National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis

This paper reports the discussions and key findings of a three day workshop held in Gävle, Sweden immediately prior to the 18th ICA/ACI International Cartographic Conference in Stock- holm. The workshop mirrored the considerable success of the first workshop help in Barcelona in 1995 and comprised demonstrations, presentations, and parallel sessions. Thirty nine delegates came from seventeen countries comprising 20% from National Mapping Agencies (NMAs), 10% from the private sector and 70% from research institutions (Geography, Cartography, Surveying, Computer Science, Physics, Planning and Linguistics). The objective of the workshop was to hold a series of discussions focused on impediments to automated map generalization, the current state of knowledge, and progress on specific problem areas. Whenever possible, discussion pressed to define specific areas for research in the coming two years. These will be noted throughout the report.

This report is structured around the plenary session headings, includes a summary of one session held jointly with the ICA Visualization group meeting concurrently in Gävle, and concludes by listing the intended themes for discussion at the next workshop in 1999.