PA DEP to Standardize Stream Related Data

To establish effective communications and the ability to interchange stream related information with other state, federal and environmental organizations, PA DEP will be standardizing its water identifiers by moving to the National Hydrography Dataset (NHD).

Over the past 25 years, DEP has built computer systems around its current DEP Stream Code File. Since the information in this file was developed for use in Pennsylvania it is not a national standard and communication with the federal government and the department’s business partners, both within and outside of Pennsylvania, is limited. In the near future, the Stream Code file will become obsolete and will be replaced with the NHD’s identifiers.

http://www.dep.state.pa.us/newsletter/default.asp?NewsletterArticleID=9735&SubjectID=