Sidewalk Inventory + ADA Transition Plan

The City of St. Charles is located along the banks of the Missouri River, with over 400 miles of sidewalks covering 20 square miles of land. To ensure that the sidewalk system functions and meets the needs of all users, the City has taken a proactive approach to inventory the sidewalks and identify needed improvements. Oates Associates worked with the City to help establish an inventory and evaluation system that would be GIS based and work within their existing GIS system. Highlights of the system included:

• Use of state-of-the-art mobile handheld GPS equipment for field data collection.
• Development of customized “toolboxes” to work within the City’s GIS software to standardize the data collection process.
• Development of custom software coding working within the City’s GIS software to “score” the sidewalk data and deficiencies based on City criteria. This coding was also used to provide varying GIS graphic output displays based on the various scoring and deficiencies.

City staff was effectively trained on operating the mobile GIS units for field collection as well as processing and accessing field data in the office. The City’s GIS Coordinator was trained on all aspects of the data collection process for the sidewalk inventory. Over the course of two summers, the City utilized interns for collecting field data. The GIS Coordinator solely trained the interns in collecting data with Oates Associates providing oversight. The GIS Coordinator was responsible for uploading and downloading data daily. Oates prepared a manual to aid the City in processing the field data. The manual also included descriptions on GIS layers created during the mobile data collection as well as a step-by-step guide to scoring the various pedestrian facilities within the City. The manual also included direction on how to modify the scoring matrix should City standards or priorities change over time.