This is the first of two papers elaborating a framework for embedding urban models within GIS. This framework is based upon using the display capabilities of GIS as the user interface to the conventional modelling process, beginning with data selection and analysis, moving to model specification and calibration, and thence to prediction. In this paper, we outline how various stages in this process based on purpose-built software outside the system, are accessed and operated through the GIS. We first deal with display based on thematic maps, surfaces, graphs and linked windows, standard to any data from whatever source, be it observations, model estimates or predictions. We then describe how various datasets are selected, how the spatial system can be partitioned or aggregated, and how rudimentary exploratory spatial data analysis enables scatterplots to be associated with thematic maps. We illustrate all these functions and operations using the proprietary GIS ARC-INFO applied to population data at the tract level in the Buffalo region. In the second part of the paper, various residential location models are outlined and the full modelling framework is assembled and demonstrated.