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Making a Difference with ParkScore
Making a Difference with ParkScore
Emmy. Tony. Grammy. Oscar. Esri?
On July 23rd, The Trust for Public Land experienced the conservation world’s equivalent of a big win on Oscar night, accepting the 2012 Esri Making a Difference Award for our innovative use of GIS mapping technology.
“This year we are honoring one of my favorite organizations on the planet,” said Jack Dangermond, President of Esri, the worldwide leading developer of Geographic Information System (GIS) software and technology. “The Trust for Public Land is an exemplary GIS practitioner who has elevated the analysis of city park systems with their cutting-edge ParkScore project, which features a very user-friendly interface with GIS.”
Breece Robertson, head of The Trust for Public Land’s GIS team, accepted the award along with TPL President Will Rogers in front of 15,000 colleagues and peers at the Esri User Conference in San Diego.
“This award is given to one entity every year that Esri considers to be making the most difference using GIS,” says Robertson. “We use GIS as the core component to our conservation vision and planning and Esri considers The Trust for Public Land to be the national expert in planning technologies.”
ParkScore and Greenprinting
Most recently, the GIS team made a significant contribution to the improvement of city park systems across the country with the launch of ParkScore, an interactive GIS-driven planning tool that ranks cities according to investment in parks, access to parks, and total park acreage. The Trust for Public Land GIS team also assists communities to plan and map conservation through our Greenprinting services. As of 2011, Greenprinting has led to the protection of more than 113,000 acres of land throughout the United States and helped leverage over $35 million in conservation funding.
“Greenprints are community-driven,” says Breece. “The community identifies what’s important to conserve, and the people really take ownership of it. We don’t present a master plan to the community—we invite them to be active participants in the conservation planning of their land—and that makes all the difference.”
Related Article
2012 Esri Making a Difference Award Press Release
Cities Ask: What’s our ParkScore?
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