The first step in upgrading American infrastructure? Make a map.

By identifying where to prioritize billions in new infrastructure funding, GIS mapping helps officials and the private sector make decisions, find efficiencies and reduce costs

By WP Creative Group

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With a whopping new $600 billion in funding for roads, bridges, broadband and more, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to upgrade the nation’s public works, and a rare opportunity for localities to tackle backlogs of repairs and badly-needed upgrades. But with a nearly endless list of needs and stakeholders, how—and where—should the money be spent? To answer that wisely and quickly, officials at all levels of government, from the White House to the nation’s smallest communities, turn to maps.

“These thousands of projects are going to have little footprints on the planet that actually impact the future,” said Jack Dangermond, founder and president of Esri, the world leader in geographic information systems (GIS) technology. Digital mapping isn’t just critical for identifying the places most in need, but for triangulating which projects are most impactful across a wide range of interests, like costs, environment, equity and business models. The new funding, Dangermond said, “means these little dots on a map are going to be directed by environmental factors, by social factors, by economic factors so that they can get the maximum value out of the investments this country is making.”

Seeing data on maps not only helps policymakers prioritize how best to spend billions in public funds, but can bring more insight and transparency into those decisions, Dangermond said at a recent Washington Post Live event. “Geography is a kind of framework or a language,” he said, “to allow people to make holistic, both decisions and allocations, but also evaluations.” It’s exactly the kind of tool government decision-makers need, a nimble system that lets them see the nation’s roads, water systems, bridges, electrical grids and airports in ways they never have been able to before. Advanced mapping is a way of combining geography and data to look at vital parts of the nation’s infrastructure to both rebuild and manage in the smartest ways.

One cornerstone of the bill is universal broadband. A system of private investment and a lack of national standards have left many communities out of the internet’s fast lanes, creating stark unjust divides, often along economic and racial lines, that only widened during the pandemic. Poor internet access means grindingly slow work, difficulty accessing jobs and extracurricular learning opportunities, challenges keeping up with schoolwork and an inability to access essential services like banking and healthcare. The bill allocates an historic $42.5 billion towards better internet in all 50 states, D.C. and Puerto Rico, along with billions more to extend a pandemic-era program that gives Americans $30 a month to pay for service.

There’s just one problem when it comes to distributing that much-needed money: We still don’t know where, exactly, the internet is too slow or too costly. In 2020, Congress instructed the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to build a National Broadband Map to address that issue. Augmented with census data, imagery and a flood of other newly-updated geospatial information, the map will also allow local government leaders, internet providers, the public and other stakeholders to make critical ongoing corrections through an online dashboard. The first draft of this map is slated to deliver in November.

Some localities aren’t waiting until then. In San Antonio—where it’s estimated closing the digital divide requires an upfront investment of $600 million—community members and city officials worked with the University of Texas to survey residents and build a detailed GIS map showing the places most in need and with the most potential for quick deployment. A public-facing dashboard has helped residents see the divide for themselves and apply for help.

Cutting-edge maps help prioritize a long list of new projects beyond broadband. A first-of-its-kind map portal released by the White House uses real-time data on climate change to help localities better understand and prepare for the future. Federal agencies have already been using an internal version of this portal to more equitably dispense billions in climate funds. The new portal, built with help from Esri and new data resources funded by the infrastructure bill, can show local communities and policymakers where new resilient infrastructure will be needed and centralizes funding opportunities to help sustainable and renewable energy development.

The Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill also includes millions for building out the nation’s maps themselves. Its largest geoscience investment is in the Earth Mapping Resources Initiative (Earth MRI), a partnership among the U.S. Geological Survey, the Association of American State Geologists (AASG) and others in the federal, state, tribal and private sectors, aimed at modernizing the nation’s surface and subsurface mapping. Its maps will enhance the nation’s understanding of its untapped mineral resources and reveal places suitable for remediation and sustainable development.

The infrastructure bill isn’t just a landmark investment; it also charts a terrain of rare agreement. In a climate of political polarization, cooperation across the aisle can be hard, but making the nation’s infrastructure build-out work will require it. Maps are key, said Dangermond, not just for illustrating what’s there, but for locating previously unseen opportunities and finding literal points of common ground. It’s never going to be easy to agree how to spend billions, Dangermond said, but when you build a map that illustrates “all the various interests for a common geography, what you find is there’s very little conflict.”

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