Newcomers tap GIS maps to find best business sites

Small shopkeepers and large developers alike can visit a Web site with a wealth of Truckee Meadows geographic information.

Posted are maps of proposed office locations and shopping centers, big-box retailers,

a spotting of massive sporting-goods meccas and a retail sales summary. But the location of chiropractors' offices?

That single specific posting under the Miscellaneous Maps heading at www.nsbdc. org/what/data_statistics/gis/data_downloads/ is a harbinger of things to come.

More specific commercial search results will be posted as the site is enhanced, says Brian Bonnenfant, program manager for Geographic Information Services, at the Small Business Development Center at University of Nevada, Reno.

Typical requests target retail service sites such as day care or doggie day care, hair salons or doggie salons, dentists and chiropractors.

"A lot of those requests are driven by the California influx," says Bonnenfant. "They have no idea what Reno-Sparks has to offer or where their competitors are."

While the office fills up to 20 requests a month, three-quarters of them are private, paid requests, costing about $250 each.

However, map requests that come via a counselor at SCORE (Service Corps of Retired Executives) or the Small Business Develop-ment Center are handled gratis. Those results are therefore considered public and are posted.

The most unusual request he's fielded? Where to site a new cemetery in Las Vegas. But, says Bonnenfant, not many requests come from the south.

"They don't do as much homework in Vegas," he says. "Because of the explosive growth in the Las Vegas valley, they operate on the philosophy of: If you build it, they will come."

However, continued growth throughout the northern Nevada commercial region, extending down through Douglas County, is increasingly driving demand for GIS mapping services. In response, the Geographic Information Services office is expanding and this month will become the Center for Regional Studies.