Charles River Natural Valley Storage Area 2005

When I was at West Hill Dam I had a B.S. in GIS from Penn State but no real world experience.  Make no bones about it; even though it says this is an internship, this is a consultant job.  You will gain a ton of experience.

The work completed by the SCA Interns is to protect the storage area in case floods happen.  I had the liberty to experience a flood right before my tour of duty ended.  As the site coordinator and I were patrolling the Charles and witnessing everywhere that was marked, under water, I knew that what I was doing was important because it saved lives and money.

This is a description of a typical day. The main duties of the SCA interns are to maintain the GIS for the Charles River Natural Valley Storage Area (CRNVSA) and to locate its boundaries.  There are 31 segments in the CRNVSA.  It takes roughly 2 months or so to fully complete a segment.  So as you can imagine it is an on-going project.  You would be using a GPS unit to go out and find the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) fee and easement markers for the CRNVSA.  But before you go out into the field you must check that the GIS match the hanging paper maps that are stamped by a surveyor. More often then not you will have to fix the polygons (boundary areas) and the point (USACE Monuments) shapefiles.  I won't lie, it can be tedious, and most of it takes about a week or so to have the entire segment fixed in the GIS.  Once all that is finished you would go out into the field, with a co-worker, and locate the monuments, mark them and take notes.  Then you come back to the office and input the notes into the attribute tables.  You also report to the site coordinators about any encroachments on the land and they will take the appropriate steps to handle that matter.  You are also given a pair of boots and brush pants for work.  Once you are there for a while and have gotten acquainted with the people at HQ you would then be asking them questions and taking on more responsibility about information on the segments you will be working on. 

I would also like to say that this opportunity is a great chance to bolster your resume.  Because of this experience I have been able to secure a full time position with the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission in Philadelphia as a GIS Analyst.

Rick Murphy
SCA Alumnus 2005