The organization I'm starting is built around using maps to improve decision making. A map, particularly a dynamic map, can bring in social, political, and physical information and make it digestible in ways that reports and papers just can't. If you present an engineer with a thorough, dynamic map, he can point out possible new build sites, and you can use the map to tell him about things like water quality conditions in the area, socioeconomic attributes, and how alterations to flow may impact transboundary water agreements. It's not to say that a map will automatically make decision-making easier, but it will definitely make the process more informed, and may help improve outcomes or mitigate adverse impacts.
The organization I'm starting is built around using maps to improve decision making. A map, particularly a dynamic map, can bring in social, political, and physical information and make it digestible in ways that reports and papers just can't. If you present an engineer with a thorough, dynamic map, he can point out possible new build sites, and you can use the map to tell him about things like water quality conditions in the area, socioeconomic attributes, and how alterations to flow may impact transboundary water agreements. It's not to say that a map will automatically make decision-making easier, but it will definitely make the process more informed, and may help improve outcomes or mitigate adverse impacts.