Projects

The USF Water Institute and Affiliated Researchers undertake projects that assess the health of our natural and built environments and promote science-based solutions to local and global water challenges.

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Tampa Tree Planting Assistance 2023-24

The purpose of this project to assist the City of Tampa with identifying specific tree planting locations and conducting outreach with residents to identify barriers to support for tree planting efforts. Activities include identifying planting locations meeting priority criteria, conducting field assessments, developing online maps and a field survey...

EPC Public Data Portal Design

The purpose of this project is to develop for the Environmental Protection Commission of Hillsborough County (EPCHC) a Public Data Portal that will allow users to access EPCHC documents and information, using either a form/tabular or a map-based search. Search results will be linked to internal EPCHC documents and data via an application interface maintained...

South Carolina Plant Atlas

Implementation of a South Carolina Plant Atlas similar in function to the Tennessee-Kentucky Plant Atlas: the creation of a website with additional enhancements desired by South Carolina Partners, such as a physiographic regions map and search, transfer protocol from SERNEC (SouthEast Regional Network of Expertise and Collections) data, and a device-responsive...

Water Quality Analysis Pilot Study for the Statewide Ecosystem Assessment of Coastal and Aquatic Resources (SEACAR) Program

The purpose of this project is to identify tools and methods to better correlate water quality measures and habitat indicators for oysters and seagrass habitats, and to identify both gaps and duplications in the current water quality monitoring network to increase efficiency and ensure data sufficiency for meaningful statistical analysis. The study...

2021: Bridging Knowledge to Action - Using Data to Develop Equitable Outcomes or Solutions to Climate Hazards and Other Disasters

  • Senior Personnel:
    • Taryn Sabia
    • Amelia Smyth
    • Corinne LeTourneau
    • Margaret Winter
    • Paul Nelson
    • Shawn Landry
    • Theodore Green
  • Dates:
    March 2022 — February 2023

This project evaluated data from the recent Tampa Tree Canopy & Urban Forest Analysis and Urban Forest Management Plan to develop a Heat Resiliency Playbook, its purpose to create more equitable outcomes associated with mitigating the effects of extreme heat, by analyzing the accessibility and quality of parks and outdoor spaces, potential cooling centers,...

City of Venice Tree Canopy Study

  • Sponsor(s):
    City of Venice
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    September 2021 — September 2022

The primary goals of this project were to develop a high-resolution (i.e., approximately 6" pixels) Urban Tree Canopy {UTC) map for use in GIS analyses, and conduct several analyses to provide information about several different topics, including: Heat island mitigation, Stormwater management, Debris planning, identify Potential planting sites, and...

City of Tampa 2021 Urban Forest Analysis

The University will assist the City of Tampa with the 2021 Tree Canopy and Urban Forest Analysis, including field data collection of 200 plots, a social survey, equity analysis, and development of tree growth models. This project will provide data in support of the City’s Management Plan and the revised Tree and Landscape Code.

Lake Seminole Bathymetry and SAV Survey

  • Sponsor(s):
    Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    December 2020 — January 2021

The USF Water Institute performed bathymetric mapping and submerged aquatic vegetation field work and data processing for the assessment of depth contours, submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) community percent area covered (PAC) and percent volume inhabited (PVI) and SAV species present in the northern lobe of Lake Seminole, Pinellas County, Florida.

Hillsborough County Water Atlas Maintenance

The Atlas Program is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water quality, hydrologic, and ecological data, as well as information about recreational opportunities and a library of scientific and educational materials on water resource issues. The Hillsborough County Water Atlas was the first...

City of Kissimmee WIN Data Management

Assistance to the City of Kissimmee in the processing and submission of water quality data to the Watershed Information Network (WIN), the data repository operated by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP). After processing/verification by USF Water Institute’s Water Quality Data Management System, USF will deliver the data to the...

SEACAR Data Discovery Interface Maintenance and Development of the Interactive Website

Maintainence and updates to the Statewide Ecosystem Assessment of Coastal and Aquatic Resources (SEACAR) database and Data Discovery Interface (DDI) developed in Phase I and Phase II, and completion of the design and launch of an interactive website with mapping capabilities. The SEACAR interactive website will consolidate biological and spatial data...

Lakeland Bathymetry, Stage, Volume and Submerged Aquatic Vegetation

The USF Water Institute worked as a subcontractor to Environmental Science Associates Inc. to perform assessments for each of the City of Lakeland’s eleven priority lakes: Beulah, Bonnet, Bonny, Crystal, Hollingsworth, Mirror, Morton, Gibson, Parker, Wire and Hunter. The analysis included estimates of lake volume and lake area at one-foot resolution,...

Hillsborough County Water Atlas Re-implementation

This project will “reboot” the suspended Hillsborough County Water Atlas, including hosting for and enhancements to an existing Erosion Control Application that is currently used by Hillsborough County staff. The project will also include development of a new Illicit Discharge Inspections application for reporting and tracking illicit discharge/connection...

Pinellas Water Atlas Website Component Services

The objective of this project is to enhance the existing Pinellas County Water Atlas. A new Coastal Water Quality component will provide directed access to water quality conditions occurring within the county, including harmful algal blooms, pollution, and bacteria. An ESRI Operations Dashboard will present the most recent water quality sampling data...

Sint Maarten: Great Salt Pond Bathymetric Survey

  • Sponsor(s):
    Sint Maarten National Recovery Program Bureau
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2019 — October 2020

The objective of this project was to provide bathymetric mapping data and the locations of surface hydrological inputs and outfalls for the Great Salt Pond in Sint Maarten, in the Lesser Antilles.

Ranking inundation potential of wetlands in the Northern Tampa Bay area

Following cutbacks in groundwater pumping at 11 well fields operated by Tampa Bay Water (TBW), thousands of wetlands in the Northern Tampa Bay area showed evidence of hydrologic recovery. Few of these wetlands are monitored and many seasonal streams entering and exiting the wetlands have not been mapped. As a result, we currently have little information...

SEACAR Database Phase II: Maintenance and Public Interface Development and Implementation

This project provides maintenance and updates to the Statewide Ecosystem Assessment of Coastal and Aquatic Resources (SEACAR) database and the Data Discovery Interface (DDI) developed under Phase I. In addition, a public interface will be designed that provides an interactive website with mapping capabilities to present the status and trends analysis...

Lake Tarpon Submerged Aquatic Vegetation Survey

  • Sponsor(s):
    Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2019 — September 2019

This project consists of bathymetric mapping field work and data processing for the assessment of submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) community percent area covered (PAC) and percent volume inhabited (PVI) in Lake Tarpon.

Understanding Risk at Wastewater Treatment Plants in Tampa Bay During Extreme High-Precipitation Events

Improved understanding of environmental conditions causing sewer and stormwater overflows in the Tampa Bay region will be obtained by developing a risk model based on precipitation, storm surge, and water utility records. The model will then be used to predict future probability of overflow under accepted sea level rise scenarios.

RAPID Collaborative Research: The Role of Landscape Configuration and Socio-economic Legacy in Understanding Tree Response to Hurricane Irma

While destructive, hurricane Irma offers an opportunity to increase our knowledge about the response of trees and urban forests to hurricane disturbance. Understanding the resistance and resilience of urban forests to disturbance is essential to increasing our knowledge about how ecosystems will respond to changing climate regimes (e.g., increased storm...

SEACAR Database Creation

The Statewide Ecosystem Assessment of Coastal and Aquatic Resources (SEACAR) is a collaborative process which involves local, state and federal natural resource managers, data providers, researchers and partners to identify and assess ecological indicators and to develop a decision support tool to better understand the status of aquatic resources throughout...

Venice Gardens Lake Bathymetric and Submerged Aquatic Vegetation Survey

This project included bathymetry and Submerged Aquatic Vegetation (SAV) mapping field work and data processing for the assessment of bathymetry, SAV community species composition, percent area covered (PAC) and percent volume inhabited (PVI) in Venice Gardens Lake in Sarasota County, Florida.

Gulf of Mexico Alliance Monitoring Metadata Catalog

The GOMA Monitoring Metadata Catalog project proposes to expand the existing, Florida-focused Terra-CAT/Water-CAT platform to create an intuitive, web-based, interactive mapping interface that provides GOMA partners with a seamless method to learn about monitoring sites and management areas in the Gulf region. While initially focusing on Alabama, the...

Rapid Assessment of Shallow Groundwater Recharge-Discharge in Salmon-Bearing Watersheds, Kenai Lowlands, Alaska

  • Sponsor(s):
    National Estuarine Research Reserve System Science Collaborative
  • Project Partner(s):
    Kachemak Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve
  • Dates:
    January 2018 — October 2019

Groundwater discharge plays a critical role in maintenance of temperature and nutrient supply for salmon-bearing stream on the Kenai Peninsula. Effective management of these systems requires knowledge of the distribution and extent of groundwater recharge and discharge sites, but this information has largely been lacking in this remote region. We will...

Polk County MS4 Outfall Inventory Update

Update of a spatial database identifying the Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System (MS4) outfalls and infrastructure in Polk County and its municipalities, including geographic location, outfall description/size, receiving waterbody, date of data collection, comments, and advisability of field verification.

NRT-INFEWS: Systems Thinking Training for Research ON Geography-based Coastal Food Energy Water Systems (STRONG-CFEWS)

This five-year National Research Traineeship (NRT) will foster interdisciplinary, 21st century, and global competency skills of graduate students at the University of South Florida (USF) and University of the Virgin Islands (UVI). It develops a transformative community-engaged training and research Food Energy Water Systems (FEWS) program where graduates...

Cherry Lake Submerged Aquatic Vegetation Study

  • Sponsor(s):
    Suwannee River Water Management District
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    August 2017 — September 2017

Perform data collection and analysis to determine submerged aquatic vegetation community species composition, percent area covered, and percent volumne inhabited for Cherry Lake, located in Madison County, Florida, to be used by the Suwannee River Water Management in the establishment of Minimum Flows and Levels (MFL) for the lake.

Florida Preservation Atlas

This project expands the Florida Preservation Atlas, a statewide preservation directory and interactive map, to include all Florida counties. Tasks include survey and data collection from Certified Local Governments and Florida Main Street Programs, development of an interview tool for future updates, and performing a web-based survey. The information...

Tenessee-Kentucky Plant Atlas

  • Sponsor(s):
    University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Eastern Kentucky University
  • Project Partner(s):
    Tennessee Native Plant Society, Kentucky Native Plant Society, Kentucky State Nature Preserve Commission
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    May 2017 — June 2022

Implementation and maintenance of a Tennessee-Kentucky Plant Atlas website, including initial database and website setup, design customization, content importation, training, hosting, and basic maintenance.

Hillsborough County .NET Support Services

Development of new and existing software applications to support Hillsborough County's Conservation Services Information Tracking System, used to coordinate land management activities of the Hillsborough County Environmental Lands Acquisition and Preservation Program (ELAPP).

Orange County Tree Canopy Cover Change Assessment

  • Sponsor(s):
    Orange County Board of County Commissioners
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2017 — June 2017

The purpose of this project is to map and estimate temporal change in the tree canopy coverage in Orange County from 1986 to present. Moderate resolution Landsat images will be used to map tree cover using remote sensing techniques at approximately 10-year intervals: 1986, 1996, 2006 and 2016. Analysis of Landsat images will produce a measure of temporal...

New York Flora Atlas Maintenance

  • Sponsor(s):
    New York Flora Association
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2016 — December 2021

The New York Flora Atlas is an online resource for information including distribution of all the vascular plants that occur in New York State. Information is also available for taxa which have been erroneously reported from New York (excluded taxa). In addition to distribution, the atlas provides information for each taxon about habitat, taxonomy, native/non-native...

City of Kissimmee STORET Data Processing

The City of Kissimmee, in Osceola County, requires the assistance of the University in the processing and submission of their data to DEP STORET. The city will send, on a quarterly basis, the latest additions of water quality sampling data for STORET inclusion. These data will be processed by the University’s own Water Quality Data Management System...

City of Tampa Tree canopy and Urban Forest Analysis, 2016

The primary goals of this project are to conduct the field and remote sampling and data analysis necessary to measure the 2016 extent, condition and value of the tree canopy and urban forest, and how the forest has changed during the five years since the past study and ten years since the first study. The measurements collected by the study will provide...

Determining Sources and Risk of Fecal Pollution in Tampa Bay Tributaries

  • Sponsor(s):
    Environmental Protection Commission of Hillsborough County
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2015 — October 2017

This project will combine nutrient and microbiological analysis of tributaries to Tampa Bay to determine sources and risk of fecal pollution from animal and human sources. Risk assessment for recreational water users will be determined from these and additional monitoring data.

Alabama Butterfly Atlas

The deliverable for this project is an online atlas with a database of information about butterflies found in Alabama. Sections of the atlas will include species lists, species accounts, a map of public lands where butterflies are likely to be observed, information about butterfly life cycles, links to related websites and videos, flight periods, host...

Bathymetric Survey of Wet Ponds in Orange County

  • Sponsor(s):
    Orange County Board of County Commissioners
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2015 — May 2018

The focus of this project is to conduct field sampling and obtain bathymetry for wet stormwater ponds in Orange County, Florida. Faculty, staff and students have developed rapid field sampling protocols to collect water depth data using sonar and GPS technology attached to small water craft (e.g., kayak or jon boat). Students learn GIS and 3D mapping...

Coastal SEES Collaborative Research: Integration of human behavior and perception into a risk-based microbial water quality management approach

  • Sponsor(s):
    National Science Foundation
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    September 2015 — September 2018

An innovative, beach water quality investigation that considers human behavior, water pollution, and risk of illness, with the goal of improving improve beach management and protection of public health in Costa Rica, other tropical regions, and throughout the world

FWC Species and Habitat Monitoring Programs Catalog

The goal of this project is to create a spatially-mapped, online catalog of habitat and species metadata that meet the FWC’s needs and those of the greater species and habitat monitoring community. The project will assist Florida’s Wildlife Legacy Initiative (FWLI) in meeting its Monitoring and Adaptation implementation goal of providing information...

Mangrove and Mangrove-Fringe Wetlands in Ostional, Nicaragua: Current Conditions and Pathways Forward

  • Sponsor(s):
    Paso Pacifico
  • Dates:
    July 2015 — December 2015

Mangrove forests have traditionally protected the coastline of Ostional, a rural Nicaraguan fishing village, from degradation of fishery habitat and onshore effects of storm surge. Swaths of mangrove were converted to agricultural use before the ecological role of these mangroves was understood. We assessed the soils, hydrology, and vegetation of the...

From Gray to Green: Tools for Transitioning to Vegetation-Based Stormwater Management

Many cities recognize the potential of green infrastructure in managing and mitigating urban stormwater runoff (e.g. nutrient load), yet most lack systematic strategies for transitioning away from their existing conventional (gray) drainage systems. This project is intended to provide natural resource managers, planners, and engineers with decision...

Hillsborough County Lake and Stream Assessments

  • Sponsor(s):
    Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    April 2015 — September 2024

Ecosystem evaluation of lakes and streams in Hillsborough County. The product of these investigations will provide the County, lake property owners and the general public a better understanding of the general health of Hillsborough County lakes, in terms of shoreline development, water quality, lake morphology (bottom contour, volume, area, etc.), plant...

Detailed Analysis of the FWC Saltwater Angler Licensing System

The overall objective of this project is to provide assistance in improving the quality and completeness of the Florida marine recreational fishing license/registry database. The intent of the project is to work with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission to: 1) identify missing key parameters; 2) examine current available data for incorrect information;...

Lake County STORET/WIN Processing

  • Sponsor(s):
    Lake County Board of County Commissioners
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2015 — September 2018

Lake County requires the assistance of the University in the processing and submission of their data to Florida Department of Environmental Protection's STORET database and its successor, the Watershed Information Network (WIN). Lake County will send, on a quarterly basis, the latest additions of water quality sampling data for STORET/WIN inclusion....

The Role of High Elevation Wetlands (Páramos) to Water Security in the Colombian Andes

  • Senior Personnel:
    • Kai Rains
  • Dates:
    January 2015 — December 2017

Water security requires a sufficient quantity and quality of water be delivered at the appropriate time. Imported water can come from three possible sources: surface water, groundwater, or desalinated sea water. Of these, surface water is the most readily available and cost-effective and therefore the preferable source in less developed nations. Headwater...

Tampa Tree Map Website

  • Sponsor(s):
    City of Tampa, Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, Florida Forest Service
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2014 — September 2018

The primary focus of this project is to maintain and support the Tampa Tree Map website that the City uses as the basis of its tree inventory, tree risk assessment and other Urban Forest Management related efforts. The deliverable product is the maintenance and upgrades of a fully functional web site for a period of two-years from the initiation of...

Polk County Bathymetry - Lake Sears and Grassy

  • Sponsor(s):
    Polk County BOCC, Parks and Natural Resources Division
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2014 — March 2015

The Water Institute will conduct bathymetric mapping for two lakes in Polk County: Lake Sears and Lake Grassy. USF-WI staff will conduct a full day field data collection to the lakes and collect detailed bathymetric mapping following a standard protocol, and process the data into TIN and bathymetric contour datasets, produce PDF contour maps, and add...

Mobile Tree Failure Prediction and Debris Estimation for Storm Preparation and Response

  • Sponsor(s):
    U.S. Forest Service
  • Project Partner(s):
    University of Florida
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    August 2014 — September 2018

Urban forest managers are limited in their ability to predict tree failure during storms. This project will create an openly available data collection and GIS mapping mobile application to help professionals quantify tree risk in the urban forest. Beginning with a systematic, nation-wide survey of storm-related data, predictive models will be built...

Tidal Creek Survey Support Phase II

A follow-up to assessments of southwest Florida tidal streams, this project involved performing vegetation, bathymetry, and bottom hardness assessment of 9 additional creeks located in Manatee and Sarasota Counties, within the watershed of Sarasota Bay.

Temple Terrace Water Meter Mapping: Phases One and Two

The Water Institute has been working with the City since summer of 2014 to map accessible front yard meters as part of a Phase One project. To date, a total of 6,627 meters have been mapped out of a total of approximately 10,065 meters. The effort to map these meters was relatively rapid and efficient because the location of the meters did not require...

Predicting i-Tree Ecosystem Services from Remote Sensing Metrics

  • Sponsor(s):
    U.S. Forest Service
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    June 2014 — September 2017

Investigate the use of metrics generated from remotely sensed imagery (including Urban Tree Canopy) and LiDAR to predict changes to i-Tree Eco based estimates of urban forest ecosystem services using data from the Tampa Bay Watershed.

Center for Reinventing Aging Infrastructure for Nutrient Management (RAINmgt).

  • Sponsor(s):
    U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    September 2013 — August 2018

The mission of RAINmgt is to achieve sustainable and cost-effective health and environmental outcomes by re-imagining aging coastal urban infrastructure communities. The overall goal is to develop the science behind new technology and management innovations and a deep understanding of the integrated system while demonstrating and assessing these innovations...

Indiana Plant Atlas Website

Implementation and maintenance of an Indiana Plant Atlas similar in function to the Alabama Plant Atlas, usable on modern tablet devices, and with usability enhancements (auto-completion fields, responsive website design, etc.). The efforts included in this project have been designed to meet the existing and future needs of this collaborative endeavor.

Tidal Creek Survey Support

This project involves performing vegetation, bathymetry, and bottom hardness assessment of 16 tidal creeks located within the study areas of the Sarasota Bay, Tampa Bay and Charlotte Harbor National Estuary Programs.

Florida Water Resources Monitoring Council Monitoring Catalog Design, Implementation, and Maintenance

The goal of this metadata catalog is to help water resource managers better protect, preserve, manage and restore water resources in the state of Florida, by making it easier for them to coordinate water resource monitoring efforts and share information. The Catalog can also help researchers by letting them know what data have been collected, where...

Orange County Data Loggers 2013

The project sets up and maintains a process that retrieves data from up to three Orange County data loggers, provides review of the results for quality assurance, and outputs the collected data to a Microsoft Access database the county staff can download.

Tampa Build Your Own Water Efficiency Rebate Program

  • Sponsor(s):
    City of Tampa Water Department
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    December 2012 — September 2013

This project is intended to enhance public policy and best practices related to efficient potable water use by better understanding why humans conserve. This pilot project in behavioral research allows participants to choose their own ways of reducing water use, offering the City and the University an opportunity to work toward sustainable behavioral...

CHNEP Water Atlas Enhancements

The purpose of this project is to complete several tasks designed to enhance the CHNEP Water Atlas. Tasks include completion of the time series analysis or water quality variables, interactive program and volunteer pages, and quality assurance and quality control meetings.

Wetland Change, 1950s to 2007: Manatee County Supplement

  • Sponsor(s):
    Manatee County Board of County Commissioners, Tampa Bay Estuary Program
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    November 2012 — April 2013

This project is a follow-on to the report "Prioritizing Habitat Restoration Goals in the Tampa Bay Watershed" which analyzed historical changes to freshwater wetland habitats in the Tampa Bay estuary's watershed from 1950 to 2007, identified changes in extent, structure, function and quality of those wetland habitats, assessed the state and condition...

Assessing Vulnerabilities from Climate Change: Impacts of Water Provision, Power Relations and Perceptions of Risk on Ecohydrology

  • Sponsor(s):
    National Science Foundation
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    September 2012 — August 2014

Coastal cities host 52% of the world's population, and are likely to be highly susceptible to the effects of changes in climate. Yet, much remains to be understood about specific vulnerabilities in particular cities as well as commonalities that can be addressed through mitigation and adaptation across US cities and around the globe. One dominant impact...

Tampa Urban Forest Management Website

  • Sponsor(s):
    City of Tampa
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    June 2012 — May 2014

This project will integrate content management, GIS mapping, and communication technologies to support work efforts for effective management of Tampa's urban forest.

Hillsborough County Parks, Recreation, ELAPP and Burns Web Application

Online database application to assist Hillsborough County Parks, Recreation and Conservation Department with record keeping and scheduling for past, present and future land management activities for the 60,000 acres of environmentally sensitive lands for which it is responsible. The Department's management responsibilities include prescribed burning,...

Mobilizing Community Support for Urban Forestry

  • Sponsor(s):
    Florida Division of Forestry
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    March 2012 — January 2013

The goal of this project is to mobilize community support and increase the participation of Tampa residents in the stewardship of the urban forest using a Community-Based Social Marketing (CBSM) approach. The partnership will establish four neighborhood pilot projects that will help to improve the Community Tree Program, expand the number of households...

City of Altamonte Springs STORET/WIN Data Processing

Altamonte Springs requires the assistance of the University in the processing and submission of their data to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection's STORET database and its successor, the Watershed Information Network (WIN). Altamonte Springs will send, on a quarterly basis, the latest additions of water quality sampling data for STORET/WIN...

Florida LAKEWATCH STORET Data Processing

  • Sponsor(s):
    Florida LAKEWATCH (University of Florida IFAS)
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2011 — September 2012

The Water Atlas program includes a data warehouse for surface and groundwater monitoring data collected by local governments, and also provides automated tools to migrate these data to the State of Florida-mandated STORET data warehouse. The Florida Center will perform formatting and quality control monitoring on data collected statewide, ensuring that...

Florida Invasive Plant (FLIP) Mobile Field Guide

FLIP stands for FLorida Invasive Plants and is a mobile field guide that was designed for, and can be accessed by, computers, smart phones, tablets, or other mobile devices with internet browser capability. It allows searching or browsing for information about Category I invasive species (and one Category II invasive species) as designated by the Florida...

Characterization of N Loading from Transportation and Attenuation by Urban Vegetation

  • Sponsor(s):
    U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (subcontract with University of Florida)
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    November 2010 — January 2013

The City of Tampa (City), University of South Florida (USF), University of Florida (UF) and the UF-IFAS/ Hillsborough Extension Service (Extension) completed an ecological analysis of the City’s urban forest in 2006-2007. The project team of UF, USF, and EPA will work together to quantify the potential of roadside vegetated buffers and other vegetation...

CHNEP Water Atlas

This is a research project and website design, development and implementation project with the goal of designing a WaterAtlas.org website for the Coastal & Heartland National Estuary Partnership (formerly the Charlotte Harbor National Estuary Program) with spatial coverage of the CHNEP Study area, including the counties of Polk, Charlotte, Lee, Sarasota,...

Connecting Pixels to People: Management Agents and Socioecological Determinants of Changes of Street Trees Distribution

  • Sponsor(s):
    National Science Foundation
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    September 2010 — August 2012

The goal of the proposed dissertation research is to investigate the contemporary agents and socioecological determinants of street tree distributions in urban residential neighborhoods in order to understand how household decisions and multi-scalar management agents shape the environment within the public-private space of the right-of-way.

Tampa 2011 Urban Ecological Analysis and Urban Forest Management Plan

  • Sponsor(s):
    City of Tampa
  • Project Partner(s):
    1) University of Florida and 2) University of Florida/Hillsborough County
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    August 2010 — August 2013

The purpose of this project will be three-fold: 1.To re-inventory Tampa’s urban forest in order to complete a 5-year update to the Tampa Urban Ecological Analysis (UEA); 2. To utilize both new and previously collected field and remote sampling information to conduct a detailed analysis of structural and spatial change to Tampa’s urban forest since 2006;...

STORET Load of Groundwater Sampling - Collier County

  • Sponsor(s):
    Professional Services Industrial, Inc. (and Collier County)
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    July 2010 — November 2010

The Water Atlas program includes a data warehouse for surface and groundwater monitoring data collected by local governments, and also provides automated tools to migrate these data to the State of Florida mandated STORET data warehouse. The Florida Center will assist Collier County (through a subcontract with PSI) to upload groundwater data to STORET.

Polk County Lake Bathymetry Data Processing Project

  • Sponsor(s):
    Polk County BOCC, Parks and Natural Resources Division
  • Project Partner(s):
    Southwest Florida Water Management District
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2009 — September 2010

The goal of this project is to used inexpensive yet accurate GPS and sonar technologies to map lakes in Polk County and produce bathymetric (contour) databases and database products from this mapping effort.

EPCHC Seagrass and Seagrass Scar Tracking

  • Sponsor(s):
    Environmental Protection Commission of Hillsborough County
  • Project Partner(s):
    Hillsborough County Specialized Services; Tampa Bay Estuary Program
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2009 — September 2011

This is a research project to design and implement methods of tracking seagrass abundance and seabed boat propellor scarring using low-cost bathymetric equipment mounted on small boats.

Urban development, power relations, and water redistribution as drivers of wetland change in the Tampa Bay Region Socioecosystem

  • Sponsor(s):
    National Science Foundation
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2009 — March 2013

Urban ecosystems are heterotrophic entities, and their reliance on external inputs is central to an emerging theory of urban ecology. Yet, the drivers and consequences of this redistribution of resources remain poorly understood. This project will investigate how social organization and distribution of power in a socioecosystem drive resource redistribution,...

Seminole County Water Atlas

The Atlas Program is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water quality, hydrologic, and ecological data, as well as information about recreational opportunities and a library of scientific and educational materials on water resource issues. The Atlas is a "one stop information shop" for...

Water Conservation Public Opinion Survey

  • Sponsor(s):
    Tampa Bay Water
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    September 2009 — March 2010

The Florida Center will conduct a public opinion survey and related analyses for use by Tampa Bay Water in the development of their updated Demand Management Plan.

Alabama Plant Atlas Website Implementation

The Alabama Plant Atlas (Atlas) will be a recognized program of the University of West Alabama (UWA), but will be a shared resource for herbaria throughout the state. The objectives of this project are to implement the Alabama Plant Atlas and enhance the plant specimen data management system to facilitate specimen data sharing between herbaria containing...

Hillsborough River Watershed Alliance Website Design, Development and Implementation

  • Sponsor(s):
    Hillsborough River Watershed Alliance
  • Project Partner(s):
    Southwest Florida Water Management District, Tampa Bay Estuary
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    August 2009 — July 2016

The objectives of this project are for the Florida Center for Community Design and Research (FCCDR) at USF to : (1) Provide interim hosting and minor management to the existing Hillsborough River Watershed Alliance (Alliance) website; (2) Redesign the website to improve functionality and ease of management; (3) Redesign and improve the Frog Listening...

Development of a Coordinated Watershed Approach for Linking Compensatory Mitigation & Tampa Bay Habitat Restoration Goals

  • Sponsor(s):
    Tampa Bay Estuary Program
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    July 2009 — February 2011

The purpose of the overall project, lead by Thomas Crisman in the Department of Integrative Biology, is to work with various stakeholder organizations, primarily local and state government agencies, to explore the concept of using compensatory mitigation in freshwater wetlands to further the overall habitat restoration and protection goals in the Tampa...

Children's Community Atlas

The objective of this project is to develop a Community Atlas website for kids that presents quality-assured data and information concerning community conditions in a format that the public in general, and children in particular, can easily access and understand.

Orange County Water Atlas

Orange County Water Atlas is an interactive web site designed to make science and watershed management understandable to all readers. It consolidates surface water related information from multiple agencies and disseminates the information to the public, decision makers and scientists. The Atlas will serve as an archive of historic data and a continuously...

City of Tampa Urban and Community Forestry Grant: Toward the Development of a Strategy for Urban Forest Sustainability

Working with the City of Tampa, the goal of this project was to develop initial Strategies for Urban Forest Sustainability and prepare many of the elements necessary to eventually create a comprehensive Urban Forestry Master Plan. Led by the University of South Florida, University of Florida and IFAS Extension Services, vision, goals and strategies...

Tampa Water Department Asset Digitization

This project focuses on assisting the City of Tampa Water Department in the recording and conversion of its asset inventory for the full service area to GIS-based data for use with the Utility Services GIS Asset Management System.

UACDC Crime Prevention Project: Community Atlas/Community Indicators

  • Sponsor(s):
    Jim Walter Partnership/USF School of Social Work
  • Project Partner(s):
    University Area Community Development Corporation
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2008 — June 2011

Assist the University Area Community Development Corporation in reducing the incidence of crime through public awareness and involvement. This project involves enhancing and maintaining the UACDC section of the Hillsborough Community Atlas and researching and developing the initial phase of a "Community Crime Indicators" project, which will develop...

Plant Atlas Website Update to include Non-native species in the Atlas of Florida Plants website database

  • Sponsor(s):
    Florida Department of Environmental Protection, Institute of Systematic Botany, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    November 2007 — June 2018

The primary focus of this project is to redesign and update the existing Atlas of Florida Plants to increase the functionality for users and expand the collections in the searchable database. Addition of data on non-native species to the Atlas of Florida Plants website database relevant to Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Committee invasive species...

Hillsborough County Site/Sub Database

  • Sponsor(s):
    Hillsborough County Planning and Growth Management
  • Project Partner(s):
    Hillsborough County
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    September 2007 — January 2008

This project is designed to assist Hillsborough County in improving their system for tracking the life-cycle of required subdivisions and site development permits.

City of Tallahassee and Leon County Water Atlas Project

  • Sponsor(s):
    City of Tallahassee, Leon County Board of County Commissioners
  • Project Partner(s):
    Watershed Management Policy Board
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    July 2007 — September 2011

The primary focus of this project is to continue to maintain the City of Tallahassee and Leon County Water Atlas that consolidates surface water related information from multiple agencies and disseminates the information to the public, decision makers, and scientists. The Atlas is available as an interactive website designed to make science and watershed...

Volusia County Water Atlas

The Volusia County Water Atlas is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water quality, hydrologic, and ecological data, as well as information about recreational opportunities and a library of scientific and educational materials on water resource issues. Typically, the scientists and citizens...

Florida Atlas of Lakes

  • Sponsor(s):
    Florida Lake Management Society
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    April 2007 — September 2007

The Florida Atlas of Lakes is a component of the Wateratlas.org portal that features 600 plus Florida LAKEWATCH lakes and provides a customized ArcIMS mapping functionality for all lakes listed in the National Hydrography Dataset (NHD) for Florida. The atlas includes special tools to allow the download of LAKEWATCH data from a specific sample site...

City of Tampa Water Atlas

The primary focus of this project is to continue to maintain the Hillsborough County Watershed Atlas by adding new datasets and content which will provide services to the staff and citizens of the City of Tampa.

City of Tampa Urban Ecological Analysis

  • Sponsor(s):
    City of Tampa
  • Project Partner(s):
    University of Florida and Hillsborough County Cooperative Extension
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    December 2006 — December 2008

The City of Tampa and the University of South Florida completed an ecological assessment of the City’s urban forest in the mid-1990’s, examining the temporal change in canopy coverage between 1975-1996, the spatial variation in canopy coverage in 1996 and the estimated benefits provided by the urban forest. In 2006, USF partnered with the University...

Orange County Historic Data

The Orange County Environmental Protection Division Ecological Assessment Team (County) has been sampling and acquiring water quality data from Orange County lakes and streams since the 1960’s. At present, data are recorded in several formats (different table configurations), in three media types: hardcopy data sheets, microfilm recordings of data sheets,...

Pollution Monitoring Application Pilot

  • Sponsor(s):
    Environmental Protection Commission of Hillsborough County
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    July 2006 — December 2009

Hillsborough County and the Tampa Bay area continue to face a number of challenges related to the pollution of our surface water resources. The objectives of this project are to enhance collaborative water resource management and pollution recovery efforts by developing and making available new data access and visualization tools on the very successful...

City of Tampa Sanitary Sewer System Asset Digitization

The City of Tampa Wastewater Department currently maintains a sanitary sewer asset inventory in a hard copy Atlas with corresponding indexed as-built pages. As part of this work effort, the University will assist the City with the conversion of this asset inventory to a GIS format, thus creating a completed Sanitary Sewer System GIS dataset for the...

Shoreline Tracking and Reporting System for the Tampa Bay Estuary Atlas

  • Sponsor(s):
    City of Tampa Mayor's Beautification Program
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2006 — December 2006

The objective of this project is to develop an online component for the Tampa Bay Estuary Atlas (www.tampabay.wateratlas.org), that will allow users to access shoreline and/or habitat restoration projects that have been identified by the Tampa Shoreline Restoration Initiative and other projects. As envisioned, the system will allow users to dynamically...

Hillsborough Community Atlas

Typically, people who live and work in different communities around Hillsborough County have found it difficult to gather the information they need from the myriad of agencies that collect the related data and provide particular services. Often when data and information are provided about communities it is limited to particular subjects. To solve this...

Polk Water Atlas Enhancements

  • Sponsor(s):
    Polk County Board of County Commissioners
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    October 2005 — September 2009

The primary focus of this project is to continue to maintain Polk Water Atlas web interface was designed using Active Server Page (ASP) programming to enable database driven web pages with a web-based GIS navigation tool. The deliverable product is for maintenance of a fully functional web site for Polk County staff and citizens to use for a period...

Lake County Water Atlas

The Atlas Program is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water quality, hydrologic, and ecological data, as well as information about recreational opportunities and a library of scientific and educational materials on water resource issues. The Atlas is a "one stop information shop" for...

Manatee County Water Atlas

Manatee County Water Atlas is an interactive web site designed to make science and watershed management understandable to all readers. It consolidates surface water related information from multiple agencies and disseminates the information to the public, decision makers and scientists. The Atlas will serve as an archive of historic data and a continuously...

City of Tampa GIS Stormwater Asset Inventory

Prior to 2006, the City of Tampa maintained their stormwater inventory as hard copy stormwater Atlas pages. Since June of 2005, the University of South Florida (University) and the City of Tampa (City) have worked together to develop a comprehensive citywide GIS stormwater asset inventory utilizing atlas pages, as-built documents and other available...

Pinellas County Water Atlas

The Atlas Program is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water quality, hydrologic, and ecological data, as well as information about recreational opportunities and a library of scientific and educational materials on water resource issues. The Atlas is a "one stop information shop" for...

Regional Tampa Bay Water Atlas

The goal of the Atlas will be to consolidate surface water related information from multiple agencies and disseminate the information to the public, decision makers, and the scientific community. The Atlas will be available as an interactive web site designed to be make science and watershed management understandable to all stakeholders. The Atlas...

Community Atlas Development - Hillsborough County

  • Sponsor(s):
    Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    April 2004 — December 2005

The objective of this project is to develop a pilot Community Atlas website which presents quality-assured data and information concerning government services and community conditions in a format that the public can easily access and understand. This pilot is a multi-agency effort that includes Hillsborough County and the Children’s Board of Hillsborough...

Tampa Shoreline Restoration Initiative

  • Sponsor(s):
    Mayor's Beautification Program
  • Dates:
    April 2004 — February 2005

The objective of this project was to develop a master plan document that addressed shoreline restoration of thirty of the City of Tampa’s waterfront parks identified by the Mayor’s Beautification Program. The University coordinated the formation of the master plan document which includes: existing conditions for each park, a park restoration ranking,...

Tampa Bay Atlas Phase I: Prototype Creation and Implementation Plan

  • Sponsor(s):
    Tampa Bay Estuary Program, U.S. Geological Survey
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2004 — August 2004

The objective of this project is to complete a detailed conceptual design and implementation plan for creating an online Water Atlas for Tampa Bay and surrounding coastal waters. It is anticipated that the Atlas will be developed as a consortium with the primary partners including: the Tampa Bay Estuary Program, U.S. Geological Survey, Florida Marine...

New York Flora Atlas Website Redesign

  • Sponsor(s):
    New York Flora Association, New York State Biodiversity Research Institute
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2004 — April 2012

The New York Flora Atlas (Atlas) is an online resource for information including distribution of all the vascular plants that occur in New York State. Information is also available for taxa which have been erroneously reported from New York (excluded taxa). In addition to distribution, the atlas provides information for each taxon about habitat, taxonomy,...

Hillsborough County Basin Digitization

  • Sponsor(s):
    Hillsborough County Public Works Department
  • Dates:
    July 2003 — February 2004

The objective of this project is to assemble eleven Hillsborough County Watershed Management Plans (Alafia River, Bullfrog/Wolf Branch, Curiosity Creek, Cypress Creek, Delaney/Archie Creek, Duck Pond, East Lake, Hillsborough River, Little Manatee River, Pemberton/Baker Creek, and Silver/Twin) into digital formats that are easily accessible through websites....

Seminole County Stormwater Data Post Processing and Management

  • Sponsor(s):
    Seminole County Public Works
  • Dates:
    May 2003 — March 2005

The Florida Center for Community Design and Research at the University of South Florida assisted the Seminole County Public Works Department in collecting and post-processing stormwater related infrastructure data. This project used the protocol document developed by The Florida Center with the assistance of Seminole County staff, and participants will...

Sarasota County Water Atlas

The Atlas Program is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water quality, hydrologic, and ecological data, as well as information about recreational opportunities and a library of scientific and educational materials on water resource issues. The Atlas is a "one stop information shop" for...

Hillsborough County Stormwater Inventory and Hansen Programs

  • Sponsor(s):
    Hillsborough County Public Works, Stormwater Division
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2003 — September 2003

The Florida Center is working to update the GIS post-processing protocol developed in 2000 so that the steps can be carried out using the latest ESRI software suite. This project will focus entirely on the initial post-processing work that is currently assigned to the Specialized Services unit. This includes all post processing steps prior to the integration...

Southwest Florida Water Management District Water Resources Atlas

  • Sponsor(s):
    Southwest Florida Water Management District
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    November 2002 — October 2004

The Atlas Program is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water quality, hydrologic, and ecological data, as well as information about recreational opportunities and a library of scientific and educational materials on water resource issues. The Atlas is a "one stop information shop" for...

GIS Database Services

  • Sponsor(s):
    Southwest Florida Water Management District
  • Dates:
    January 2002 — November 2002

The purpose of the project was to provide Geographic Information Systems (GIS) database services to the District. These services included database design and automation, data translation, spatial metadata creation and intergovernmental data sharing activities. The primary product delivered under this agreement was a GIS land ownership parcel layer for...

Public Water Supply Service Area Digitization Project

  • Sponsor(s):
    Southwest Florida Water Management District
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2002 — December 2003

The goal of this project was to create a GIS layer and database for water utility retail service area boundaries of public water supply utilities throughout the Southwest Florida Water Management District. This project involved developing and conducting a protocol to work closely with each utility to determine the boundaries of their service area and...

Future Land-Use Layer Creation

  • Sponsor(s):
    Southwest Florida Water Management District
  • Dates:
    June 2001 — June 2002

The objective of this project was to produce a comprehensive Future Land-Use Layer that covered the entire Southwest Florida Water Management District jurisdictional area. This was accomplished by utilizing various GIS techniques to combine data layers that are collected from the sixteen counties and 98 local governments located within the Southwest...

Seminole Stormwater Protocol Development

  • Sponsor(s):
    Seminole County Public Works
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 2001 — September 2001

The objective of this project is to develop a pilot program to asses the current state of Seminole County’s stormwater data and develop a protocol to create a comprehensive stormwater GIS database. The newly developed protocol will provide a procedure for the County to create a complete layer of stormwater data for the entire County from the remaining...

Polk County Water Atlas

The Atlas Program is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water quality, hydrologic, and ecological data, as well as information about recreational opportunities and a library of scientific and educational materials on water resource issues. The Atlas is a "one stop information shop" for...

Hillsborough County Stormwater Inventory

  • Sponsor(s):
    Hillsborough County Public Works, Stormwater Section
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    August 1999 — February 2000

The objective of the Hillsborough County Stormwater Inventory is to assist the County with the creation of a Stormwater Atlas. The scope of this work involves mapping the existing stormwater infrastructure and the development of a stormwater management system interface by which County staff can identify stormwater features, attribute stormwater infrastructure...

Atlas of Florida Plants

  • Sponsor(s):
    Florida Department of Transportation, Institute of Systematic Botany, Southwest Florida Water Management District
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    June 1999 — June 2024

Florida, with over 3,800 species of native or naturalized ferns and seed plants, is the third most floristically diverse state in the United States. The Atlas of Florida Plants provides a source of information useful to anyone who needs to know the distribution of plants within the state. It will also serve as a companion volume for The Guide to Vascular...

Hillsborough County Water Atlas

The Atlas Program is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water quality, hydrologic, and ecological data, as well as information about recreational opportunities and a library of scientific and educational materials on water resource issues. The Atlas is a "one stop information shop" for...

WaterAtlas.org (1997-)

  • Sponsor(s):
    Multiple Sponsors (Please see website.)
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 1997 — n/a

This is the web portal that provides access to all of the Water Atlas websites. Each Water Atlas is a website that helps communities to make informed decisions by providing up-to-date information on our vital water resources. The Atlas Program is designed to provide citizens, scientists, professionals, and planners with comprehensive and current water...

Tampa Urban Ecological Analysis 1975-1996

  • Sponsor(s):
    Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services
  • Senior Personnel:
  • Dates:
    January 1997 — October 1999

The Florida Center at USF's School of Architecture completed an exciting research project to help the City of Tampa in the management of an important natural resource, the urban forest. Urban forests are vital to city life and provide residents with many benefits such as: reduction in household energy use, air pollution reduction, decreased stormwater...