Brief History

1998 Apr. Established the Center for Spatial Information Science
1998 Sep. The 1st Symposium
1998 Dec. Started Joint Research Using Spatial Data
1999 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.1-1998 Fiscal Year
1999 Sep. The 2nd Symposium: Future Prospects on the Common Use and Exchange of Spatial Data (First Anniversary Memorial Symposium)
2000 Apr. Started CSIS Data Sharing System Service
2000 Apr. Started Clearinghouse System Service
2000 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.2-1999 Fiscal Year
2000 Sep. The 3rd Symposium: Deepening of Spatial Information Science
2001 Jul. Opened a portal site "GIS School"
2001 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.3-2000 Fiscal Year
2001 Sep. The 4th Symposium: Spatial Information Science Facing the New Century
2002 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.4-2001 Fiscal Year
2002 Sep. The 5th Symposium: Research Network of Spatial Information Science
2003 Aug. Moved to Komaba Research Campus Bld.#45
2003 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.5-2002 Fiscal Year
2003 Sep. The 6th Symposium: Pioneers of Spatial Information Science
2004 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.6-2003 Fiscal Year
2004 Sep. The 7th Symposium: Spatial Information Science and the Newest Development of Cartography
2005 Mar. Moved to Kashiwa Campus
2005 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.7-2004 Fiscal Year
2005 Sep. The 8th Symposium/ The Session of Inter-University Researh Activities: CSIS DAYS 2005
2006 Apr. Relaunched CSIS as a National Joint-use Facility
2006 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.8-2005 Fiscal Year
2006 Oct. The 9th Symposium/ The Session of Inter-University Researh Activities: CSIS DAYS 2006, CSIS as a National Joint-use Facility Anniversary Memorial Symposium
2007 Jul. The 10th Symposium 2007: Arrival of Geospatial Information Society
2007 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.9-2006 Fiscal Year
2007 Nov. The Session of Inter-University Researh Activities: CSIS DAYS 2007
2008 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.10-2007 Fiscal Year
2008 Oct. The 11th Symposium 2008: Forefront of Industrial Applications in Spatial Information
2008 Dec. The Session of Inter-University Researh Activities: CSIS DAYS 2008
2009 Sep. Published CSIS Annual Report Vol.11-2008 Fiscal Year
2009 Nov. The Session of Inter-University Researh Activities: CSIS DAYS 2009
2009 Dec. The 12th Symposium 2009: Theory and Application of Spatial Information Analysis
2010 Apr. Relaunched CSIS as a Joint Usage/ Research Center
2010 May. Started Joint Research Administration System Service
2010 Jul. The 13th Symposium 2010: Advances in Real Time Spatial Information Science Studies by "Digital Experiment Field"
2010 Nov. The Session of Inter-University Researh Activities: CSIS DAYS 2010
2011 Nov. The Session of Inter-University Researh Activities: CSIS DAYS 2011
2012 Jan. The 14th Symposium 2011: Social Interface of Spatial Information Science
2012 Jul. The 15th Symposium 2012: Contribution of Spatial Information Science to construction of a safe and secure society
2012 Nov. The Session of Inter-University Researh Activities: CSIS DAYS 2012
2013 Jul. The 16th Symposium 2013: Reconstruction from Great East Japan earth quake -socio-economic perspective-
2013 Nov. The Session of Inter-University Researh Activities: CSIS DAYS 2013

Overview of the Establishment of CSIS

The movement to establish the center goes back more than a decade. However, the project truly began with a recommendation for a national cartography museum (tentative name) given at the 104th meeting of the Science Council of Japan in 1988. The recommendation contained two parts. The first was to create a museum for maps and other types of spatial information. The second was to build an academic cartography library and develop a research institution to pursue new disciplines based on maps (then referred to as the "New Cartography").

Over five years, a national movement formed to make this recommendation a reality. However, it became clear that establishing a facility along the lines of the original recommendation was difficult, and the approach was rethought to forego museum facilities and focus on research.

At the same time as this change, the "New Cartography" was also being reconceived from a broader perspective, to become a new field called "Geographical Information Science." The main issues for the new facility were how to create an institution that would give birth to and foster the development of this field and what kinds of research would be performed. With a timely Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (A) from the Former Ministry of Education, three years (1994-96) of "Research for Deepening Geographical Information Science and for the development of a Research and Education Organization" (leader: Professor Osamu Nishikawa) were conducted to search for answers.

Through this study, the center's research organization and domain were specified, and the University of Tokyo was selected as a suitable host university for the center. The University of Tokyo then began its own efforts to establish the center. In 1996, the National Geographical Information Science Research Center Establishment Preparation Committee was created along with a sub-organization-the Establishment Preparation Association for the Geographical Information Science Research Center-at the University of Tokyo.

In preparation for the center's organization, the University of Tokyo created the Geographical Information Science Laboratory in 1996 in the Graduate School of Engineering. This research organization began with the School of Engineering and included researchers from the Graduate School of Economics, the School of Science, the Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology, the Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, the Institute for Industrial Science, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology, and the Faculty of Medicine. Research seminars and information exchanges among the researchers were common and frequent.

These research activities focused the organization proposal, and a request to establish the center was submitted by the School of Engineering, the School of Science, the Graduate School of Economics, the Institute for Industrial Science, and the Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology to Hiroyuki Yoshikawa, who, at that time, was president of the University of Tokyo. Debate also continued over the content of Geographical Information Science, resulting in the adoption of an even broader perspective in "Spatial Information Science."