Learn More. Spend Less.
We have worked hard to reduce your costs. Boise is ideally located in the Pacific Northwest for easy travel to and from the conference. The Grove Hotel is providing affordable lodging right next door to the conference in the heart of Boise's vibrant downtown.
The Northwest GIS User Conference continues its history of providing affordable learning opportunities, previews of upcoming GIS technology, and opportunities to share with GIS professionals from across the Northwest.
Conference Highlights
The 26th annual Northwest GIS User Conference offers a diverse range of pre-conference training, from introductory to developer level courses. Technical sessions and hands-on tutorials will be offered during the conference at no extra cost.
Our keynote speakers will provide forward-thinking perspectives applicable to the GIS profession. ESRI will give you a look at their current and upcoming products. The user presentations and posters offer an opportunity for you to share your work and to learn from your colleagues from across the Northwest. Visit with local and national companies to find GIS solutions that can help meet your GIS needs. Side meetings will give you an opportunity to visit with and share ideas with other GIS professionals.
Innovate
The rise of the mobile web has transformed GIS from back office software to a key technology changing how we live, work and play. As geographic innovation revolutionizes the way everyone interacts, we as GIS professionals must evolve to support and guide the millions of individuals using and creating spatial data.
The challenge for GIS Professionals has moved from building proprietary, enterprise spatial databases to sharing and consuming diverse sources of spatial data. In our Wednesday keynote address, Don Cooke, Community Maps Evangelist at ESRI, will discuss solutions developed by industry leaders at Google, TomTom, Garmin, ESRI and the Open Street Map Consortium for distributed volunteer mapping and spatial data.
Design
A key skill of the geographic professional is conveying information in graphic form. While traditional map-making remains a core component of modern GIS, Web-based visualizations have become increasingly more important. In a new addition to our annual poster contest, conference attendees will have the opportunity to compete in two Web application categories. One award will be presented for web cartography and another for innovative design.
This year we will also be adding special student categories to our poster contest.
Collaborate
The Northwest GIS User Conference provides something no other conference does: the opportunity to meet and visit with your fellow GIS professionals from across the Pacific Northwest. In addition to the user presentations, you will have plenty of opportunities to meet with your colleagues in both formal and informal settings.
Are you ready to share, but not sure you're ready to give a full user presentation? New this year is an exciting Ignite-format session allowing you to dip your toes in the water with a quick 5 minute presentation of 20 slides.
Fall for Boise
Mountains and museums. Restaurants and rivers. Festivals and fresh air. Boise is a surprising blend of urban and outdoors -- big enough to have all the comforts of a big city, yet small enough to make it easy to enjoy it all.
Check out our outdoor activities, arts scene or our city's museum pass program. Learn about our growing wine region or thriving dining scene. Or like us, simply Fall for Boise, and be part of a celebration of the city's culture and community which will run throughout the NWGIS Conference.
Visit our Interactive Map of Local Business Partners to browse special offers for conference attendees. These include food discounts, drink specials and even special rates for a round of golf. Most of the businesses offering conference specials are within easy walking distance of Boise Centre on the Grove.
Boise Centre on the Grove
NWGIS 2011 will occupy the largest convention facility in Idaho, The Boise Centre, located in the heart of beautiful downtown. When not in session, enjoy Boise's diverse cuisine from Basque pub food on one block, Thai spring rolls on the next, wood-fired pizza with regional beer at the place around the corner and many other choices. At night, enjoy an active local music scene featuring live entertainment. Home to a distillery and several breweries, you can find a perfectly made cocktail or small-batch brews in spots across the city. Discounts will be available to conference attendees from a variety of local restaurants.
Everything you need is within walking distance.
Stay & Play Downtown
After the sessions end, you don't have to leave. NWGIS has arranged discounted rates at The Grove Hotel, just across the fountain from the conference meeting rooms. Perched above the Qwest Arena, home to the Idaho Steelheads, Boise Burn and Idaho Stampede, rates are $99 for corporate and $77 for government attendees.
Events will be planned into the evening including an around town geocache, mountain biking in the foothills, special interest happy hour meetups and a Thursday night outdoor block party on Boise's historic Basque Block.
