News Roundup – August 2025
How is the City of Surrey turning its long-standing urban vision into measurable progress using geographic information system (GIS) technology? Is a geospatial app helping fast-track housing development in New York City? How is the Town of Oakville innovating with GIS to address the housing crisis? Learn more in the News Roundup for August 2025.
Feature Stories
Geographical Thinking: Episode 106—Getting Technical: Summer 2025 GIS Update
In this first edition of Getting Technical, a new quarterly segment on the Geographical Thinking podcast, Esri Canada’s geographic information system (GIS) technology experts explore the latest updates from the world of GIS technology. Hear what’s new in ArcGIS Online, ArcGIS Enterprise and ArcGIS Pro from Esri’s panel of experts.
Listen to the latest episode of Geographical Thinking here.
An ArcGIS Enterprise deployment tailored to your needs with Kubernetes
Do you want an ArcGIS Enterprise deployment that lives in the cloud? No need to search further with the cloud-native ArcGIS Enterprise on Kubernetes. Discover resources and training in this blog post from Esri Canada instructor Guillaume Arnoux Hébert.
What’s new in the Living Atlas: Indigenous datasets
New Indigenous datasets just dropped in the Living Atlas! Explore and celebrate the power of Indigenous knowledge. Start your journey today.
Introducing a new public safety hybrid basemap style
The Community Map of Canada has introduced a powerful new basemap style designed to elevate your emergency mapping workflows. The Public Safety Style with Imagery Transition is built using authoritative Canadian data with seamless imagery integration, offering a high-contrast, context-rich foundation for decision-making when every second counts. By developing this specialized map style, we aim to help build stronger, more resilient communities and empower them to respond effectively to emergencies.
From paper to pixels: bring your property sketches into the GIS era
Still using paper sketches? It’s time to draw the line. Digitize, integrate and unlock smarter property insights right inside your GIS.
Updates on Living Atlas items that are moving-
Get the latest updates on the Esri Canada Living Atlas items that are migrating to a new, singular ArcGIS Online account.
ArcGIS AllSource: Intelligence analysis powered by GIS
ArcGIS AllSource enables intelligence operations to action geographic information system (GIS)-based information by combining relational geodatabases, 2D and 3D visualization, field applications and data analysis capabilities into a single powerful solution. Discover a few of AllSource’s capabilities, as well as further reading and training resources, in this blog post by Esri Canada certified ArcGIS instructor Ray Caron.
Surrey’s 15-minute neighbourhood vision gets a GIS-powered boost
How do you turn a long-standing urban vision into measurable progress? Surrey’s planning team is doing just that—using GIS to support livable, walkable neighbourhoods. From sidewalk planning to grocery access and council reporting, spatial data is driving smarter decisions citywide.
Make better decisions on critical local government issues
Introducing the GIS Playbook for Local Government Leaders, featuring 70+ innovative ways to navigate today’s municipal, county-level and regional challenges using a geographic approach.
Esri Canada News
Halifax Regional Municipality receives Esri Special Achievement in GIS Award
July 15, 2025
Pomerleau wins Esri Special Achievement in GIS Award
July 17, 2025
Esri News
Esri Launches New E-Commerce Experience for Demographic Data
July 8, 2025
Esri Collaborates with Microsoft to Bring ArcGIS Users New AI Enhancements
July 14, 2025
Esri’s ArcGIS Basemaps Power Dataminr First Alert for Enhanced Real-Time Event Detection and Awareness
July 14, 2025
Esri Releases New Book for GIS Professionals to Learn and Improve Python Skills
July 16, 2025
Esri Releases New Edition of Best-Selling ArcGIS Pro Book Written for the Classroom
July 16, 2025
Esri Releases Essential Guide to Empowering Storytelling with Maps
July 16, 2025
Esri, Microsoft and Space42 Join to Launch “Map Africa Initiative”
July 29, 2025
Resources
ArcUser: Location Intelligence Drives Renewable Energy Construction
In 2023, construction kicked off in New Mexico and Arizona on the largest wind energy project in the Western Hemisphere. Pattern Energy’s $11 billion SunZia will provide 3,000 megawatts of clean energy from 916 wind turbines, and its 550-mile transmission line will carry enough power for three million Americans when it comes online in 2026. Along with volumes of data and drones equipped with Site Scan for ArcGIS, a shared mapping solution called Maps to Megawatts, developed by Esri partner Aegean Energy Group, has helped manage all phases of the project.
Read the latest issue of ArcUser online.
ArcNews: Geospatial App Helps Fast-Track Housing Development in New York City
New York City, like so many other municipalities across the United States, is facing a severe housing crisis. To help combat housing scarcity, the New York City Department of City Planning (NYC Planning) developed a geospatial survey app to determine whether planned housing projects are eligible for the new citywide Green Fast Track for Housing rule.
Read the latest issue of ArcNews online.
WhereNext Magazine: JLL Delivers Location Intelligence to Thousands of Employees
Through an innovative system of self-serve and full-serve analytics, real estate standout JLL equips its advisers with data to meet clients’ changing needs.
Video: CVS Health: When Health Meets Location
CVS Health is transforming how it delivers care by integrating geospatial intelligence across the enterprise. What began as a resiliency initiative has scaled into a platform that supports logistics, clinical strategy and outreach. This journey from fragmented systems to a shared geospatial foundation shows how one organization moved from reactive to proactive by integrating everything, everywhere. This is a story of how location insight is enabling CVS Health to reach everyone, more effectively, one community at a time.
Video: GIS for Innovative Housing Solutions
The Town of Oakville was facing changing regulatory requirements, new reporting requirements and repetitive information requests—all of which were making it hard to keep up. To make it easier to address requests and make planning data readily available to those who needed it, the Town developed the Oakville Data Hub using advanced geographic information system (GIS) technology.