Georgia Rural Areas and IT Implementation
Georgia Rural Areas and IT Implementation
The Enterprise and Information Technology
September 1, 2013
INTRODUCTION
Georgia has the second most counties of any state in the United States following Texas. Georgia has a total of 159 counties in the state. The Georgia Department of transportation is required to keep an account of all public roads in each county. Roads are maintained at a state and county level. Many of the past resources that were available for road improvement has been terminated due to lack of funds and now it is solely the county’s responsibility to maintain these roads. GDOT located in Atlanta uses an elaborate IT system with GPS by superimposing it with the maps and is only available to the Atlanta area. Unfortunately, the rural areas does not have this technology due to the fact it is a very expensive system and rural areas does not have the funds to purchase the same technology. Atlanta gets to reap the benefit of this system where the smaller counties do not. Since all counties in Georgia rely on the system to determine the amount of money that is granted to each county(LMIG Grants) depending on population and the mileage of county roads to improve the road system. This paper will show that by implementing access to this IT system for all counties in Georgia will save taxpayers money, improve the road in rural areas, and maintain an accurate road data system.
DISCUSSION
When trying to obtain information on the rural area (mainly grants) to help with county road issues, there are limited resources. I spend a lot of time on the phone with GDOT trying to obtain exact information such as, centerline mileage, to apply for grants that will help maintain the roads. The amount of LMIG money that is spent on each county depends on the population and the mileage of the county roads within each county. My office alone spent around $1000.00 dollars just trying to
The Enterprise and Information Technology
September 1, 2013
INTRODUCTION
Georgia has the second most counties of any state in the United States following Texas. Georgia has a total of 159 counties in the state. The Georgia Department of transportation is required to keep an account of all public roads in each county. Roads are maintained at a state and county level. Many of the past resources that were available for road improvement has been terminated due to lack of funds and now it is solely the county’s responsibility to maintain these roads. GDOT located in Atlanta uses an elaborate IT system with GPS by superimposing it with the maps and is only available to the Atlanta area. Unfortunately, the rural areas does not have this technology due to the fact it is a very expensive system and rural areas does not have the funds to purchase the same technology. Atlanta gets to reap the benefit of this system where the smaller counties do not. Since all counties in Georgia rely on the system to determine the amount of money that is granted to each county(LMIG Grants) depending on population and the mileage of county roads to improve the road system. This paper will show that by implementing access to this IT system for all counties in Georgia will save taxpayers money, improve the road in rural areas, and maintain an accurate road data system.
DISCUSSION
When trying to obtain information on the rural area (mainly grants) to help with county road issues, there are limited resources. I spend a lot of time on the phone with GDOT trying to obtain exact information such as, centerline mileage, to apply for grants that will help maintain the roads. The amount of LMIG money that is spent on each county depends on the population and the mileage of the county roads within each county. My office alone spent around $1000.00 dollars just trying to
References: Georgia department of Transportation . Retrieved August 31, 2013from (http://www.dot.ga.gov) Wikipedia. Retrieved August1, 2013 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_counties_in_Georgia Georgia Department of Transportation, retrieved September 8 , 2013 from http://www.dot.ga.gov/informationcenter/statistics/RoadData/Pages/PavedMileage.aspx