 100% accurate.  So cloudy skies, buildings, and trees conspired against me to screw up pin three's position.  We learn something new every day.

The hardware I used to make this map were a Garmin GPS 12 Personal Navigator and a PC.  The software I used was ArcMap, Waypoint, Excel, and Front Page.

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