Marcia Banach
Director of Planning
Town of South Windsor
Windsor, CT

Preparation of an Open Space Master Plan for the Town of South Windsor, CT using GIS Technology

The suburban Town of South Windsor, Connecticut (population 24,000) recently completed an Open Space Master Plan to guide the conservation/preservation of open space in this rapidly-growing suburban town northeast of Hartford. Town staff utilized ArcView GIS software and digital parcel base mapping plus digital natural resource information to create the master plan. The Open Space Task Force, a Town Council standing committee charged with open space planning, used ArcView and the computerized mapping at their committee meetings to do hands-on planning. Use of the computer mapping at the committee meetings enabled the Task Force to turn the various layers on and off as needed to examine specific goals and objectives.

Digital data used included: regulated wetlands, prime farmlands, steep slopes, FEMA 100-year floodplain data, and state land use coverages. The Town Assessor’s data base was used to create vacant and developed land layers, as well as to identify all land with tax exemptions for farming. All Town-owned land, State-owned land and properties preserved by quasi-public conservation agencies were identified. All of this information was used to determine prospective properties and areas to be conserved/preserved.