Alaska Hydrography Database
About AK HYDRO
The Alaska Hydrography Database (AK HYDRO) streamlines the task of updating the National Hydrography Dataset (NHD) by centralizing NHD maintenance services within a single group for all of Alaska. AK HYDRO has two goals: (1) update the NHD in Alaska to national high-resolution standards, and (2) meet the needs of Alaskan agencies. In doing so, the numerous agencies participating in surface water mapping across the state no longer need to run the complex NHD GeoConflation or update tools. Instead, partners and editors provide updated hydrography data that meet statewide and national standards to AK HYDRO. Data stewards for AK HYDRO then use the NHD GeoConflation and update tools to submit updates back to the NHD. This workflow ensures that the updates happening throughout the state make their way into the NHD in a timely and consistent manner, and allows partners throughout the state to include important and necessary attributes with their mapped water data.
Alaska Hydrography Technical Working Group
The Alaska Hydrography Technical Working Group (AHTWG) is an active committee focused on the coordination of current and future surface water mapping in Alaska. AHTWG is chartered under the Alaska Climate Change Executive Roundtable (ACCER) and works closely with the Alaska Geospatial Council. AHTWG is composed of six federal agencies, four state entities, and numerous technical advisors from various groups.
The AHTWG promotes a strategic vision that supports the maintenance, stewardship, and use of common hydrography datasets for state, federal, and other partners. Specifically, the AHTWG:
- Promotes the implementation of a Statewide Stewardship Model
- Coordinates statewide hydrography editing standard operating procedures, standards, and editing workflows
- Facilitates development of feature level metadata standards
- Provides input to improving the NHD data model and tools
- Communicates hydrography issues to leadership and technical staff
For the benefit of all digital hydrography issues to leadership and technical staff.
The group is co-chaired by a representative from the USGS and the Alaska Hydrography Database at the University of Alaska Anchorage. AHTWG has adopted AK HYDRO as the preferred stewardship model to support surface water mapping updates in Alaska and to move updated hydrography from partners into the NHD.
Staff
Kacy Krieger, M.S.
Coordinator | kekrieger2 (at) alaska.edu
Kacy Krieger has a B.S and a M.S. in Geology from Idaho State University where he focused his work on surface geology, Arctic geomorphology, and GIS. He is the Alaska Hydrography Coordinator and is working on updating surface water mapping and the NHD in Alaska. In this role, he works closely with local, state, and federal partners to better map Alaska’s water resources and bring them into the 21st century. He has worked extensively with geospatial data, GIS, remote sensing, and lidar to better understand the processes that shape the earth’s surface.
Wen Cao, M.S.
Database Administrator | 907-786-6386 | wcao4 (at) alaska.edu
Wen is the Alaska Hydrography Database Administrator and works with the Alaska Hydrography Technical Working Group to map Alaska’s water. He maintains the AK HYDRO Geodatabase, Web Map Services, and develops tools and applications to assist with the mapping using ArcGIS Model builder and Python. Wen has a M.S. in Computer Science from University of Northern Virginia. Before moving to Alaska, he worked as a Web Developer in the Department of Geography at the University of Calgary.