Map of the Week - About that Tropical Storm

My colleagues in Vermont are doing a great job providing timely data for disaster responders under difficult circumstances. The Vermont Center for Geographic Information's offices have been flooded for the last week and a half but they are up and running. Meanwhile the Vermont Agency of Transportation is publishing and updating this detailed map every 12-24 hours.

Here's a detail from Wardsboro, a town I've spent time in and that was until recently inaccessible.

It's a big, colorful mess over there but they're still hoping to be open for the upcoming foliage season when things get really colorful.

Public Redistricting Contest

Azavea, a GIS software development company is launching an online redistricting contest for Philadelphia in an attempt at a non-partisan, collaborative process. From techPresident:
Amid Protest Over Closed Philadelphia Redistricting Process, Tech Firm Decides to Start Its Own.

Giving the public a nice and easy interface to make their own districts is a good idea but the City Council can still choose to ignore it. Results will be posted on the Redistricting the Nation website. This site also has a draw your own district interface and lists the Top 10 least compact congressional districts in the country such as Maryland's District 2.

Find Yourself a City to Live In

Sunshine Superboy posted this map on his awesome Black Maps blog. I'd say more but the map speaks for itself. Click to make it readable Link to original post.

There's a Map of the Week for That

OK - I screwed up this post a bit. I will leave the original post intact but see the correction section at the end.

Verizon has blitzed the TV and print media with their clever "There's a map for that" advertisements. Given the ease of manipulating this type of map, I'm surprised that this ad has gone virtually unchallenged so far. Does Verizon's map color in any area of reception regardless of how spotty? Are the map projections the same? Does the red vs blue scheme imply some kind of secret Republican bias on the part of Verizon?
I wasted way too much time on a somewhat extensive web search and found nothing out there that challenges this ad. Here is a screenshot from the ad.


Here's a look at AT&T's "coverage viewer" map - it tells a slightly different story.


Both carriers, Verizon and AT&T have interactive coverage maps. You can zoom down to street level to see your local coverage. However, if you live in any urbanized area you're likely to see nothing but a sea of color. Both of these pages have very similar disclaimers. Here's part of AT&T's.
"Map may include areas served by unaffiliated carriers, and may depict their licensed area rather than an approximation of their coverage. Actual coverage area may differ substantially from map graphics, and coverage may be affected by such things as terrain, weather, foliage, buildings and other construction, signal strength, customer equipment and other factors. AT&T does not guarantee coverage"
Sounds like lots of gray areas that can go either way depending on whose map you're making.

The obvious lesson in all of this-don't believe everything you see in advertisements-or maps.

Or on this blog (See below)!!!!!





CORRECTION:
So, as anonymous commenter pointed out, the AT&T map I show above from their website is a "Voice & Data" map, not 3G. As are both of the coverage viewers that I linked to above. You can get a 3G map from AT&T but it's very tricky-if you really want it look for instructions in the comments. The map you will find is actually pretty similar to the map shown in the ad.

What's the difference? Is it just speed or are there things you can't do with "Voice & Data?" I don't know enough about this stuff to speculate.

So if I've unfairly portrayed Verizon as a bunch of liars, sorry about that. However, I am still very skeptical about their own coverage map and the entire premise of the ad. As the Verizon disclaimer says:

"This does not show exact coverage. Wireless service is subject to network and transmission limitations, particularly near boundaries and in remote areas"

If you want maps that are better than the blurry ones in the ads, see the Verizon 3G page.

Map Channels - Useful Content!

Map Channels is a service that lets you embed a custom map into your website or blog. In addition they have numerous "channels" to look at local events, book hotels and look at street views. They also have a nice function to compare Google Maps with Virtual Earth.
When you get past the flashy "cool" stuff there's actually some very useful functions here. Going to Los Angeles? Need to know what's happening? Below is a map of upcoming events. What's really nice about this is it's actually current to today! Usually these things are months out of date. Oh, and they have your city too. I know because I've checked.

Need a hotel? Here's a map of available hotel rooms in San Jose del Cabo, Mexico. Click a dot and make the reservation!





Here's another cool "channel" - free things to do in London. OK so most of them are parks - I can live with that.

Map of the Week - GISCorps Helps in Myanmar Cyclone Recovery Efforts

GISCorps is a Peace Corps type of organization for GIS volunteers. In early May the call went out from UNOSAT (the UN's satellite imagery team) to many GIS folks including me for volunteers to help map damage from Cyclone Nargis. Unfortunately I could not handle the time commitment they needed but I often wish I had tried to make the time. Below is a portion of a map showing the extent of building damage in the Irrawaddy Delta region of Myanmar. GISCorps volunteers analyzed satellite images from before and after the storm and did a "change detection analysis" to arrive at these figures and maps.

Further information on this project and more maps can be found here.