Land Acquisition Geographical Information System (LAGIS) for the Upper Rouge River Tunnel

Somat used GIS technology to develop and maintain an information system related to the land acquisition task of the Upper Rouge River Tunnel (URT) project.  The project needed hundreds of private and public properties within a specified zone surrounding the URT project area to be acquired within a specified time. 

With the LAGIS developed by Somat, the project team was capable of assembling, storing, manipulating, and displaying geographically referenced land ownership information collected manually and that obtained from the Assessor’s office of the City of Detroit.  In the system, Somat utilized the power of GIS to relate different information in a spatial context.  The GIS facilitated retrieval and updating of the information continuously during the design process which involved tunnel alignment changes, facility relocations, facility re-sizing, property ownership changes, and, land requirement changes (permanent vs. temporary easement).