Lancaster, Pennsylvania (June 1, 2011) – On May 25th geographIT^® was honored to receive a 2011 Geospatial Excellence Award at the 2011 PA GIS Conference in Grantville, Pennsylvania. The award by PA-MAPPS was in recognition of a project titled “Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) for Wireless Broadband Internet Mapping in Pennsylvania”.

geographIT^® was a subcontractor to Michael Baker Jr. on this American Reinvestment and Recovery Act funded project overseen by the Governor’s Office of Administration and the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development. The project objective was to assist the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in its effort to promote and monitor the availability of broadband Internet services for all citizens in support of state and federal legislative initiatives which advocate that broadband Internet access is essential for economic development in the information age and that rural areas should not be excluded from accessing this service. The award was in recognition of the complexity of the project given the terabytes of data that had to be processed, the technological innovation of production methodology, and the suite of software chosen to obtain the desired results.

“We are thrilled to receive this award”, said Ashis Pal, President of geographIT^® . "Statewide studies such as mapping wireless broadband coverage represent only one of many ways the PAMAP Program’s high resolution geospatial data provided by the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Bureau of Topographic and Geologic Survey can be applied to benefit society and formulation of public policy.“