Department of Geography Spatial Applications Research Center

Welcome to SpARC, the Spatial Applications and Research Center.  Formerly known as the Geographic Application and Research Laboratory (GARL), the lab was established in 1982 as a contract applied research laboratory for the NMSU Geography Department.  SpARC provides a variety of services including planning and research, GIS, image processing, modeling and training.  The original purpose of the lab was to undertake externally funded projects under the direction of geography faculty and employ students within the department. Twenty-Five years and over $3,500,000 in projects later, the lab continues to do project related work. It has employed more than 100 students, and provided assistance to more than 20 faculty members inside and outside geography.

The primary clients of the lab have been government agencies.  A number of local, regional, and federal agencies have utilized SpARC's services.  These agencies include the State of New Mexico Property Tax Division, The New Mexico Department of Transportation, The Department of Housing and Urban Development, Federal Highway Administration, Dona Ana County, The El Paso Metropolitan Planning Organization and many local and county government offices.

Not only does SpARC provide services for the public sector, but it is open to faculty, graduate students and advanced undergraduate students wishing to pursue applied research.  The lab houses 11 high performance Gateway workstations, 2 large format digitizing tablets, and a HP 1050 large format plotter.  Software available for use includes word processing and database software, ERDAS image processing software, TransCAD, and the entire suite of ESRI GIS software.

The NMSU Geography Department SpARC would like to hear from you. We welcome your comments. Note: SpARC's webpages are best viewable using Mozilla's Firefox web browser