GEOGRAPHY 5157
GIS For Economic Geography and Business Decisions

Department of Geography,
University of Florida
SpringTerm 2000 -- Section 4814X

Tuesday period 7
Thursday period 7 & 8
Location: 3018 Turlington Hall		 Grant Ian Thrall, Professor
Office Hours:
     Tuesday period 4,
     Thursday period 7,
      and by appointment
Office: 3121 Turlington Hall
URL: www.thrall.cjb.net tel: 1-352-392-4652
E-mail: thrall@geog.ufl.edu

Return to Professor Thrall's University of Florida WWW Page

Course Description
Course Outline (subject to change)

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COURSE DESCRIPTION

This course examines the methods that professional human economic geographers have used in the business community, starting with William Applebaum and extending through to the contemporary period. Emphasis is on the use of GIS and geographic analysis in business decisions. Topics include trade zone, geographic market-area analysis, and gravity retail models.

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) is the technology for the creation, modification, display and analysis of spatial information. To be knowledgeable of GIS one must be familiar with geographic analysis and reasoning, knowledgeable of geographic data bases, and familiar with computer software and hardware technology, and familiar with the geography technology industry. This course builds upon Geo 3171, Foundations of GIS, by examining each of these topics as they relate to how professional human economic geographers practice GIS in the business community.

Advances in geographic information systems (GIS) technology has increased the value and stature of the human economic geographer in the business community. This course focuses upon the practice, technology and reasoning of human economic geography as applied in the business community today.

In this course the instructor will explain how trade zones are identified, and how geographic market-area analysis is performed. The course covers business geography technology, including its history and its reasoning: Where did business geography come from? Geography pioneers like William Applebaum more than 60 years ago (Thrall and del Valle, 1996b, 1996c) were actively developing the field of business geography. The issues that business geography addressed in the time by these pioneers are still the issues business geography addresses today. Of course, the pioneers would not recognize the contemporary technology. The contemporary technology brings with it higher productivity and higher accuracy. The instructor will convey to the students how commercially available products allow the geography practitioner to achieve the higher levels of productivity and accuracy of analysis.

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PREREQUISITES TO THE TOPIC

Students must have completed Geo 3171, Foundations of GIS, or its university level equivalent. Undergraduate students must also have senior level standing, or permission of the instructor. Students are advised to have completed Urban Geography 3602. 

Students are required to either be familiar with ArcView GIS software, and skilled in the use of a microcomputer, or have permission of the instructor. Students are required to have access to their own microcomputer capable of running ArcView, as well as storing about 20 MB of data.

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RECOMMENDED ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND READINGS

Students are recommended to have mastered the following. Some possible background readings are provided for each topic:

Students should become familiar with the two leading trade publications of the industry: GeoInfo Systems and Business Geographics.

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LINKS TO GIS SOFTWARE COMMONLY USED IN BUSINESS GEOGRAPHY

Name

Headquarters

Example Product

Internet URL

Caliper Corp. Newton, Mass. Maptitude http://www.caliper.com/
Autodesk San Rafael, California World GIS http://www.autodesk.com/
Intergraph Huntsville, Alabama GeoMedia http://www.intergraph.com/
ESRI Redlands, California ArcView http://www.esri.com/
MapInfo Troy, New York MapInfo http://www.mapinfo.com/

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TEXTBOOK

Grant Thrall's book Real Estate Market Analysis is under development. Chapters from that book will be assigned.

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COURSE OUTLINE (subject to change)

I. Introduction And Motivation

GIS and Business Geography

This introduction to the course answers how GIS can conceptually be applied to business decisions, what are the issues and obstacles. Business geography is inherently applied. Equal to the issue of rigor in business geography are the concepts of relevance and cost effectiveness. Analysis and the strategic management performing the analysis, will ultimately be evaluated on the basis of the value added to to the business decision, and the cost of that value added.

 GIS Reasoning

This section deals with the conceptual organization of the myriad of facts and information into a structure that can be evaluated and reasoned with using geographic technology.

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II. Housekeeping, Data, Spatial Data Functions, Mapmaking

It can be said that GIS is 90% data. In business geography, issues of data are paramount. Business geography differs from say planning geography and other applied divisions of geography in that in business geography it is seldom economically feasible to build unique databases strictly for the purpose of geographic analysis. Business geographers purchase data that, through high volume distribution, becomes inexpensive for the individual consumer. Data that is normally maintained by the business can be made to be geographically enabled through various batch mode geocoding procedures.

Data

Software functionality issues

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Most of GIS is descriptive. Because few business managers have backgrounds in geographic analysis and geographic reasoning, their first introduction to output of GIS will be in the form of descriptive reports of data that they are already familiar. Spatial data visualization is important because it comes early in the development cycle of a business GIS and must be relied upon to generate additional and continuing funding.

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Descriptive presentations should naturally evolve into searches for explanation for the spatial pattern. Ideally, the general theory should proceed the descriptive GIS. So, for example, Grant Thrall's 1987 book Land Use and Urban Form, referenced above as background reading, provides anticipation of how cities evolve spatially. The GIS analysis then can be used to link the general theory to description and thereby be used for explanation.

With explanation, predictive models have their foundation in general theory, and thereby become linked to the larger body of understanding. Business decisions normally require judgment for an action today whose consequences will be felt into the future. Therefore, knowledge of the future consequences of actions today, and knowledge of the geographic landscape are imperative for good business decisions.

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The degree to which judgment is improved by geographic analysis and geographic technology places limits on how much business is willing to invest in the creation and maintenance of their GIS. GIS staff also cannot ignore the process by which their GIS output contributes to decision making.

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After a decision has been made, the results of the decision must be monitored to notify the analyst if additional attention, and perhaps reevaluation, should be done. Not only should the consequences of the decisions be monitored, but also the process and procedure of how the decision is made must continually be reexamined with respect to changing technologies, and improved forms of analysis.

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VIII. The Technology For Business

It has been said that GIS is data, software, hardware, analysis, and people to put it all together. To that list should be added "knowledge of the GIS industry." Business geographers make recommendations on which technology (data, software, hardware) to purchase. Without knowledge of the industry, appropriate analysis might not be produced, and analysis performed might not be completed in the most cost effective manner.

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In the below series of articles, the authors provide a detailed outline of how a retail business can use GIS to improve its management decisions. In the authors' conceptualization, retail location is approached from the viewpoint that the decision is made top-down:

  1. which regions should be entered, in which order, and when
  2. where within the regions should trade zones be established
  3. where within the trade zones should the retail facility be built
  4. monitor the decision

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GRADING

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(c) 1999, 2000. Grant Ian Thrall, Gainesville FL. All rights reserved.