HiRIS: The New York - New Jersey Highlands Regional Information System

Land use decisions made now will determine the shape of the Highlands landscape long into the future. The most reverberating of these will be felt at the local level. That is why Rutgers University's Grant F. Walton Center for Remote Sensing and Spatial Analysis (CRSSA) developed a project to provide citizens and participants in municipal government with the information they need to make the best decisions for their communities: the Highlands Regional Information System (HiRIS). CRSSA developed and maintains this interactive web site to supply viewers with key pieces of geographic information. The site illustrates the status and possible future of the Highlands at the local level. We mined the rich geographical database created for the New York-New Jersey Highlands Regional Study Update in order to make county and municipal profiles that highlight the most important findings of the study. This information is made available here with no need for specialized geographic information system (GIS) software or training. The Highlands Regional Information System is made possible by grants from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation and the USDA Forest Service.