GEOG 341: GIS for Social Scientists

U.S. government open data. Use facets on the left to narrow down the types and sources of data.

"Topographic maps and geographic information system (GIS) data for elevation, hydrography, watersheds, geographic names, orthoimagery, governmental units/boundaries, transportation, and land cover."

A variety of data available for download from the National Park Service.

Downloadable housing data at the county, place, census tract and block group level.

Education Demographic and Geographic Estimates

Environmental and natural resources data from the USDA. The Gateway allows you to choose your area of interest, browse and select data from the catalog, customize the format, and have it downloaded or shipped on CD or DVD.

Cartographic Boundary files are available in shapefile format for the 2018, 2010 and 2000 censuses and selected geographies for other years.

Categories of data include agriculture, borders, boundaries, chemicals, commercial, communications, education, emergency services, energy, finance, food industry, geonames, government, LandScan, law enforcement, mail shipping, mining, national flood hazard, natural hazards, public health, public venues, air transportation, ground transportation, water transportation, and water supply.

"The PRISM Climate Group gathers climate observations from a wide range of monitoring networks, applies sophisticated quality control measures, and develops spatial climate datasets to reveal short- and long-term climate patterns. The resulting datasets incorporate a variety of modeling techniques and are available at multiple spatial/temporal resolutions, covering the period from 1895 to the present. Whenever possible, we offer these datasets to the public, either free of charge or for a fee (depending on dataset size/complexity and funding available for the activity)."

"Our lab is a clearinghouse for data sets that can fuel studies on elections and how they're conducted. Find election data and research tools produced by us and others."

"The IPUMS National Historical Geographic Information System (NHGIS) provides free online access to summary statistics and GIS files for U.S. censuses and other nationwide surveys from 1790 through the present."

"The Atlas presents in maps and text complete data about the creation and all subsequent changes (dated to the day) in the size, shape, and location of every county in the fifty United States and the District of Columbia. It also includes non-county areas, unsuccessful authorizations for new counties, changes in county names and organization, and the temporary attachments of non-county areas and unorganized counties to fully functioning counties."

"Sixty-seven maps from Indian Land Cessions in the United States, compiled by Charles C. Royce and published as the second part of the two-part Eighteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1896-1897 have been scanned, georeferenced in JPEG2000 format, and digitized to create this feature class of cession maps."

"The database is the result of a High Country News investigation that has located more than 99% of all acres distributed through the Morrill Act of 1862 (or in lieu thereof), identified their original, Indigenous inhabitants and care-takers, and researched the principal raised from their sale in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The database reconstructs approximately 10.7 million acres taken from nearly 250 tribes, bands, and communities through over 160 violence- backed land cessions."

Not specifically GIS data but data and documents that can be used to develop GIS data.