A GIS STUDY OF THE SLOPES OF NORTHEASTERN STATEN ISLAND, NY

GIS was used to develop a slope map of the Special Hillside Preservation District(SHPD) on Staten Island for Staten Island Community Board 1. The perimeter of the irregularly shaped SHPD is 19.4km and the area is 7.46 sq km. The long axis is approximately 4.5km and the short axis is approximately 1.9km. This author used Digital Elevation Models(DEM's) of the Narrows, NY and Jersey City, NJ quadrangles to construct a slope magnitude map showing three categories of slopes as requested by Community Board 1, i.e., slopes less than 10%; slopes between 10% and 25%; and slopes greater than 25%. Almost all of the SHPD is underlain by Staten Island Serpentinite bedrock and a glacial till overlies the serpentinite bedrock. Additional GIS layers include area wetlands, tax blocks and lots and census tracts. This map complete with local streets, tax blocks and lots, and slope aspect will serve as a base map for future planning and as more refined data becomes available it will be added to this base map. The work was done as part of the College of Staten Island's Staten Island Project now known as the Center for the Study of Staten Island.