Glens Falls Tree Inventory
Applied Technology for Managing Resources
In 2006 a Glens Falls High School biology teacher, Jason Bretchko, planned a tree inventory project for his students with practical benefits to the City. With technical assistance from the County GIS Administrators, the students recorded on hardcopy maps the location and species type of approximately 80% of the street trees. These features and attributes were then entered into a GIS geodatabase using the school's computer lab set up with ten workstations running ArcView.
With the re-formation of the Glens Falls Tree Commission in 2008, including Jason Bretchko, new students had an opportunity to complete the inventory as well as collect additional tree information for DBH and general health. A grid system was established for creating maps to record data which were then used by the students in the fall to finish the inventory. These features were added to the existing GIS layer in the Spring of 2009.
A preliminary layer can be viewed on the City's interactive mapping website. The City Tree Commission will be able to evaluate the distribution and health of trees and manage when specimens should be replaced.