United States Department of Agriculture
Natural Resources Conservation Service		 Rhode Island Go to Accessibility Information
Skip to Page Content


Digital Soil Data for Rhode Island - Information Page

Background: Rhode Island is the first State to have digital soil data available for all land areas. There are two main sources for digital soil data (Geographic Information Systems -GIS); The Rhode Island Geographic Information System (RIGIS) and the USDA-NRCS Soil Data Mart. In addition to being able to download tabular and spatial soils data for use with a GIS, there are two internet based mapping systems (IMS) online for obtaining digital soil information; the RI DEM Environmental Resource Map (http://www.dem.ri.gov/maps/index.htm#GV) has the RIGIS soil data, special features, and allows interpretation maps with links to the published soil descriptions; the USDA-NRCS has the Web Soil Survey which allows soils data to be viewed for all areas of the U.S. that have digital soil data.

The following are links to the various sources of digital soil data for Rhode Island. Please contact Jim Turenne if you have any questions about obtaining or using soil information for Rhode Island: 401-822-8830.

Official USDA-NRCS Soil Data:
Soil Data Mart for Official Spatial and Tabular Soil Data for Rhode Island | To also be able to download imagery data (topographic maps and Orthophotography) visit the Geospatial Data Gateway.

RIGIS Soil Data (data is in Rhode Island State Plane, NAD 83 Feet Coordinates):
 Rhode Island GIS
Download the digital soil special features (Ad hoc spot symbols) for the RIGIS soil coverage.
Download a soil join table with additional soil attribute data for the RIGIS digital soil data.

RI Soil Survey Report 1981
Adobe Acrobat Document (10 MB PDF Document)

The published Soil Survey of Rhode Island is considered to be an archived (outdated) report and Not "Official" USDA-NRCS soil data. The source to obtain "Official" NRCS soil maps (spatial data) and interpretive information (tabular data) is from the Soil Data Mart (http://soildatamart.nrcs.usda.gov/Survey.aspx?State=RI) and the Web Soil Survey (http://websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov/app/).

The archived published report (manuscript and maps) has been scanned into an electronic format and is posted online at: http://nesoil.com/ri/Soil_Survey_of_Rhode_Island_1981.pdf (this is a 10 megabyte PDF Document) a GIS file of the index to atlas sheets with hyperlinks to the scanned map sheets is available at: http://nesoil.com/ri/map_index.zip.

< Back to RI Soil Survey Program