research guides by subject arts & science geography government geospatial data Canadian, Provincial, and Municipal Government Geospatial Data
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Introduction
This page lists geospatial data (GIS data) that is produced by the Governments of Canada, Ontario, and the City of Montreal. The geospatial data on this website consists of: census geography files, topographic map data, digital elevation models, general mapping data. Geospatial data, also known as GIS Data, can be used to create maps and analyse geographic information. To view and analyse this data, a Geographic Information System software is required.
To access geospatial data produced by DMTI, click here.
GeoGratis - Natural Resources Canada
GeoGratis is a web and file transfer protocol (ftp) site that distributes geospatial data of Canada. Data is available for download, without charge. Vector mapping data is available in scales ranging from 1:50 000 to 1:30 000 000 in a variety of file formats.
Some of the products available from GeoGratis are:
CanVec
"CanVec is a multi-source product coming mainly from the National Topographic Data Base (NTDB), the GeoBase initiative (www.geobase.ca) and the data update using Landsat 7 imagery coverage. CanVec provides topographic information in vector format and contains more than 90 topographical entities thematically organized into 11 distribution themes: Administrative Boundaries, Buildings and Structures, Energy, Hydrography, Industrial and Commercial Areas, Places of Interest, Relief and Landforms, Toponymy, Transportation, Vegetation and Water Saturated Soils."
CanImage
"CanImage is an image composed of three spectral bands originating from resampled Landsat 7 orthoimages. They are chosen by the user based on the National Topographic System (NTS) at the 1:50 000 scale. This product is distributed in GeoTIFF format."
CanMatrix
"CanMatrix raster data is produced from scanned maps of Canada at the 1:50 000 and 1:250 000 scales."
NOTE: an easy way to identify the geographic area you are interested in along with its National Topographic System (NTS) code is through Toporama, a topographic browsing tool.
Additional Geospatial Data - Government of Canada
Atlas of Canada
The Atlas offers free small scale data for North America, Canada and Canadian provinces.
Census Geography Files
The Census Geography Files are the geospatial data files that represent the different census geographies in Canada: Provinces, Census Divisions, Census Subdivisions, Census Tracts, Dissemination Areas etc. This data is available for the 2006 Census and earlier. This data is accessible for download to Concordia University researchers, students, and faculty, and is to be used only for educational purposes.
GeoConnections Discovery Portal
GeoConnections is a an online catalogue that gives access to millions of geospatial products. Resources are mainly Canadian and include topographic data, satellite imagery and aerial photographs. Some of the content is free.
GeoBase
"GeoBase is a federal, provincial and territorial government initiative that provides access to a common, up-to-date and maintained base of quality geospatial data for all of Canada." Data is free and the products available are:
- Administrative Boundaries
- Canadian Digital Elevation Data (CDED) 1:50,000 and 1:250,000
- Canadian Geodetic Network
- Geographical Names of Canada
- Landsat 7 Orthoimages & Control Points
- National Road Network
Ontario Geospatial Data Exchange
The data that is part of the OGDE is only available to students and faculty of Concordia University. To obtain a dataset, please contact the geography librarian.
The following data is a list of OGDE datasets:
- Southern Ontario Land Resource Information System (SOLRIS)
SOLRIS is a comprehensive landscape scale inventory of southern Ontario's natural, rural and urban areas. Available in SHAPEFILE format. - Provincial Digital Elevation Model
A high resolution raster data set covering the province of Ontario to the 51st parallel. Cell resolutions are 20 metres in northern Ontario and 10 metres in southern Ontario. The DEM is divided up into 150 tiles. - For a description of other datasets that are part of the OGDE click here.
City of Montreal Data
City of Montreal Cartographic Plans (Autocad format)
The City of Montreal detailed cartographic plans, at the scale of 1:1000, contains building footprints, elevation spot heights, and other detailed features. This data is only available to Concordia students and faculty for research and academic purposes. To acquire this data, please contact Marco Burelli at the Department of Geography, 514-848-2424 ext. 2060.
Transit Data - Societé de Transport de Montréal
The STM transit geospatial data constists of bus stop locations, bus routes, metro stops, metro lines, commuter train stops and lines, in shapeformat. To acquire this data, please contact the Geography librarian.
Software Requirements
ArcGIS
ArcGIS is a fully operational Geographic Information System that is used to view, interpret, and analyse geospatial data. It can be used to create maps, calculate spatial statistics, and much more. The ArcGIS software is installed on workstations W-226, 227, 229 and 230 located near the Webster Library information desk.
ArcExplorer
ArcExplorer is a free software that is used to view and do basic interpretations of geospatial data. It cannot be used to analyse the data. ArcExplorer is available to download.
Open Source Geographic Information System Applications
There are several open source geographic information system applications available for download. Please note that most of the open source GIS applications do not have the same level of functionality as ArcGIS. For a list of open source GIS applications go to: http://gislounge.com/open-source-gis-applications/.
