Interorganizational GIS: Issues and prospects

Better analysis and understanding of local and regional phenomena can result from large scale data built by a variety of local government agencies and private sector organizations. Reducing duplication and saving organizational resources are two main arguments for sharing geographic data and systems. This, however, is quite challenging and requires extensive interorganizational coordination. Drawing on existing literature and focusing primarily on local government settings, this paper reviews the major issues related to coordinated development and use of local geographic information systems and databases. These issues include motivation for sharing, coordination process, organizational factors, standardization and interoperability, cost of coordination, and mechanisms for GIS sharing.