This is the 42nd ESRI User Conference yet in some ways it felt like the first. This is the first in-person user conference since the COVID—19 outbreak after almost 2 and a half years. All in-person participants had to have proof of vaccination to attend, even with that requirement there are over 14,000 participants. I heard more than once that it was nice to be meeting again in person.
The tag line from ESRI this year is ‘GIS – Mapping Common Ground'. They are making the case that GIS will help us as a society meet/share data on Common Ground. This can be when addressing complex issues such as Climate Change, Conservation Planning, Urban Planning etc. All these activities need us all to meet on common ground and mapping helps with that. We heard about the development and use of Geospatial data from Deanne Criswell the Director of FEMA and California's Natural Resources Secretary - Wade Crowfoot Crowfoot and Nate Roth from the Department of Conservation's Chief Science and Data Advisor, they described the data and the tools created for the California 30x30 initiative these data will be available in a web app developed in concert with ESRI https://www.californianature.ca.gov/.
I the coming days I am looking forward to hearing about the new tools that ESRI have been developing. These tools include ArcGIS Insights, Spatial Analysis of Big Data, Knowledge Graphs, etc, I look forward to writing more about the advancements as the week progresses.