insights Floodmap desktop | Understanding risks, empowering communities

Flooding is one of the most common and costly disasters that faces communities today. The challenge is not only to life and property – flood risks are notoriously hard to manage because they change constantly. New building developments, shifts in climate, and dynamic floodplain boundaries are just a few factors that affect flooding.

SHAPING FLOOD RESILIENT COMMUNITIES

In 2010 FEMA launched Risk MAP – the Risk Mapping, Assessment and Planning program. It’s a high-quality suite of maps and tools that enables communities to assess and ultimately reduce their vulnerability to flood hazards.

As part of our commitment to support the program, Atkins developed Floodmap Desktop. It is the only publicly available software on the market that evaluates risk at specific locations. Floodmap can be used by anyone, from homeowners to engineers, and community officials. It gives users access to critical flood hazard information from reputable sources such as FEMA and the United States Geological Survey (USGS).

With Floodmap, people can create discovery maps, flood hazard profiles, flood risk reports & databases, quality control reports, and flood insurance studies. Automated and flexible data processing allows users to obtain, develop, compile and report on floodplain data easily and efficiently.

Individuals can secure a single standalone license, while teams can use floating server licenses for maximum project efficiency. We built in enhanced quality checks to verify all data meets FEMA’s quality control requirements, and ‘rules’ that ensure the database feature-classes are all topologically correct. We also included help desk support and software updates with a yearly license.

“With FloodMap Desktop, ordinary people now have a simple, quick, and effective tool to complete digital flood insurance rate map (DFIRM) tasks and Risk MAP projects."

Our teams are constantly pushing innovation to make the world better for everyone. Floodmap Desktop has enabled people to create ‘flood communities’ who can share insights and plan together for a safer future.

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