The Schuylkill River Watershed stretches through portions of eleven counties in southeast Pennsylvania and provides drinking water for approximately 1.5 million people. Azavea is working with the Stroud Water Research Center, Millersville University and the Cartographic Modeling Lab to develop WikiWatershed™, a suite of web-based, wiki-style tools that will engage users in understanding and managing this important water resource.
WikiWatershed is a multi-year project being funded by the National Science Foundation, the same organization that funded Azavea’s GPU research. One of the overarching goals of the WikiWatershed Project is to help students understand how present and future actions can impact environmental changes, and to potentially interest them in pursuing STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) careers.
The first of several planned modules for the WikiWatershed Project is already live. The Model My Watershed Information Portal is streaming real-time stream gauge and weather station data for the entire Schuylkill River watershed. Stream gauge data from the United States Geological Survey is used for a broad range of important watershed management activities nationwide, including flood prediction, water allocation and recreational safety enhancement. Local weather data includes temperature, wind speed, barometric pressure and precipitation totals. WikiWatershed users have the option to view current stream gauge or weather station data for a particular location, or to visualize historic data through the use of graphs and tables.
Keep checking back over the next several months as new modules are added to the site, including interactive applications that will support the simulation of stormwater runoff and infiltration. Once complete, the WikiWatershed website will provide a collaborative platform where local students and other users can share their observations, ideas and resource data to enhance environmental stewardship.
The Model My Watershed Information Portal enables users to visualize historic stream gauge data with graphs and tables.
