58 :: Putting Food, Arts & Bicycles on the Map
On Friday, I gave a short talk at the FAB Windsor event on May 2nd, 2014. And I mean, it was short. 5 minutes: 20 slides that auto-advance every 15 seconds. Here are those slides and the words that I meant to say.
Slides are available at : http://copystar.github.io/AbFAB14/ Presentation made using reveal.js
Slide 1
image from: http://sf0.org/copystar/Map-Your-Life/
Hi! I’m Mita Williams. I’m a librarian at the University of Windsor and I have an undergraduate degree in Geography & Environmental Science and I’m currently on sabbatical researching web mapping and “in the field” information seeking.
Slide 2
image from: http://www.google.ca/maps/search/playgrounds+walkerville/@42.30949,-83.0157389,14z/data=!3m1!4b1
When we search for information through Google Maps, we are drawn a map that favours the commerical over the civic. The top hit for playgrounds walkerville is Maxine’s Adult Playground
Slide 3
The city of windsor doesn’t use Google – they use a powerful software suite called a Geographic Information System But the power of that system is for those who work at the city. We just get a view of the maps they create
Slide 4
image from: http://www.citywindsor.ca/residents/Culture/Pages/Windsor-Culture-Map.aspx
That last map came from the recently released Cultural Mapping Project from the City which I think is worth reading especially for its cultural employment summary of the city
Slide 5
image from: http://www.mappmycity.ca/COMMUNITY_CULTURAL_ORGANIZATIONS
The project produced a number of map apps like this one of Community Cultural Organizations But while the project report gives analysis, the maps themselves don’t really lend themselves telling a story
Slide 6
image from: http://www.citywindsor.ca/residents/parksandforestry/trails/pages/trail-map.aspx
GIS maps allow users to assemble our own maps from layers of information which can be great But that doesn’t mean that pre-assembled maps, like this one of bike trails, still aren’t useful
Slide 7
image from: http://www.fordcity.ca/community-map/
One of the reasons why Google Maps is so popular is that it allows all of us to make our own maps This is the Ford City Community Map – which doesn’t look too different than the City GIS produced one
Slide 8
image from: http://www.historypin.com/
There are a variety of other web services that make the mashing up of google maps easier. Here’s another example: recently some University of Windsor History students added images to History Pin
Slide 9
image from: http://www.zeemaps.com/view?group=901593&x=-83.009509&y=42.317769&z=1
And a third example which uses something called Zeemap The Olde Walkerville Residents Association surveyed the missing trees from the neighbourhood and this map does a very good of conveying the scale of how many are ‘missing’
Slide 10
image: from: http://nhutchpersonalgeog.weebly.com/1-where-commuters-run-over-black-children.html
Maps do more than just help us explore – maps can tell very powerful stories. This infamous map of downtown Detroit from 1968 is called Where Commuters Run Over Black Children. It higlights much more than a lack of playgrounds in the downtown
Slide 11
image from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windsor_Sculpture_Park
I’m interested in how web mapping allow those in the community to make our own maps I’ve noticed that Wikipedia now has longitude and latitudes points for many of its entries
Slide 12
image from: http://inkdroid.org/ici/
Open data plus open standards means that new kinds of new maps can be built without GIS or Google This is a website called ici that tells you which things are nearby that have been geocoded in wikipedia
Slide 13
image from: https://www.ingress.com/intel
Here’s a map of the Windsor Sculpture Garden. Except its in a game called Ingress All the sculptures are portals that are fought over and captured for territory between two rival factions
Slide 14
image from: http://www.strava.com/
Here’s another map of bike trails in Windsor. Except the trails aren’t drawn by hand These are trails made by the GPS tracks by those using the Strava app
Slide 15
image from: http://www.openstreetmap.org/
Some companies like FourSquare choose not to spend money on the high licensing fees set by Google to make use of its maps It uses the Wikipedia of Maps called OpenStreetMap: I added most of the features of the UW campus to it here
Slide 16
image from: http://ruebot.net/yudl-leaflet.html
This map from York University also uses OpenStreetMap and make browsing a digital collection more intuitive I don’t have to search all the names of the places that are near where I live
Slide 17
image from: http://www.citywindsor.ca/opendata/pages/open-data-catalogue.aspx
There can’t be ONE map for all the uses we have in the world. That’s why I am thankful that the City of Windsor for sharing some of its map data for all of us to use and reuse in its Open data Catalogue
Slide 18
image from: http://hackf.org/opendatawindsoressex/
I just happen to be lead of the a group called Open Data Windsor Essex We’ve recently received Trillium funding to help nonprofit organizations organize and host open data to share with others in the community.
Slide 19
image from: http://fragile-success.rpa.org/maps/jobs.html
I’m hoping to be able to make wonderful web maps with the data we collect: hopefully with info about food, bicycles and art Because we can make and share maps that are more than just push pins
Slide 20
If you are interested in sharing data or making webmaps with us, please get in touch: Mita Williams :: aedileworks.com / twitter.com@copystar OpenDataWindsorEssex :: http://hackf.org/opendatawindsoressex / twitter.com@opendatawindsor