[EAS] concerning the request for new weather Event Codes

[Botterell, Arthur@CalOES]

Dave, what you're suggesting is akin to something that was considered in the course of standardizing CAP: Some folks wanted to use the US National Grid notation instead of polygons.  We didn't go that way for two reasons.  First, we were attempting an international standard and we didn't want to create a profusion of different local reference systems, which would be hard to maintain particularly on consumer devices.  (In fact even the adoption of NAD 83 coordinates proved controversial on the international stage as some folks saw it as "an American standard" and thus a matter of sovereign pride, even though it's used in GPSs worldwide.)

The other problem was that using a grid of squares (in the case of USNG) would put a lower limit on the possible granularity of the geotargeting.  We were presented with notional use-cases where an alert might need to be targeted to just a part of a building, and decided not to impose a precision limit on future implementations.

Part of the challenge... and we see this with the use of FIPS codes as well... is that programmers unfamiliar with GIS tend to be over-anxious about the complexity of testing whether a given point or region intersects a geospatial polygon.  In practice that's a library function baked into a number of databases and software frameworks.  But folks more familiar with string-matching operations on area "names" had a tendency to lean toward what they already knew.

(FIPS codes have another problem, which is that they confuse political boundaries with hazard risk contours.  Very few hazards are cooperative enough to stop short at the county line!)

Art

-----Original Message-----
From: eas-bounces at radiolists.net [mailto:eas-bounces at radiolists.net] On Behalf Of Dave Kline

Good comments Clay.

Is it possible that our EAS to CAP/IPAWS connection would be able to do at least some of what you talk about?

Here is another thought.
What if, instead of NWS polygons, and EAS Counties how about if everyone used Hexagons?
Hexagons could have a defined size and it would take X number of these is an appropriate pattern to do what polygons do now.
Perhaps a very local event such as a train derailment would be covered by one or two Hexagons, while it would take hundreds to cover a hurricane.
It would be a major change to what EAS and NWS are currently doing, but wouldn't it help if everyone were on the same page geographically?
I suppose the other problem is that the public would have to translate Hexagons into other better known areas, such as counties.
But maybe there could be a way to make it work so that the machines (NWS and EAS) talk in terms of Hexagons while the verbal or text warnings do the translation to counties, or even parts of counties.

If this sound half baked it may have something to do we me working out in the hot weather earlier.

Dave
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Dave Kline   UNO-TV/Mav Radio/KVNO
University of Nebraska at Omaha
6001 Dodge St. Omaha, NE  68182  CPACS 200

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