GIS APPLICATIONS IN TURKEY AND PROBLEMS ENCOUNTERED

2nd International Scientific Conference - SGEM2002, www.sgem.org, SGEM2002 Conference Proceedings/ ISBN: 954-918181-2, June 9-15, 2002, 213- 232pp

ABSTRACT

GIS had been put in to application in 1987 in Istanbul Big City
Municipality in Turkey. Since then, during the last 15 years, it has gained a
wide application fields all over the country. In the other big city
municipalities, and the other city municipalities which are belong to the big
cities, and also in independent municipality organizations, GIS application
has been widely started to form up fast. Additionally, in the institutions
which are belong to government such as National GIS Project and National
Land Registration Offices, great effort has been spent to apply GIS lately.
In one hand, in this study, the applications of GIS, its continuity, and
achievements in applications will be discussed even some of the officials
saying that “The project has already been applied and It’s been completed”.
The phase of GIS project application will be reviewed. On the other hand,
during those GIS studies, the difficulties (because of the organizational,
data qualifications and quality, software and hardware, human resources in
both qualification, financial and legal etc.) will be put on to the table and
tried find to solutions.
Turkey has big potentials in GIS applications. GIS projects have been
realized by individual not hierarchic organizations. Because of not having
legally accountable institutions, not predefined legal responsibilities and not
having auditing, the resources has been wasted, in addition to previous
waste points all individuals have been using, non standardized data and
formats, different versions and non compatible soft wares and hard wares.
In this article, while reviewing Turkey GIS application, we also
reevaluate the countries which have limited sources and define the troubles
which are sourced of organizational, structural problems.