ASGDC - About Metadata

Introduction:

Metadata, often referred to as "data about data", is structured information that describes, explains, locates, or otherwise makes it easier to retrieve, use, or manage an information resource. It represents the who, what, when, where, why and how of the resource.

Metadata found on this website is organized by category and theme. Each metadata record also includes a link to the data being described.

While the Department of Natural Resources hosts the data found on this website, it comes from a variety of sources, including the Department of Fish & Game and Department of Transportation & Public Facilities.

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Available Datasets:

The following datasets are available:

Biological
Contains anadromous fish species and steams metadata
Boundaries
     Contains statewide boundary metadata, including but not limited to the following
     boundaries: coastal district, administrative large parcel, borough, election district,
     incorporated city, recording district, and state park trail and unit
Cultural
Contains Alaska Place Name, city, populated place and recording office
metadata
DNR Land Records
Contains base, land estate, mineral estate, ownership, surface classification
and water estate metadata
Environmental
Contains statewide Environmental Sensitivity Index metadata
General Land Status
Contains statewide land ownership metadata
Geoscience
Contains Minerals Data Information Rescue in Alaska (MDIRA) data set
metadata
Graticule
     Contains graticule metadata, including but not limited to the following: survey
     monument, nautical chart, state plane zone, UTM zone, Public Land Survey
     System, and USGS Quadrangle
Natural Resources
Contains aquaculture and tidelands, mining and oil and gas metadata
Physical Features
Contains coast, elevation, glacier, hydrography and volcano metadata
Transportation
Contains airport and runway, Alaska Marine Highway, infrastructure, pipeline,
power line, railroad, road, telephone line and trail metadata

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Biological:

Anadromous Fish

THEME	DESCRIPTION
1998
Species	Depiction of the known anadromous fish bearing streams within Alaska (1998)
Streams	Depiction of the known anadromous fish bearing streams within Alaska (1998)
2002
Species	Depiction of the known anadromous fish bearing streams within Alaska (2002)
Streams	Depiction of the known anadromous fish bearing streams within Alaska (2002)
2005
Species	Depiction of the known anadromous fish bearing streams within Alaska (2005)
Streams	Depiction of the known anadromous fish bearing streams within Alaska (2005)
2006
Species	Depiction of the known anadromous fish bearing streams within Alaska (2006)
Streams	Depiction of the known anadromous fish bearing streams within Alaska (2006)

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Boundaries:

THEME	DESCRIPTION
ACMP Coastal District	Statewide 1:250,000-scale or better vector representation of the Alaska Coastal District Boundaries
ACMP Coastal Zone Management	Statewide 1:250,000-scale or better vector representation of the Alaska Coastal Zone Management Boundaries
ACMP Permit Notification Area	Component of the statewide 1:250,000-scale or better vector representation of the Alaska Coastal Zone
ACMP Special Area Management Plan	Commonly known and referred to as the Areas which Merit Special Attention (AMSA) dataset, even though it includes SAMPs that are not AMSAs.
ADEC Contingency Planning Regions	The Contingency Plan (c-plan) Regions reflect the c-plans published by ADEC. There are 10 regions.
ADFG Game Management Unit	Game management units (GMUs), Subunits, and uniform coding units (UCUs) are the underlying geographic foundation of the wildlife and habitat management and regulations for ADFG-DWC.
ANSCA Corporation	The boundaries of the native regional corporations created by the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) were derived in March 1992 from the 1990 TIGER database, prepared by the US Census Bureau.
Administrative Large Parcel	This data contains the administrative large parcel boundaries for both the state and federal government. It combines the formerly known Legislatively Designated Areas (LDA's), or state parcels, and the Conservation System Units (CSU's), or federal parcels, with data improvements.
Alaska Seaward Boundary	Includes cases depicting the State's three nautical-mile territorial limit
Borough	Alaska borough boundaries
DNR Region	Regional boundaries of DNR Offices
Election Districts 1994	The compilation of these boundaries represent Governor Hickel's Reapportionment and Redistricting Plan as required by Article VI of the State Constitution
Election Districts 2002	The compilation of these boundaries represent election districts as of 2002
Incorporated City Boundary	Boundaries of incorporated cities
Recording District	State of Alaska Recording Districts
Rural Education Attendance Areas	The REAA boundaries are important to state funding of school programs throughout Alaska. The boundaries were extracted from the LAS Land File and adjusted to follow organized borough boundaries, where applicable and to follow legal descriptions for those portions not corresponding to borough boundaries.
State Park Trails through ILMA	Trail location of state parks created through the process called Interagency Land Management Agreement (ILMA) process
State Park Units through ILMA	Boundaries of state parks created through the process called Interagency Land Management Agreement (ILMA) process

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Cultural:

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Alaska Place Names	The USGSNAMES coverage was generated from the latitude, longitude coordinates provided by USGS. These locations reflect the coordinates and names cited in the Dictionary of Alaska Place Names.
Cities	A subset of Populated Places that is used primarily for large scale mapping
Populated Places	Locations of statewide towns and villages entered by latitude-longitude, digitized from USGS 1:250,000 quadrangle maps, and heads-up digitizing from USGS 1:250,000 maps based on relative positioning of digital hydrography and digital township lines. Many locations were later updated by snapping them to points in the USGSNAMES coverage obtained from USGS.
Recording Offices	Locations of the 14 recording district offices

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DNR Land Records:

This section is divided into the following categories:

Base
Land Estate
Mineral Estate
Ownership
Surface Classification
Water Estate

Base

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Airstrip	Depicts airstrip and runway locations in Alaska
Alaska Seaward Boundary	Includes cases depicting the State's three nautical-mile territorial limit
BLM Monuments - Digitized	Survey monument locations that have been screen or hand digitized from a variety of sources and from a variety of media
BLM Monuments - GCDB	GCDB geographic data collected and processed for the Bureau of Land Management's Alaska Geographic Coordinate Data Base Project under contract YA-652-RFP9-440003 by Infotech Development Inc. between December 1989 and June 1996
BLM Monuments - SDMS	Spatial representation of the Public Land Survey System (PLSS) in Alaska, generated from land survey records
Borough Boundary	Alaska borough boundaries
Electrical	Depicts electrical power line locations in Alaska
Highway	Depicts highway locations in Alaska
Hydrography	Detailed hydrographic features
Incorporated City Boundary	Boundaries of incorporated cities
National Geodetic Survey	National Geodetic Survey Monuments are stations having known, precise positions established by geodetic methods
Pipeline	Depicts pipeline locations in Alaska
Railroad	Depicts railroad locations in Alaska
Recording District Boundary	State of Alaska Recording Districts
Secondary Road	Depicts road locations in Alaska
Section	Protracted section boundaries electronically generated using aliquot part algorithms developed by DNR staff
State Control Survey	Alaska State Control Survey Monuments
Survey Boundary	Contains miscellaneous state, federal, and private surveys
Telephone	Depicts telephone line locations in Alaska
Township	Township boundaries generated from radian measurements of township corner coordinates
Trail	Depicts trail locations in Alaska

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Easement	Includes private and public easements and right-of-ways granted by the State of Alaska
Land Disposal
Available, Potential Reoffer	State land that is available or will potentially be reoffered to the public for land sale
Conveyed	Parcels conveyed to private individuals through a DNR land disposal program
Other	DNR land disposal parcels currently unavailable to private individuals

Other Activities	Includes Miscellaneous and Trespass case types
Other Land Designation
Agreement, Settlement, Reconveyance	Includes cases in which the State may convey land to another party as a condition of a legal agreement or settlement concerning the other party's claim to state land
Federal Action	Includes federal actions that are depicted on State status plats in order to identify any exclusions, reservations, or other stipulations that affect the transfer of the land to the State
Management Agreement	Agreements where management authorization is transferred from the federal government to the State, or from DNR to another agency
Mental Health Trust Land	Lands managed by the Mental Health Trust Authority
Municipal Entitlement	Selected and conveyed Municipal Entitlement parcels
Municipal Tideland	Conveyance of tide and submerged land to municipalities per AS 38.05.825
Native Allotment	BLM Native Allotments involving State interests as outlined in ANILCA, Section 905

Permit or Lease	Includes a variety of competitive and non-competitive permits, leases, and authorizations issued by the Alaska Department of Natural Resources
Resource Sale	A sale of a non-mineral resource by the State
State Owned, Managed
Other State Acquired Land	Lands conveyed to the State of Alaska with a variety of cases such as general purpose, expansion of communities, University of Alaska, and recreational purposes
RS2477 Trails	Rights-of-way (ROW) acquired under RS 2477
State Tentatively Approved or Patented	Lands conveyed to the State of Alaska with a variety of cases such as general purpose, expansion of communities, University of Alaska, and recreational purposes.

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Annual Placer Mining Application	The APMA is a permit application process for mining and reclamation of locatable as well as saleable minerals
Federal Mining Claim	Non-surveyed boundaries of active (recorded or interim) federal mining claims within the State of Alaska
Leasehold Location	Order limiting mineral entry on State land to leasehold locations and prohibiting new mining claims. Unlike a mining claim, a leasehold location must be converted to a lease before mining is allowed.
Mineral Order	An order that closes State land to all forms of mineral entry, making it unavailable for staking mining claims, leasehold locations or prospecting site locations; or a mineral order that reopens land closed to mineral entry by a previous mineral closing order.
Mineral Permit or Lease	Oil and Gas Lease, Shallow Gas Lease, Exploration License, Geothermal Permit or Lease, Mining Lease, Offshore Prospecting Permit or Lease, Coal Prospecting Permit or Lease
Other Land Designation
Agreement, Settlement, Reconveyance	Includes cases in which the State may convey land to another party as a condition of a legal agreement or settlement concerning the other party's claim to state land
Federal Action	Includes federal actions that are depicted on State status plats in order to identify any exclusions, reservations, or other stipulations that affect the transfer of the land to the State
Management Agreement	Agreements where management authorization is transferred from the federal government to the State, or from DNR to another agency
Mental Health Trust Land	Lands managed by the Mental Health Trust Authority
Native Allotment	BLM Native Allotments involving State interests as outlined in ANILCA, Section 905

Prospecting Site	Includes prospecting site for locatable minerals (A.S. 38.05.245)
State Mining Claim	Includes mining claim for locatable minerals (A.S. 38.05.195 and .210)
State Owned, Managed
Other State Acquired Land	Lands conveyed to the State of Alaska with a variety of cases such as general purpose, expansion of communities, University of Alaska, and recreational purposes
State Selected Land	Lands conveyed to the State of Alaska with a variety of cases such as general purpose, expansion of communities, University of Alaska, and recreational purposes.
State Tentatively Approved or Patented	Lands conveyed to the State of Alaska with a variety of cases such as general purpose, expansion of communities, University of Alaska, and recreational purposes.

Well Site	Includes areas of land or water that contain one or more active or abandoned oil and gas wells within a 1/4 mile radius

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Classification
Disposable Interest	Geographic representation of land parcels within the State of Alaska contained by the Surface Classification - Disposable Interest category
General Land	Geographic representation of land parcels within the State of Alaska contained by the Surface Classification - General Land category
Habitat Land	Geographic representation of land parcels within the State of Alaska contained by the Surface Classification - Habitat Land category
Miscellaneous	Geographic representation of land parcels within the State of Alaska contained by the Surface Classification - Miscellaneous category
Recreation Land	Geographic representation of land parcels within the State of Alaska contained by the Surface Classification - Recreation Land category
Reserved Use	Cases used to flag public needs or interests such as proposed parks and fish and game designations
Special Use Land	A designation placed on certain land identified as having special resource values needing protection
State Managed
Legislatively Designated Area	Areas established by the Legislature for management of forest; recreational and historical purposes; to protect and preserve natural habitat for fish and/or wildlife; and, special restrictions not specifically tied to any of the previously mentioned purposes

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Temporary Water Use Permit
Subsurface	Geographic representation of land parcels within the State of Alaska contained by the Temporary Water Use Permit - Subsurface category
Surface	Geographic representation of land parcels within the State of Alaska contained by the Temporary Water Use Permit - Surface category
Water Reservation
Instream Flow Reservation	Geographic representation of land parcels within the State of Alaska contained by the Instream Flow Reservation category
Water Right
Subsurface	Geographic representation of land parcels within the State of Alaska contained by the Subsurface Water Rights category
Surface	Geographic representation of point locations within the State of Alaska contained by the Surface Water Rights category

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Aleutian Islands	Environmentally Sensitive Areas for the Aleutian Islands
Bristol Bay	Environmentally Sensitive Areas for the Bristol Bay region
Cook Inlet	Environmentally Sensitive Areas for the Cook Inlet region
Kodiak Island	Environmentally Sensitive Areas for the Kodiak Island region
North Slope	Environmentally Sensitive Areas for the North Slope region
Northwest Arctic	Environmentally Sensitive Areas for the Northwest Arctic region
Prince William Sound	Environmentally Sensitive Areas for the Prince William Sound region
Southeast	Environmentally Sensitive Areas for the Southeast Alaska region
Western	Environmentally Sensitive Areas for the Western Alaska region

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Land Ownership	General land ownership statewide

THEME	DESCRIPTION
AMIS	MDIRA Data Set - AMIS
ARDF	MDIRA Data Set - ARDF
BOM Geochem	MDIRA Data Set - BOM Geochem
Metadata Index	MDIRA Metadata Index
NURE Rock Sample	MDIRA Data Set - NURE Rock Samples
NURE Sediment Sample	MDIRA Data Set - NURE Sediment Samples
NURE Water Sample	MDIRA Data Set - NURE Water Samples

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Alaska State Control Monuments	Alaska State Control Survey Monuments
BLM Monuments - Digitized	Survey monument locations that have been screen or hand digitized from a variety of sources and from a variety of media
BLM Monuments - GCDB	GCDB geographic data collected and processed for the Bureau of Land Management's Alaska Geographic Coordinate Data Base Project under contract YA-652-RFP9-440003 by Infotech Development Inc. between December 1989 and June 1996
BLM Monuments - SDMS	Spatial representation of the Public Land Survey System (PLSS) in Alaska, generated from land survey records
Latitude Longitude Lines 1 Degree	Latitude and longitude lines for every degree spanning the state of Alaska
Latitude Longitude Lines 2 Degrees	Latitude and longitude lines for every two degrees spanning the state of Alaska
NOAA Nautical Charts	Index of the nautical charts within Alaska
National Geodetic Survey Monuments	National Geodetic Survey Monuments are stations having known, precise positions established by geodetic methods
State Plane Zones	Longitude lines which define the Alaska Coordinate System of 1927, state plane zones one through ten
UTM Zones	Longitude lines which define the Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) Grid, zones 1 through 9 and 59 through 60

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Section Grid	Protracted section boundaries electronically generated using aliquot part algorithms developed by DNR staff
Township Grid	Township boundaries generated from radian measurements of township corner coordinates

THEME	DESCRIPTION
250,000	Boundaries of the USGS protracted 1:250,000 quadrangle maps covering Alaska
63,360	Boundaries of the USGS protracted 1:63,360 quadrangle maps covering Alaska

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Alaska Coast
1,000,000	Coverage taken from ESRI's Digital Chart of the World and clipped to the State of Alaska
250,000	Coastline coverage of Alaska representing a collective effort by many organizations over the course of the last 15 years
63,360	First cut at a statewide 1:63,360 coastline, only where data was available as of January 1998
63,360 Excluding Small Islands	Same as 1:63,360 coastline, excluding the small islands that are difficult to visually map at 1:1,000,000 (area < 500,000 square meters)
Simplified	Generalized Alaska Coast

Canada	Coastline containing only the Canadian boundaries close to Alaska
Russia	General outline of Russia

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Contours 1,000,000	Coverage containing elevation contours at every 1,000 feet
Elevation Points 1,000,000	Coverage of the hypsography elevation points obtained from the Digital Chart of the World tile coverages
Summit Points 1,000,000	Coverage of the hypsography elevation points obtained from the Digital Chart of the World tile coverages

THEME	DESCRIPTION
1,000,000	Combined coverage of glaciers for several Digital Chart of the World (DCW) tiles
2,000,000	Statewide glaciers assembled from seventeen files in the USGS 1:2,000,000 Digital Line Graphs (DLG) dataset

THEME	DESCRIPTION
1,000,000	Combined coverage of lakes and rivers for several Digital Chart of the World (DCW) tiles
2,000,000	Statewide lakes assembled from seventeen separate files in the USGS 1:2,000,000 Digital Line Graphs (DLG) dataset
63,360	Detailed hydrographic features
Major Lakes	Selected major lakes extracted from lakes in the USGS 1:2,000,000 Digital Line Graphs (DLG) dataset
Major Rivers	Selected major rivers extracted from all rivers and streams in the USGS 1:2,000,000 Digital Line Graphs (DLG) dataset (major rivers include the Copper, Susitna, Kuskokwim, Yukon, Koyukuk, Kobuk, Noatak, and Colville Rivers)

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Aquatic Farms	Depicts the boundaries of current aquatic farm permits and leases issued by the State of Alaska
Easements	Depicts the location of current easements on tide and submerged land issued by the State of Alaska
Leases	Depicts the location of current tidelands leases issued by the State of Alaska
Shore Fisheries	Depicts the location of current shore fishery leases issued by the State of Alaska
Tidal Conveyances	Depicts the boundaries of current tidal conveyances issued by the State of Alaska

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Coal Resources	Location of coal resources within the State of Alaska
Federal Mining Claim	Non-surveyed boundaries of active (recorded or interim) federal mining claims within the State of Alaska
Mining Districts	Data containing the Mining Districts for Alaska
Placer Districts	Data containing placer district boundaries
Significant Metalliferous Lode Deposits	Data containing significant metalliferous lode deposit locations as determined by the U.S. Geological Survey and published in U.S.G.S. Bulletin 1786.
State Mining Claim	Includes mining claim for locatable minerals (A.S. 38.05.195 and .210)
State Mining Lease	Non-competitive mining lease for locatable minerals A.S. 38.05.205(A)
State Offshore Permit or Lease	Permits and leases issued for offshore mining of locatable minerals
State Prospecting Site	Includes prospecting site for locatable minerals (A.S. 38.05.245)

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Oil and Gas Basins	Digitized from DGGS publication - Special Report 32 - Oil and Gas Basins Map of Alaska 1983, by Arlen Ehm

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Volcanoes	Coverage created from a file of volcano names and locations from and Alaska Earthquake Information Center

THEME	DESCRIPTION
FAA	Airport and runway locations received from the FAA in February 1995
USGS	Depicts airstrip and runway locations in Alaska

THEME	DESCRIPTION
Ferry Ports	Communities with Alaska State Marine Highway ferry ports
Routes	General representation of the Alaska State Marine Highway system

Introduction:

Available Datasets:

Biological:

Anadromous Fish

Boundaries:

Cultural:

DNR Land Records:

Base

Land Estate

Mineral Estate

Ownership

Surface Classification

Water Estate

Environmental:

Environmental Sensitivity Index

General Land Status:

Geoscience:

MDIRA

Graticule:

Other

Public Land Survey System

USGS Quadrangle

Natural Resources:

Aquaculture and Tidelands

Mining

Oil and Gas

Physical Features:

Coast

Elevation

Glaciers

Hydrography

Other

Transportation:

Airports and Runways

Alaska Marine Highway

Infrastructure

Pipelines

Power Lines

Railroads

Roads

Telephone Lines

Trails