http://civicaccess.416.s1.nabble.com/Re-CivicAccess-discuss-Digest-Vol-7-Issue-40-tp643p660.html
Google allows you to view road maps & some mosaicked remote sensing
images, allows you to create some mashups and to put some points on the
map, it is however not a data download site in the sense we are
discussing here, and one cannot do any analysis with that data. It
does allow you to do some fun stuff, add some local content and
navigate around the world.
There are a wide variety of data resources listed on the civicaccess.ca
wiki that you may find interesting -
. Andrew, is suggesting that a
local public library could also become a data library and help citizens
in their community learn about their neighbourhoods, or acquire data to
inform planning decisions and such.
I was also entertaining myself yesterday morning at GoogleMap's expense
- you can read a biased view here -
Hi:
I really haven't had time to read all of this, but a quick question:
Has anyone checked out Google Maps. It allows you to connect all sorts of
data to maps.
Carmen Kazakoff-Lane
-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email]
[[hidden email]]On Behalf Of
[hidden email]
Sent: Friday, June 02, 2006 2:16 PM
To: civicaccess discuss
Subject: Re: [CivicAccess-discuss] CivicAccess-discuss Digest, Vol
7,Issue 40 - Bob & Marcel
I recalled something of this kind being done some years ago in St. Louis
Missouri Public Library. A quick Google search produced this:
Kofron, Charles P. and Anne Watts. "St. Louis Library's GIS Disseminates
Public
Information", Geo Info Systems 3 #7, July/August 1993, pp.46-50.
Abstract: This article describes how the St. Louis Public Library and
Regional
Research and Development Services at Southern Illinois University at
Edwardsville developed the Electronic Atlas, an electronic set of thematic
maps
containing selected data elements from the 1990 US census. The Electronic
Atlas
has proven to be an efficient and economical alternative to producing color
copies of thematic maps from preconceived data classing schemes.
On the other hand, I can find no evidence on the SLPL site
that the service still exists. If not, would be interesting to know
why...
Andrew Hubbertz
Quoting Marcel Fortin [hidden email]:
Funny you should mention that. I have thought for a few years now to try
and formulate a proposal to some public librarians here in Toronto to
see if they think a demo of GIS to the general public would fly and then
perhaps extend it to actually doing some outreach to the public on GIS
questions.
As I mentioned in a previous post, the issue could be much easier to
deal with if open source software were on par with commercial software
in the GIS realm, but it just isn't at that level yet. there are tons of
packages, but none that do exactly what you want, other than the web
mapping packages. But, there I go again. I have hope that something can
still be done.
I am currently writing a book while on sabbatical, a kind of How-to for
GIS Services in Libraries and one of the concepts, or ideas I want to
put forward with the book is that GIS should be brought into the public
realm through libraries. I really believe in the concept, it's just a
matter of getting some public libraries interested. There are no public
libraries in canada, that I know of at least, that currently offer any
gis services and I know of only one in the United States, where as you
may know, they have free data! :-)
Marcel
Tracey P. Lauriault wrote:
Fantastic Marcel!
One of my optimistic/utopic dreams - data access dreams that is - is to
extend the dli (Data Liberation Initiative) and other academic data
access infrastructures to public libraries, school boards, and community
groups. I know that this would require additional hardware, software,
and peopleware resources in cash strapped institutions but alas, i
wonder what role the librarians (map, data and reg) + archivists can
play within their associations to push for the extension of some of the
excellent knowledge agreements already in place?
What do you & others think? am I delusional on a sunny Friday afternoon
after hours of looking into the metadata policies of science data
portals? I feel a little light headed but alas is this an
angle/strategy/solution to explore?
cheers
T
ps-when i started uni but a few years ago, there was only US data to
work with. And i look forward to those links.
Marcel Fortin wrote:
Thanks Tracey,
You're right, we definetly do have a long way to go in the public realm,
but, on the academic side, we have also come a long long way. When I
started at the U of T in 1999, we had access to maybe 2 or 3 Canadian
geospatial datasets taking up roughly about 1 gig of space mostly taken
up by one orthophoto set). In 2006, I have access to probably over 100
Canadian geospatial datasets taking up over a terabyte of space, without
counting the free Canadian data on the web. Again, most of this is of
course through academic licensing, but I think things will progress for
the general public as well. That's my hope at least. Maybe I'm too
optimistic? I imagine everyone else on this listserv has hope
considering the existance of the civicaccess group and listserv.
I will try and add links and other docs as you request in your message.
Marcel
Tracey P. Lauriault wrote:
Marcel;
I partially agree with you, we do have much to celebrate, however,
after
having spent thousands of dollars on data to do some quality of life
indicator work at the scale of the city, and trying to do some
demographic analysis of my neigbhourhood and some school catchment
areas, i feel we have a long way to go for the average citizen - not
the
specialist - getting easy and free/no cost access to some useful data.
Having said that, Marcel, would you be so kind as to look at our
resources page and see if there are additional resources we can add
there? You could just post them to the list if you like or put em up
on
the wiki. That would be really great!
http://civicaccess.ca/wiki/Resources
So, a failure? I don't think so. I think we have to build on some of
these
successes and not try and compare ourselves to the U.S. too much.
The federal government is not oblivious to the fact that data are
mostly
free in the US. In many cases federal and provincial hands are tied
because
of Crown Copyright and licensing policy, or they think their hands are
tied
See Werschler's "Dissemination of Government Geographic Data in Canada
:
Guide to Best Practices" at
http://cgdi-dev.ccrs.nrcan.gc.ca/publications/Best_practices_guide/Guide
_to_
Best_Practices_v12_finale_e.pdf
Our data cultures are different and we can't change that overnight.
i added this ref doc to the wiki here -
http://civicaccess.ca/wiki/Politiques
The Association of Canadian Map Libraries and Archives (ACMLA) along
with
the Canadian Association of Public Data Users (CAPDU) have worked hard
at
negotiating data deals over the years.
I've added the orgs here -
http://civicaccess.ca/wiki/Organizations/Organismes
if you have some good refs, fire em over and I will get em listed!
What we in the ACMLA have done is
demonstrate the need for their data, how they can be used (something
they
don't always know), and how we intend to use them. The most effective
argument we often have, however, is the ability to demonstrate to them
a
similar deal with another organization (this also works with
industry).
The
strategy is often used at the provincial and local level. I realize
again
that these are academic deals but it does demonstrate the power of
negotiation and communication and the usefulness of building on past
successes.
Marcel
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--
------------------------------
Note: I am currently on research leave.
I am monitoring my email, but it may take longer than usual for me to
reply.
If you require help with maps or Geographic Information Systems, please
contact [hidden email]
------------------------------
Marcel Fortin
GIS and Map Librarian, University of Toronto
130 St. George Street, Toronto, ON M5S 1A5 416 946 0522
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Andrew Hubbertz
Librarian Emeritus
University of Saskatchewan Library
613 692 2709
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