Mobile GIS applications for environmental field surveys: A state of the art

• Published in: Global ecology and conservation 2020-09, Vol.23, p.e01089, Article e01089
• Main Authors: Nowak, Maciej M., Dziób, Katarzyna, Ludwisiak, Łukasz, Chmiel, Julian
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Biotic data collection; Environmental monitoring; Field mapping; Geolocation data; Mobile GIS; Online geoprocessing
• ISSN: 2351-9894; 2351-9894
• DOI: 10.1016/j.gecco.2020.e01089

Geographical location and object description is an important aspect in field research, regardless of the spatial scale. Throughout time, environmental researchers have been using different tools and methods to determine and record location/description of observations with all limitations on their use. Lately, more and more common digital methods and new technologies have been gaining interest and popularity within the environmental science community. Among those technologies there are mobile mapping devices and applications which have been gaining audience in recent time. dedicated Handheld devices such as consumer-grade GPS (Global Positioning System) dedicated for tourism purposes have been substituted by smartphones and tablets with integrated GPS receiver so that field mapping became much easier and more readily available to a broader audience. Although the possibility of using mobile devices and dedicated applications for field mapping has an increasing trend, there is very little attention dedicated to them in methodology sections of research works. The purpose of this paper is to bring further awareness about such technologies to environmental researchers as they could benefit from using dedicated software available for mobile devices. Such software could ameliorate their workflow, accuracy and quality of data, which can help to achieve better research results. We briefly present our review result of mobile applications for field mapping as the first global overview within scientific journals. The review includes environmental citizen science apps as a particular example of data collection applications. The comprehensive description of workspace creation for field surveys using ArcGIS Online (Esri, 2019) and Collector for ArcGIS (Esri, 2019a) is presented in this work. This research is conducted using the case study of the limestone mining plant in Poland.