Assignment 3

Introduction

Hadleyville cemetery lost the majority of their burial records.  They have been experiencing problems in selling burial lots.  Since they have no records, they don’t know which plots are empty and which are not.  A GIS was built for this cemetery to show an image to go along with the points that were plotted.  This gives the information of the headstones, while also showing where the stone is located in the cemetery.  A survey grade GPS unit was used, as well as a UAS drone and visual interpretation skills.  Images were also taken of the headstones.  The drone supplied a locator map while the survey grade GPS unit was used to accurately map the locations of headstones.  This provides 3 pieces of information, the accurate locations, all the information on the stones, and an image of the stone.  Some of the stones were very difficult to read or to even be seen.  This makes it difficult to know if all of the data was received and collected.

Study Area

Hadleyville cemetery is located just outside Eleva Wisconsin.  It is located right on the edge of a cornfield and is a quite old cemetery.  It is located right on county highway HH between Eau Claire and Eleva. (Figure 1) The data was collected in two shifts in early to mid September.

Figure 1.  This image shows the locations of Eleva, Hadleyville, and Eau Claire.  The image shows that Hadleyville is in the center between Eleva and Eau Claire.

Methods

The class used many different tools to conduct the survey.  GPS units, UAS drones, and notebooks were all used to accurately describe and map the data.  These tools were used to get a background on how they work and how exactly they differ in accuracy and capabilities.  The only problem faced was that the survey grade GPS unit used took too long to gather data for all of the points.  The data gathered with this unit, however was extremely accurate.  (Within 1 centimeter)  This method was extremely time consuming and time ran out while we were trying to gather the data for these headstones.  To collect the data the class used notebooks, a survey grade GPS unit, and cameras.  Although a UAS drone was used, this did not help us collect data.  For this project a digital mode of data collection would not be best, because it was so time consuming.  The data collected was recorded into a Microsoft excel file.  From this file the data was transferred into an attribute table.  This data includes whether the stone was readable, the type of stone, the name on the stone, and the birth and death dates.  (Figure 2) The hard copies of the data gathered were put into an excel file in which the labels match that of the headstone labels.  For example, the third headstone in the second row would be labeled B3. (Figure 3) This allowed for a table join based on the grave id field.  The UAS data was used to more easily see the stones against the background.  This data was then used as the background of the map to easily locate the stones and see the attributes.  The accuracy of the GPS placed points nearly exactly where they are located in relation to the other headstones.  The pixel resolution was not clear enough to zoom all the way in to see some of the stones.  This is where the imagery coloring needed to be changed to clearly see the contrasting colors of the stones.

Figure 2.  This is the attribute table showing some of the data that we collected.  The top row shows the category.  The column on the far right shows the letter and number combination to the corresponding stone.

Figure 3.  This figure shows the rows and numbering system used to label each headstone

Results

The attributes that were used can be seen in the attribute table.  (Figure 2)

There was a lot of time spent in putting the data into an excel file.  This data was critical in the final map created.  These attributes were easily transferred into ArcGIS.  This gives us all of the information for who is buried at each point on the map.  (Figure 4)

As a class there should have been more communication on how to go about the process.  It would have greatly improved the data entry.  This could also have saved a large amount of time.  Communication is key in large data collection.  The communication between groups could have also been improved to save time.

Figure 4.  This image shows the information for headstone O2.  In the bottom left of the image, this is the selected point.  On the right side, the corresponding attributes can be seen.

Conclusion

The methods of this project worked well and this answered the questions that needed to be answered for the Hadleyville cemetery.  The mixed forms of data that were collected really added to the overall time spent on the project.  It was very disorganized and the attributes needed were not clearly discussed within the class.  The errors are negligible as everything was figured out.  The errors were worked through and all the data that was possible to be collected was collected.  This map should be a great upgrade for the records of Hadleyville cemetery.  This survey was a success as all of the data possible to read, was recorded.  This GIS can be constantly updated and should be a great form of keeping the cemetery’s records in the future.  Figure 5 shows the final map that was created.

Figure 5.  This image shows the final map along with the locator map that was created to show the area in which the data was collected.  Toward the top of the locator map there is just a small sliver of UWEC campus.  The area that was mapped is very small and located by the callout box.