Bringing Data Points Into Arcgis

Bringing point data into ArcGIS Step 1: Get the data into a format with at least these three minimum fields: Some sort of unique water source / hydrant ID number 1

X – Coordinate (Decimal Degrees)

Y – Coordinate (Decimal Degrees)

-70.259583

44.239150

Hints: Don’t forget to have the Y coordinate as a negative number… or you'll end up in Kazakhstan! Also, don't forget to format the cells containing the X and Y coordinates as numbers with an appropriate number of decimal places – before saving the file as a DBase (dbf). If you forget this step when converting the data into a .dbf, it will truncate most if not all of the decimal places, so all of your points will end up on top of each other. Additional fields might include Description of water source, Directions to the source, etc. Step 2: Save the file as a D-Base in a location that is accessible to ArcGIS Step 3: Open up ArcGIS and bring in a roads layer to check the new points against. Bringing another base layer in first "sets" the layer coordinate system to NAD 1983 UTM Zone 19N. So when you save your points as a shapefile – you can automatically save the shapefile under this "State Standard" coordinate system. Step 4: Go to the "Tools" menu and select "Add X,Y Data" Step 5: Locate your D-Base file and select it – indicate which fields contain your X and Y data (this is done automatically if you name your fields X, Y). Step 6: If the points we collected with a GPS, click on the "Edit" button and then use whatever coordinate system was in use by the GPS when the coordinates were being collected. If this is unknown, my first choice is to use the WGS84 system because that is the geoid that the GPS system uses by default. Step 7: Click Ok – You should see your points on the screen – check them against the roads layer or another set of base data to ensure that they are at least in the correct town! Step 8: If everything looks ok – you can export the X, Y data as a shapefile by following these steps. Right click on the file name, go to "Data" on the menu, select "Export Data." Make sure that you are exporting all features, and be sure to select the radio button for "Use the same Coordinate System as the data frame" – this will save the shapefile with the same NAD83 / UTM Zone 19N that most other MEDEP data follows. Name your shapefile and save it in a good location – congratulations – you are done!