Contact information:
Gale Nigrelli, Town Planner
Tel: 508-636-1029
Bernadette Oliver, Principal Clerk
Tel: 508-636-1037
Fax: 508-636-1031
Address: Town Hall, 816 Main Road, Westport, MA 02790
Hours: 8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.-- Monday - Friday
Note: Documents and forms are in "PDF" format, which means you need the free Adobe Acrobat Reader to read them. Although many computers already have this installed, if you don't have a copy you can download it here.
Asst. Town Planner Job Description - Download file
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Tips for Using the On-line Parcel Viewer/GIS Maps
The Westport On-Line GIS Parcel Viewer and Mapping Website is now operational and may be found at:
http://host.appgeo.com/westportma or by using the link on the Town Website.
What it is:
The website is a three-tab site, meaning it has three areas which provide three, somewhat overlapping, but different capabilities. When you log on, you will be presented with the opening page, or GIS Home. You can return to this page at any time by scrolling to the bottom of whatever tab (page) you are on and clicking the “GIS Home” link.
The first tab is the Property Tab, which displays Assessor’s data for a given parcel of land and allows limited overlays of additional information, such as soils, wetlands, zoning and aerial photos (scroll down to see your options).
The second tab is the Interactive Mapping Tab, which allows you to add additional data to your map. You may look at a particular parcel, which you have previously selected or you may go directly to this tab from GIS Home and look at the entire town, or zoom in and out to particular areas.
The third tab, Abutters, is mainly of interest to permitting boards and commissions and the assessor’s office. It shows the direct abutters to your selected parcel and allows the option to add abutters within a certain distance or individual abutters. It then allows you to print the list of abutters onto address labels or print the list for certification by the assessor’s office.
What you can do:
- You can search for a property by property ID (assessors map, block, lot), by street name, by street number, or by owner’s last name and obtain information such as assessed value, lot size, deed book and page, etc. on the Property Tab.
- You can overlay resource information, zoning, and aerial photos onto a property map.
- You can view the location of certain features town wide using Interactive Mapping.
- You can make a custom map showing certain combinations of features and print it at 8.5 x 11 or 11 x 17.
- You can generate lists of abutters and print them.
- You can find out additional information about certain feature by using the ‘I” button to retrieve a data table.
Tools:
There are tools that appear to the right of the map that allow you to:
- Zoom in and out or to a selected parcel/lot.
- Pan to different areas of Town Of Westport
- Select or de-select a parcel
- Measure an approximate distance
- Measure an approximate area
- Obtain more information about a feature
Move your mouse over a tool to see what its function is.
Tips:
- Read the information on the GIS Home page before you start.
- Use the scroll bars to scroll down and see all the features available on a tab and the links at the bottom of the page.
- When starting a property search, entering less information will usually ensure that your search returns all the possibilities. For example, if you don’t know how to spell someone’s last name, enter a few letters.
- Try zooming in and out using the + and – slider on the Property Tab and Interactive Mapping tab to display information such as labels that may only appear at a particular scale.
- Don’t add too much information to a map—add one layer at a time and click the “Refresh” button. Too many layers will obscure one another.
- Certain themes or datalayers allow you to pull up data tables with more information about that feature by clicking the circular “radio button” in the legend for the feature, then clicking the “I” or Info button tool, then clicking on the feature of interest, whether it be an area of a certain soil type, a wetland feature, etc. Note: Public Landings does not have a data table and will return an error message.
- If you don’t see the data you have requested, look in the Windows taskbar at the bottom of the screen. There may be a button down there that when clicked will show you the data table.
- When using the measuring tools, you can see the distance or area measured better if you turn off the aerial photo.
- To print a map, use the “Printable Map” button at the upper right of the page, rather than the Windows print option.
- Sometimes what you get is more than what you see; if you can’t zoom to a level where you can see all of a selected parcel plus its dimension labels, try zooming to the extent where you can see the labels, then printing. You may get the entire parcel printed, even though you can’t see it all on the screen.
- If you encounter an inexplicable error and receive a message to email the administrator, email the administrator, but check back in 5 to 15 minutes. The situation usually resolves itself in that period of time.
Please send comments and/or questions to
GIS@westport-ma.gov.