Boundaries for Outstanding Florida Waters (OFWs) as described in Section 62-302.700, F.A.C. This layer includes all three types of OFWs: OFW Aquatic Preserves, Special OFWs, and Other OFWs.
A note about data scale:
Scale is an important factor in data usage. Certain scale datasets are not suitable for some project, analysis, or modeling purposes. Please be sure you are using the best available data.
1:24000 scale datasets are recommended for projects that are at the county level. 1:24000 data should NOT be used for high accuracy base mapping such as property parcel boundaries. 1:100000 scale datasets are recommended for projects that are at the multi-county or regional level. 1:125000 scale datasets are recommended for projects that are at the regional or state level or larger.
Vector datasets with no defined scale or accuracy should be considered suspect. Make sure you are familiar with your data before using it for projects or analysis. Every effort has been made to supply the user with data documentation. For additional information, see the References section and the Data Source Contact section of this documentation. For more information regarding scale and accuracy, see our webpage at: <http://geoplan.ufl.edu/education.html>
Aquatic Preserve boundaries were created by the Florida Marine Research Institute (FMRI)/CAMRA. We are using these boundaries to represent the OFWs that are also designated Aquatic Preserves
Special OFW Category :
The streams and lakes that do not have defined legal boundaries were automated using methods other than transferring legal descriptions into a digital format. Because of the interpretive nature of the boundaries for the Special Waters Category, we have avoided making any implication that this line represents the ordinary high water line that separates the State-owned lands from privately-owned lands by referring to this line as a fuzzy boundary or trip wire. Final determinations of these boundaries will require on-site inspections or aerial photo-interpretations coupled with field verifications and will not be carried out for any of the streams and lakes designated as OFWs, in the short term. These interpretive boundaries were designed to alert persons making land use decisions that on-site inspections or further investigations by qualified soils scientists or botanists may be necessary. These interpretive boundaries are necessary because if a proposed activity falls within or near an OFW boundary, different, more stringent permitting review standards are imposed on the permittee's application. The OFW Special Water boundary is based on the contour lines from the U.S. Geological Survey 1:24000-scale quadrangle maps. This boundary is labeled with the elevation of those contours that are most likely to meet the criteria of supporting obligate and facultative plants and hydric soils. These elevations are 5 or 10 feet apart vertically, so that other information was used to modify the line. Currently, the best additional information is a set of EOSAT satellite images from 1992. The 1994 EOSAT imagery was also available, but because 1994 was an extremely wet year, the spectral reflectance values were judged less reliable. However, other indications that the area inside the Special Waters delineation line is likely to meet the rule's criteria are the swamp symbols on the quadrangle, the change in slope that is indicative of the seepage line, or springs that indicate that the groundwater is near the surface at that elevation. Cultural features can also be helpful. Roads often stop at wetted areas and buildings are usually (but not always) built above the elevation of the water feature's most frequent floods. Similarly, railroads are usually built up high enough to stay dry. This information is generally discernible on USGS 7.5 minute quadrangles.
Other OFW Categories :
All other categories are taken from the Lands managed for Conservation created and compiled by GEOPLAN or have been created by us using descriptions from the Outstanding Florida Waters documentation. Those boundaries created internally were scanned from published materials, registered and rectified with 1:24,000 USGS Public Land Survey section corners. Data was then extracted from USGS 1:24,000 hydrology layer and attributed. For boundaries not completely represented by USGS 1:24,000 hydrology layer, arcs were digitized directly from the scanned material to complete the boundary. State Parks and Recreational Areas Category
The COGO method has several advantages and disadvantages for use in producing a database for the OFWs. It uses primary source material - the legal description on the deed. Data created using this method should have validity within the legal system because it is from a source familiar to the courts. Other agencies are using the COGO system so it is a familiar process and product. COGO methodology is appropriate in that it weds the new system for describing land ownership to the existing system. Additionally, each parcel boundary will be maintained in a digital form and can be extracted from the official boundary as a parcel's status changes. This data layer will also be maintained and updated by the stewards of all the state park boundaries data, so as the parcel boundaries change, the OFW boundaries will automatically be updated. The downside is that COGO (or the survey data it automates) is labor intensive and requires extensive training and expertise to use. Each legal description references source materials that may only be available locally or from the county appraiser's office, at a cost of travel and materials. Each park boundary may have numerous parcels transferred to the state at different times and some parcel boundaries overlap. Legal descriptions were transferred to digital form using the COGO modules in ESRI's ARC/INFO software on a UNIX platform DEC Alpha 3000 workstation and Softdesk's ADDCAD Civil/Survey software on 486/90 DELL personal computers configured with 1 gigabyte storage memory, 32 megabytes of RAM, 17" VGA monitors and running DOS. Both platforms are connected to HP-650C plotters. See Standard COGO Procedures developed by the Division of Parks and Recreation.
Added Bear Creek State Recreation Area (Other OFW). Rule_ID 9c5 Added Passage Key (Special OFW). Rule_ID 9b22
Edited Myakka River State Park (Other OFW). Rule_ID 9c57 Edited Big Bend Seagrasses Aquatic Preserve (Aquatic Preserve) by removing the Keaton Beach exceptions. May need more editing.
Made the following edits as well:
9)(h) Aquatic Preserves
18. Indian River Malabar to Vero Beach (additions) - except those portions of Sebastian Creek and Turkey Creek upstream of U.S. Highway 1.
42. Wekiva River Addition, except that portion of the St. Johns River between Interstate Highway 4 and the Wekiva River confluence.
December 19, 2003
Rule ID 9i38 (GIS_ID 530): Weekiwachee Riverine System. Effective as of December 11, 2003. Added on 20031219 by RH for Janet Klemm. {Special OFW.}
Rule ID 9i17 (GIS_ID 540): Lake Disston. Added on 20031219 by RH. {Special OFW.}
Rule ID 9i14c (GIS_ID 500): Hillsborough River. Two wetland areas removed at request of Janet Klemm on 20031219. RH. Wetlands were removed from T26S, R19E, section 26 and 27 respectively. {Special OFW.}
January 29, 2004
Rule ID 9b8 (GIS_ID 12): Egmont Key NWR. Changed "Name" field from Egmont Key (designation undetermined) to Egmont Key NWR for Janet Klemm. RH 20040129. {Other OFW}
Rule ID 9b22 (GIS_ID 520): Passage Key. Changed "Type" from "Special" OFW to "Other" OFW for Janet. RH 20040129. {Other OFW}.
April 8, 2004
Rule ID 9f43 (GIS_ID 550): Placid Lakes Highlands. Acquired boundary from FWCC Management Areas shapefile. Added 20040408. by RH for Janet Klemm. (Other OFW).
April 28, 2004
Rule ID 9i40 (GIS_ID 560): Wiggins Pass Estuarine Area and the Cocohatchee River System. Added on 20040428 by RH as special request by Kim Jackson. She needed it for Janet Klemm's "OFW Economics" pilot project. Re-edited on April 29, 2004 using a map from Janet Klemm and 24K DRG's USGS Quad Maps.
May 4, 2004
Rule ID 9f60 (GIS_ID 570): Three Lakes/Prairie Lakes. Added on 20040504 by RH. To create this shape, I used major river boundaries, state lands boundaries, PLS Boundaries, Cad Files from TLSDSL6 and hand digitizing.
Rule ID 9f49 (GIS_ID 580): Saddle Blanket Lakes Scrub. Added on 20040504 by RH. Used State Lands and PLS Boundaries to make this. Only State Owned Property is included for the time being.
March 30, 2005
Rule ID 9e58 (GIS_ID 590): Stoney-Lane (10-4-90). Added on 20050330 by RH. (Other OFW).
April 19, 2005. Rule_ID 9e9 (GIS_ID 600): Nassau Valley State Reserve (12-1-82). Added on 20050419 by RH. Not all areas within boundary are OFW. Hand created by using ArcView 3.2 while using 1987 OFW Atlas page 182 and 24k DRG as guide. Confidence Level: Low. Strictly meant for representation. Not for legal purposes. (Other OFW).
May 11, 2005. Rule_ID 9f31 (GIS_ID 610): Indian River North Beach (5-14-86). Added on 20050511 by RH. Indian River North Beach Complex and County Property in northern portion. Number 11 Corp and Sirk Tract in southern portion. Based on State Lands Records from DataMiner. Confidence level Medium. OFW Atlas 1987, page 214. (Other OFW).
May 13, 2005. Rule_ID 9f41 (GIS_ID 620): North Beach (5-14-86). Also known as North Beach Additions. Added on 20050513 by RH. Edits based on State Lands Records from DataMiner, 24K DRG, 1999 DOQQ and OFW Atlas 1987, page 219. Confidence level Medium to Low. Boundaries directly on either side of Sheridan St. were hand created. (Other OFW).
May 25, 2005. Rule_ID 9h19 (GIS_ID 231): Indian River - Vero Beach to Ft. Pierce Aquatic Preserve. Edited on 20050525 by RH at request of Janet Klemm. Added the portion of the Harbor Beach Channel waterward (eastward) of preconstruction mean high water line. Confidence Level Medium. Corresponded with Earl Pearson from the Office of Coastal and Aquatic Managed Areas. He edits the Aquatic Preserves layer. We need to have both OFW and Aquatic Preserves boundaries coincide so I sent him a jpeg and the shapefile that I edited. He said that my edits look the same as he planned to do, but that it will take some time to get his edit approved. Janet already approved mine, so I went ahead and updated the boundary and asked Earl to let me know when he gets his edits approved. (Aquatic Preserve OFW).
June 20, 2005. Rule_ID 9i13 (GIS_ID 630): Florida Keys. Added on 20050620 by RH. Hand digitized. Used 24k DRG for Dade-Monroe boundary reference. Used Everglades National Park Other OFW as boundary reference. Also used John Pennekamp Other OFW and State Land Records parcels to create boundary. Confidence Level: Low. Stock Island and artificial water bodies were not removed at this time. (Special OFW).
June 21, 2005. Rule_ID 9i29 (GIS_ID 282): Sarasota Bay Estuarine System. Edited on 20050621 by RH at request of Janet Klemm. Used 24K DRG as guide to include Blind Pass and the water just below Blind Pass and above Midnight Pass. (Special OFW).
June 21, 2005. OFW was submitted to BIS/GIS for SDE Layer update. Added to SDE Layer on 20050624.
Inserted updated dataset acquired from Ron Hughes (WRM) and inserted in ArcSDE. This updated dataset has 3747 records.
November 29, 2005. Rule_ID 9b7 (GIS_ID 640): Created Crystal River National Wildlife Refuge. Edits based on State Lands layer from FDEP DataMiner library. (Other OFW).
November 29, 2005. Rule_ID 9b12 (GIS_ID 650): Created Island Bay National Wildlife Refuge. Edits based on Florida Managed Areas layer from FDEP DataMiner library. (Other OFW).
November 30, 2005. Rule_ID 9b17 (GIS_ID 660): Created Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. (Other OFW).
December 1, 2005. Rule_ID 9e11 (GIS_ID 670): Created Prairie Lakes State Preserve. (Other OFW).
December 13, 2005. Rule_ID 9e19 (GIS_ID 680): Created Weedon Island State Preserve. Edits based on Florida Managed Areas and State Lands FDEP layer. (Other OFW).
February 22, 2006. Rule_ID 9h4 (GIS_ID 216): Big Bend Seagrasses Aquatic Preserve. Edited on 20060222 by RH. Corrected Southeast corner in Levy County near mouth of Withlachoochee River. Aquatic Preserve.
March 24, 2006. Rule_ID 9f16 (GIS_ID 690): Created Deering Hammock/Estate.
November 29, 2005. Rule_ID 9b12 (GIS_ID 650): Added Island Bay National Wildlife Refuge. (Other OFW).
Inserted updated dataset acquired from Ron Hughes (WRM) and inserted in ArcSDE. This updated dataset has 3755 records.
Submitted on July 10, 2006 for DataMiner update.
Inserted updated dataset acquired from Ron Hughes (WRM) and inserted in ArcSDE. This updated dataset has 3756 records. Josslyn Island polygon was to the Pine Island Sound Aquatic Preserve.
October 3, 2006. Rule_ID 9f66 (GIS_ID 700): West Lake. Added on 20063108 by RH. Edits based on 1987 OFW Atlas and State Lands layer from FDEP DataMiner library. Confidence level Medium. (Other OFW).
December 8, 2006 Rule ID 9i4 (GIS_ID 259): Edited Butler Chain of Lakes. (Special OFW).
December 15, 2006 Rule ID 9c67 (GIS_ID 710): Created Rose Sink (addition to Ichetucknee Springs State Park) (1-9-06). (Other OFW).
Five sliver parcels were removed which reduced the record count.
May 22, 2007: Multiple edits to Lower Econlockhatchee.
June 11, 2007: Multiple edits to Savannas State Reserve.
June 13, 2007: Multiple edits to Lake Woodruff NWR.
June 15, 2007: Created Hillsborough River State Park.
June 21, 2007: Created ITT Hammock Snapper Creek.
September 14, 2007: Created Carlton Half-Moon Ranch OFW.
Submitted for SDE Update.
December 19, 2007: Major edits to Mosquito Lagoon Aquatic Preserve were finally completed.
Submitted for SDE update.
June 25, 2008: Created Stark Tract OFW.
June 25, 2008: Created Upper Black Creek OFW at Janet Klemm's request.
June 27, 2008: Created a new boundary for Canaveral National Seashore OFW.
July 1, 2008: Edited Spruce Creek Special OFW. Added tributary (see OFW Rule ID 9i33a).
Submitted for SDE layer update.
- Added the field DESCRIPT based on NAME. - Added the field FGDLAQDATE based on date downloaded from source. - Upcased all text in the attribute table. - Data set was renamed ofw_other_jan08 from OUTSTANDING_FLORIDA_WATERS