Volume 26 • No 11 • 2003
ISSN 0742-468X • Since 1978
On-line Since 2000
Advanced Spatial Analysis
The CASA book of GIS
a book review
Academic research often leads to great discoveries for business, science and the humanities. At first blush, it can look like ivory tower wishful thinking. It sometimes feels that the academicians are totally out of touch with reality. I guess that’s one reason they call their lofty digs ivory towers
Too many decades ago to care to remember I had a professor explain why we were looking at the theory instead of the “how to” practical applications of a particular subject. He made it clear that whatever endeavor we chose would have its own way of doing things. The art department of an ad agency would use a particular technique that others may not choose to use; the Marines attack a beach in a completely different manner from the Navy; a scientist at Dupont will use tools that may not mirror those used at GE, yet they are researching the same concept. The university’s job, he asserted, was to teach theory — the why; your future boss’s job was to teach technique – the how.
Just recently I heard an interview with the head of a studio animation department. He was asked how important was student’s knowledge of computer animation. He echoed my old professor when he said “Not at all important. What we want are people who can draw. We will teach them how to use our proprietary software. We cannot teach them to have a passion and talent for art.”
Mi Casa or su Casa?
GIS is no stranger to the practical application (just ask the folks at Autodesk, ESRI, Intergraph, GESmallworld and others), nor is this discipline a stranger to the academic world.
 A highly respected ivory tower for GIS can be found at the University College London’s Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis, or CASA. Using an interdisciplinary approach, CASA draws from archaeology, architecture, cartography, computer science, geography, remote sensing and other related sciences. But rather than giving you some far out theory, “Advanced Spatial Analysis” tells you how GIS is being used in the real world, and how it is changing that world. Drawing on case studies editors Longley and Batty provide a look at that step beyond simple GIS that they call advanced Spatial Analysis.
Paul A. Longley is a professor of GIS at the university and acts as deputy director of GIS. The director of CASA is Michael Batty, a professor of Spatial Analysis and Planning at the university.
The forward is written by one of the best-known experts and evangelist on the GIS, Jack Dangermond. He sums this book up quite well when he writes “A book like this allows us to become more conscious of [this] shift towards spatial literacy, illustrating the cost of urban sprawl, the benefit of using advanced location-allocation algorithms for site locations É and many more examples. In all those we see the evidence, and it is powerful.”
Between the covers
This 463-page book is divided into seven sections, each providing a different, yet important, glimpse of GIS in action.
- Prologue
- Virtual cities and virtual simulation
- Data systems, GIS and the new geography
- Location in physical and socio-economic space
- Spatial modeling
- GIS and community participation
- Epilogue.
Conclusion
“Advanced Spatial Analysis” is a must for anyone who wants to know if GIS is truly making a contribution, or if it is just an exercise we endure for pay.
The case studies are excellent and it is hard to escape the fact that our collective involvement in GIS is making an impact on the world.
The book is available from ESRI for $39.95, or from Amazon.com for $27.97
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