Question on creating a radius

[RyanBaer1]

Greetings,

I am trying to create a .5 mile and .25 mile radius around a block consisting of four streets within the boro of Brooklyn.  I am new to GIS so any help on this would be greatly appreciated.  Please keep the answer as simple as possible if you can.  Thanks. 

PS Is it possible to have 2 radius on the map (one .5 and one .25).  If so, how would I do this?

[MarkBoucher]

You can use the Buffer tool (Toolboxes\System Toolboxes\Analysis Tools.tbx\Proximity\Buffer)

If you want circles, put a point where you want the circles to be centered on and run the buffer on that point. You can do this twice to create the two circles. If they are not where you want them, edit the layer(s) and move them.

You can also buffer polygons. If you have several polygons, you can edit and merge the buffers after the running the buffer tool or choose the "Dissolve" option when you run it. Again, you can buffer twice.

I think in Arc Info you can use the multiple buffer tool to get all the buffers in one tool run.

[RyanBaer1]

Thanks for the response.  How can I drop a point at the intersection?

[MarkBoucher]

To "drop a point" you need to create a point feature class and add a point to it.

[JoshuaDamron]

Another method could be to create a circle with the desired radius.

To do this you would create either a line or polygon shapefile/feature class in Arc Catalog, probably a polygon. Then while in an edit session you select "circle" from the "construction tools" listed at the bottom of the "Create Features" tool bar. You then select the center of your circle and set the radius (Ctrl + R). Obviously the radius has to be written in the units the map is set to (typically feet in the USA) unless you are using abbreviations as discussed here: http://help.arcgis.com/en/arcgisdesktop/10.0/help/index.html#//001t00000008000000.htm  .

You can learn about more keyborad shortcuts here: http://help.arcgis.com/en/arcgisdesktop/10.0/help/index.html#//00660000025m000000

Hope this helps!