What you get

Three things a search engine will not do.

It knows the servers.

A registry of public city, county, state and federal GIS servers, crawled and re-checked on a schedule.

It tells you what is missing.

For any area: which data themes have a local source, which are only covered by a wider one, and which have none.

It keeps the evidence.

Every source is labelled with who publishes it, whether it opens without sign-in, and the date that was checked.

By the numbers

870,000+

layers catalogued

standard data themes, from parcels to survey control

Seconds, not hours

351 zoning layers for Washtenaw County in under 4 seconds (measured Oct 12, 2026)

About 30 seconds

for a full area report on a 5,000-source area

Find

Ask for data the way you would ask a colleague.

Ask the registry in plain English — “parcels and zoning in Washtenaw County, updated this year.” The question becomes a structured search you can see and edit; results can be saved.
Search on the map — draw or name an area, and the map shows where each source actually has data.
The map on phones and tablets, with a Panel and Map switch on small screens.
Access label on every result — “Public · county government · read without sign-in <date>”, or “Open data”, or “Account required”.
Statewide questions get a notice and progress, because they take longer.
26 data themes — parcels, zoning, address points, roads, hydrology, utilities, elevation and lidar, imagery, flood, and more.
Search by field name — “layers with a status field in Ohio” finds the attribute you need, not just the layer title.
Change any condition and run it again; the AI is not called a second time.

The condition editor in dark mode: the Washtenaw County zoning question laid out as theme and county conditions, with layer, service and theme choices you can change and run again, beside a dark basemap of Washtenaw County around Ann Arbor, Michigan. — **See and edit the search**The question laid out as themes, counties and regions you can change and run again.

A statewide search of Ohio for zoning layers with a status field in progress: a notice that it can take up to a minute, a line reading the registry for Ohio with elapsed seconds and a Cancel search button, and the conditions Theme Zoning and land use, State OH and Field contains status, beside a map of Ohio from Dayton to Columbus and Cincinnati. — **Statewide questions**A notice up front and progress while it runs.

Check

Know what an area has before you start the project.

The area checklist — parcels, zoning, roads, hydrography, elevation, boundaries, and more, with the best source for each.
County coverage status, one of four: local server · covered by a wider source · not checked yet · no source found.
Honest results — no out-of-area filler; “not checked yet” says so.
Area inventory — every service and layer that touches your area, from a parcel block to most states, up to the top 5,000 services, each with its access label and check date.
Export the inventory to CSV or Excel.
Compare two areas side by side.

Summarize

A plain-English summary where every sentence cites its source.

Summarize this area — a short summary: a headline, then what the area has, what it lacks, what is still unchecked, and what to do next.
Numbered citations link to the publisher and layer behind each point.
You see the cost before the AI runs, and every account has a monthly cap.

Workbench working map for Ann Arbor, Michigan, with three live layers and the Take it to ArcGIS export menu. — The project’s working map, ready to send to ArcGIS.

Process

Take the data with you, terms attached.

Clip and download — the features inside your area as GeoPackage, GeoJSON or CSV, in WGS84, or for GeoPackage the publisher’s own coordinate system, with the publisher’s terms and attribution packed in the download.
Area report as PDF or Word — area map, checklist, county coverage and the cited summary, plus an optional appendix of every source. Ready for a proposal or a project file.
Open it in ArcGIS Pro — send the project’s working map to ArcGIS Pro as layer files. Layers stay live links to the publisher; nothing is copied.
Save to ArcGIS Online — save the working map to your ArcGIS Online as a private web map (references only; nothing is copied or shared).

Keep and watch

Your sources, saved and watched.

Projects keep their evidence — a saved source keeps what was observed when you saved it; later changes are flagged, never overwritten.
Favorites, with offline copies of the layers you rely on.
Watch areas — Workbench re-checks an area’s sources and lists what changed under What’s new, with a weekly digest or a same-day email alert, your choice per area.
Email alerts the day a watched source changes.

How it works

Three steps from a question to usable data.

STEP 1

Name or draw your area.

STEP 2

Check what it has.

The checklist, the coverage status and the summary.

STEP 3

Clip, save, report or watch.

Who it is for

Built for the people who scope the work.

Planners and engineers

Check what a site or corridor has before the scope is written.

GIS consultants and analysts

Find the authoritative layer, its publisher and its terms in minutes, not an afternoon of portal browsing.

Due diligence and proposals

A dated, cited area report to attach to a proposal or a project file.

Data and sources

Every result names its publisher.

Workbench indexes public government GIS servers that anyone can read without signing in. All Things Spatial does not own or alter the data.
Each source shows its publisher, its access label and the date it was checked. Publisher terms travel with every download.
Servers are re-read more often (the crawler now runs every minute).
Coverage grows as the registry is read. The most complete states today: Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, Ohio, Illinois, North Carolina, New York, Minnesota, Georgia, Iowa, Missouri and Kentucky (as of Oct 12, 2026).

FAQ

Fair questions.

Is Workbench a public product?

No. It is a demonstration application. Access is set up one person at a time for clients and prospects of All Things Spatial. Request demo access

Who owns the data?

The publishing agencies. Workbench finds it, labels it and dates the check.

How current is it?

Every source shows the date it was last checked. Watch areas re-check on a schedule.

Can I rely on it for a project?

Use it to find and evaluate sources, then confirm with the publisher. Results are for evaluation only.

Which states?

All 50 states and DC are in the registry. The most complete states today: Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, Ohio, Illinois, North Carolina, New York, Minnesota, Georgia, Iowa, Missouri and Kentucky; the rest are being read now (as of Oct 12, 2026).

What is it built with?

ArcGIS Maps SDK for JavaScript and the Calcite Design System, Esri basemaps, and a PostGIS spatial database. It is the same stack All Things Spatial uses for client work.

What is planned next?

See Coming next. Planned items are labelled until they ship.

Can ATS build something like this for my organization?

Yes — Book a consultation.

The workbench for public GIS data.