USC

2019 Full Program

2019 Los Angeles Geospatial Summit Program

Friday, February 22, 2019
USC Hotel (formerly the Radisson Hotel at USC; 3540 S Figueroa St, LA 90007)

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8:00 – 8:30 a.m.: Galleria Lobby, second floor
Pre-Registration Check-in | On-site Registration | Continental Breakfast

8:30 – 9:30 a.m.: Center Ballroom 

Welcome: Jennifer M. Bernstein, Ph.D., Lecturer, Spatial Sciences Institute

Keynote Address: “Geospatial: Where To?”
Manish Dasaur, Managing Director, Accenture Digital

Panel: John P. Wilson, Ph.D., Professor and Founding Director, USC Spatial Sciences Institute

Sean Boon, Principal Product Manager, Visual Analytics Maps, Tableau Software

Arnab Chakraborty, Managing Director, Accenture Applied Intelligence

Zachary Matthew, Sales Engineering Lead, Alteryx

9:30 – 10:30 a.m.: Center Ballroom 
Student Lightning Talk Session I
Students from participating Southern California GIS academic programs present 5-minute lightning talks, followed with discussion and Q&A 

Moderator: Steven Moore, Ph.D., Center for Spatial Studies, University of Redlands

Student Presenters:

  1. Hanfeng Gu (UCLA) :“Mapping Cropland Extent Change in Al-Raqqa, Syria”
  2. Adam Vaccaro (USC): “Automated Wetland Hydroperiod Mapping Integrating Optical Satellite Imagery and Synthetic Aperture Radar”
  3. Marlee Antill (Cal Poly Pomona): “Post-fire vegetation mapping for restoration planning in the Angeles National Forest”
  4. Samantha Levi (USC): “Investigating Submarine Groundwater Discharge on Santa Catalina Island, CA”

10:30 – 10:45 a.m.: Center Ballroom
Esri Education Update: “What is GIS? Crowdsourcing the Elevator Pitch”
David DiBiase, Director of Education, Global Business Development, Esri

10:45 – 11:30 a.m.: Victory Room
Poster Presentations

  1. Marlee Antill and Erin Questad (Cal Poly Pomona): “Testing the effects of site selection and artificial shelters on native plant recruitment from seed in a degraded coastal sage scrub restoration”
  2. Adonis Bell (CSULB): "Santa Ana Country Club Remodel Through Remote Sensing"
  3. Anuradha Diekmann (University of Redlands): “Location Value and Spatial Maturity: Findings from a Private Sector Survey”
  4. Matt Duyst (UCLA): “The Mendocino Complex Fire: Measuring Vegetation Changes and Anomalies”
  5. William Fulkerson; Elisha Ibanga; Cari Porter; and Richard Windisch (USC): “Disaster Mitigation Through Data Collection and Exploitation”
  6. Jenna Gray (USC): “LA ROSAH - Affordable Housing and Open Space Development Analysis”
  7. Harrison Knapp; Cameron M. Levine; Kiana Kerr; Ariel L. Simons; Xiazhe Yin;  Travis Longcore (USC): “Characterizing light pollution along the Southern California coast using hemispherical photography”
  8. Tori Oulie (USC): “Coastal Vulnerability Assessment for Archaeological Sites on San Clemente Island and San Nicolas Island, California”
  9. Maria Raquel N. Reynolds; Lana Jeries; Jordan Henry; and Lauren M. McKenna (Cal Poly Pomona): “Rewilding the Green Heart of Los Angeles in the Age of Climate Change"
  10. John Rowles (CSULB): "A Study of Habitat Similarity in Feral Pigeon Populations"
  11. Daniel Scheir; Laurel Skinner; and Chris Weathers (Cal Poly Pomona): “Capturing the coast – Reconstructing Coastal Community in the Age of Climate Change”
  12. Richard Windisch; Jong-Su Kim; and Young-Kyung Kim (USC): "Detecting Village Burnings with High-Cadence SmallSats: A Case Study in the Rakhine State of Myanmar"

11:30 a.m. –  12:30 p.m.
Buffet Lunch (Galleria) and Knowledge Network Tables (Champion Room)

  • Accenture
  • AECOM
  • California Geographic Information Association
  • California State University, Long Beach
  • Eclipse Mapping and GIS
  • Esri
  • OmniSci
  • Northrop Grumman Corporation
  • Raytheon
  • SADA Systems
  • SoCal URISA
  • Tableau
  • U.S. Geological Survey
  • University of Redlands
  • USC Spatial Sciences Institute
  • Women in GIS

12:30 – 1:30 p.m.: Center Ballroom
Short Bursts I: Use case examples from the geospatial industry

Interactive Exploration of Million+ Feature Geodata Using GPU Computing Dashboards
Michael Flaxman, Ph.D., Founder, Geodesign Technologies, and Aaron Williams, Vice President of Global Community, OmniSci

Spatially-enabled sensors are in our cell phones, cars, drones, and satellites. As planners, we wish to extract value from this data in order to understand and address socioeconomic and environmental issues in the public sphere. But to do so, we need methods which can handle data streams orders of magnitude larger than conventional tools.

GPU databases and dashboards are two important innovations which can handle this challenge. When run within a cloud environment, they require no installation and avoid massive data downloads. They allow planners to use their existing skills to interactively explore data within a rich web environment, or - using web services - within other common planning tools such as GIS and CAD.

We will briefly show one example in environmental planning and a second in mobility. We will first consider how LIDAR and satellite data can be processed to visualize potential fire risk in the immediate vicinity of woodland urban interface structures. This allows us to go beyond conventional modeling approaches, and test “geodesign” ideas interactively.

Our second example will consider how anonymized trip data can help planners understand how people are using new transportation services such as bike and car sharing. Such insights are important if we are truly to design cities for the future.

Mobile GIS: How mapping and GIS professionals are utilizing high accuracy GNSS receivers in a BYOD age 
Isaiah Mack, Eclipse Mapping and GIS

When it comes to GPS/GNSS Field mapping, BYOD (bring your own device) is no longer a fad or futuristic concept. It is now the norm. And along with the rapidly expanding and improving (and now industry standard Esri field Apps such as Collector and Survey 123), among others, the high accuracy BYOD field data collection arena has absolutely exploded with new possibilities. This short presentation will highlight just a few of the interesting use cases of new users including:

  • City of San Francisco: Mapping critical park infrastructure in Historic Golden Gate Park
  • US National Parks Service: Mapping Redwoods, Joshua Trees, Yellowstones, 20ft snowdrifts, and Hawaiian Volcano Trails
  • Squaw Valley Ski Resort: Mapping on mountain water infrastructure which feeds snow-making equipment.

One World Terrain – An Overview
Ryan McAlinden, Director of Modeling, Simulation and Training, USC Institute for Creative Technologies and Adjunct Assistant Professor, USC Spatial Sciences Institute

The One World Terrain (OWT) project is a Department of Defense (DoD) initiative designed to assist our military, related agencies (such as DHS and FEMA) and support agencies (such as NGA, NSA, and CIA) in creating the most realistic, accurate and informative representations of the physical and non-physical landscape. As part of the Army National Simulation Center’s Synthetic Training Environment (STE) concept, the goal is to help establish a next-generation government/industry terrain standard for modeling and simulation (M&S) hardware and software for training and operational use. The project seeks to: (1) construct a single 3D geospatial database for use in next-generation simulations and virtual environments; (2) utilize commercial cloud-front solutions for storing and serving geospatial data; (3) procedurally recreate 3D terrain using drones and other capturing equipment; and (4) reduce the cost and time for creating geo-specific datasets for M&S.

1:30 – 2:30 p.m: Center Ballroom
Student Lightning Talk Session II
Students from participating Southern California GIS academic programs present 5-minute lightning talks, followed with discussion and Q&A.

Moderator: Suzanne P. Wechsler, Ph.D., Professor, California State University, Long Beach

Student Presenters:

  1. Jonathan Quinn (University of Redlands): “Legionnaires’ Disease – A Prototype Tool To Identify At-Risk Hospital Rooms”
  2. Christian DeCasas (CSUN): “Utilizing GIS to Inform Public Health Emergency Planning for Mosquito-Borne Infections”
  3. Grace Corsi (USC): “Changing Our Global Infrastructure in East Los Angeles, California: An International Collaborative Geodesign Studio”
  4. Christopher Konieczny (Cal Poly Pomona): “A Shift in Value – Redefining Downtown Los Angeles in the Age of Climate Change”

2:30 - 3:30 p.m.: Center Ballroom
Short Bursts II: Use case examples from the geospatial industry

Intelligent Insight – Leveraging Drone-Based Analytics To Drive Efficiency & Continuous Improvement
Andy Kellett, Geospatial Engineer, Sr., AeroVironment

Quantix hybrid drone and Decision Support System (AV DSS) data analytics platform provides growers across the U.S. with actionable intelligence to optimize farm resources and improve yield potential. AV’s farming partners have taught us the impact that subtle geospatial and spatio-temporal cues can have and the value of continuous improvement.

GIS Career Opportunities and Innovative GIS Technology
Jason Sokol, GISP / Technical Excellence & Innovation Manager, AECOM

The field of GIS career opportunities is expanding rapidly. This session will give an overview of where these opportunities are, the typical work tasks recent grads can expect in the different work sectors, how to find these job opportunities, and desirable skill sets employers are looking for. The session will conclude with a brief overview of innovative GIS technology we are using at AECOM to deliver high quality products for our clients.

Data-Informed Design + Development
Andrew Jackson, Job Captain, Carrier Johnson + Culture

Data mapping can pinpoint key underdevelopment zones for opportunities to address the housing crisis and to develop long-term sustainable design that fits into and strengthens our existing socio-economic and environmental ecosystems.

3:30 – 4:30 pm: Center Ballroom

Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, GIS and Geospatial Technologies

A team of scientists will discuss some of the latest advances and challenges in AI/ML as applied to geospatial data collection, analytics, and geovisualization.

Moderator: COL [R] Steven D. Fleming, Ph.D., Professor of the Practice of Spatial Sciences, Spatial Sciences Institute and Institute for Creative Technologies

Panel:

Sean O'Brien, Ph.D., Corporate Artificial Intelligence Architect and Algorithmic Warfare Unit Lead, Northrop Grumman Mission Systems

Barry Tilton, Vice President of Engineering and CTO for U.S. Government Programs, Vricon

Rawleigh Smith, Senior Maps Specialist and Senior Account Executive, North America, Google

4:15  – 4:30 pm Center Ballroom

Closing remarks
Dr. John P. Wilson, USC Spatial Sciences Institute