ENVISION is a GIS-based tool for scenario-based community and regional planning and environmental assessments.

ENVISION combines a spatially-explicit polygon-based representation of a landscape, a set of application-define policies (decision rules) that are grouped into alternative scenarios, landscape change models, and models of ecological, social and economic services to simulate land use change and provide decision-makers, planners, and the public with information about resulting effects on indices of valued products of the landscape

ENVISION is built on an open, extensible architecture that can be adapted to a variety of location and applications.

A "Quick Summary" overview document is available here.

Quick Downloads:

• ENVISION Version 5 - This is the current version of Envision. This is for 32-bit Windows platforms. For Windows XP Users, you may need to install additional files, available here. For 64-bit platforms, see the download page.
  
  
• ENVISION Software Development Kit (Version 5) - for developers who want to write custom plug-ins for Envision (Note: This must be "in sync" with the Envision version you install. It is advisable to download and install both Envision and the Envision SDK during the same session to ensure they are compatible with eachother.)
  
  
• ENVISION Developer's Guide - contains everything you'll need to know to write Envision plug-ins.