Mapping Stimulus Projects in Oz

Last month in my post on Google tools for public sector I provided a few examples of how Australian government departments and organisations are using Google maps to present various information. Today another interesting example: a map showing where and what projects billions of dollars committed by the government in the economic stimulus package is spent on. Information is available for six different expenditure categories: education, community infrastructure, road and rail, housing, insulation and solar. Zoom to your local area to find out what is actually happening in your neighbourhood with the allocated money.

Some of the information available on the Nation Building - Economic Stimulus Plan site has also been released under Creative Commons - Attribution 2.5 Australia (CC-BY) licence and can be freely used for various mashups and analysis. In particular, you can access information on all current community infrastructure, and road and rail projects across Australia. And if you have a great idea on how to use this data you can enter Mashup Australia contest for great prizes. It is run by Government 2.0 Taskforce for a limited time.