Driving directions with real-time traffic

Another small improvement has just been added to Google Maps - now it includes estimated driving time based on live as well as historic traffic data.  The information will show up every time you search for directions in the city that already has traffic data layer.

Google Maps used to show estimates of trip times based on historic traffic data alone but it didn't always reflect real-time traffic conditions so, the feature was removed last year. Now Google calculates real time travel duration based traffic data, coming from Android users who have opted to use the My Location feature on Google Maps for mobile, as well as historic records. The new directions feature on Google Maps gives you several different routes to choose from, and each presented with total distance in km and travel time base on average speed as well as based on current traffic conditions. Very handy if time to get to the destination is more important than mileage travelled!

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Modelling city fringes

A critical challenge facing planners in any large and growing metropolitan area is “urban sprawl” and the increasing pressure on rural land and surrounding communities it creates. In order to address this challenge, planners require a better understanding of where future development pressures will be most pronounced and what will be the associated impacts. Atlases for Scenario Planning for Melbourne’s Peri-urban Region is an example of how GIS and spatial analysis can assist in the study of urban sprawl phenomenon and its implications. [“peri-urban - immediately adjoining an urban area; between the suburbs and the countryside”].

Spatial Vision, one of Australia’s foremost GIS consulting companies, working in partnership with the RMIT School of Global Studies, Social Science and Planning, has developed a methodology for modelling peri-urban development pressures, as a central component of the Sustainable Planning for Melbourne’s Peri-urban Region research program (commissioned by the Peri-urban group of councils and funded by Sustainability Victoria through the Victorian Local Sustainability Accord).

The research has identified how and where increases in population (and development demand) are expected to impact on Melbourne city fringes. The results are presented as a series of interactive atlases, comprising maps, tables, graphs and explanatory text, and are organised under the themes of Population Projections, Supply and Demand, Impact Analysis, Offsets/ Mitigations, and Township Analysis (click “Previous/Next” buttons positioned in the bottom of the page to navigate between the themes).

Atlases for Scenario Planning for Melbourne’s Peri-urban Region are built in Flash as an “interactive dashboard”. Google map features prominently on each page, providing spatial context to details presented in a tabular format and on graphs. The application is both, visually attractive and informative, and is a great example of how to present effectively complex concepts and large volume of information. Great resource for local communities, property developers and investors. 

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Enhanced landmarks on Google Maps

Google is continuing with the efforts to make its maps prettier and more useable. The latest change is an enhancement of the quality of more than a thousand 3D landmarks/ buildings around the world. Keir Clarke from Google Maps Mania has created a slideshow to showcase the most attractive landmarks around the world. It uses the Styled Maps feature in the Google Maps API to take away roads and other map features to help the 3D buildings stand out. Enjoy.

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Mapping sun position, anywhere

There are thousands of mapping applications on the web, many very pretty. Some are more useful than others. Occasionally I stumble on something that ends up on my list of favourite tools. SunCalc map is one of such applications. It is a simple map that shows sun movement and sunlight phases during any given day, at any given location around the world. There is nothing much to it – just click on the map in the desired location (or search for a specific locations) then select a date and you will be presented with a full set of information about sun movement for that location.

For example, you can see on the map sun positions at sunrise, specified time and sunset. The thin orange curve is the current sun trajectory, and the yellow area around is the variation of sun trajectories during the year. The closer a point is to the centre, the higher is the sun above the horizon (i.e. it is representative of a shadow). The colours on the time slider above the map show sunlight coverage hours during the day and there is a small table showing exact times for dawn, sunrise, solar noon, sunset and dusk for any given date.

SunCalc is a very handy tool for home buyers, architects and builders. Perfect, if you want to determine quickly if the sun can reach all those less then optimally positioned rooms in the house or apartment at different times throughout the year. It will help to avoid nasty surprises if it turns out that your main living area is not getting any sun for 6 coldest months of the year!

SunCalc map appears to be rather basic but believe me, a lot is happening “in the background” to present the information on the map almost instantly. SunCalc is built with Google Map API v3, jQuery javascript library and Raphael javascript vector graphic library. How about reliability of information, you may ask? I can verify that the results are very reliable - I tested the application for my home location. The match between the real direction of the sun in the sky and on the map was very accurate.

First spotted on Google Maps Mania.

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Mapping crime in Canberra

Just a couple of weeks ago I reviewed a very impressive UK Crimes Map. Now it is time to put a local equivalent under the microscope. In late February Simon Corbell, ACT Minister for Police and Emergency Services, launched a new interactive online crime mapping tool: Crime Statistics. It has been developed to help provide the public with valuable and accurate information about criminal activity in their neighbourhood. The map provides the local community with crime statistics by suburb, allows drawing comparisons between suburbs and view crime trends over the past five years.

The information presented on the map is quite comprehensive. In particular, the new crime map has data on the number of homicides, traffic and Criminal Infringement Notices, other offences against the person, road fatalities and road collisions with injuries. The information can be viewed as absolute numbers of offences per suburb but also as offences per 1000 of the population, which allows to accurately compare statistics of the larger suburbs with the smaller ones.

Users can select incident type of interest (one or many) and nominate either a year, or quarter of a particular year, to see the total number of those incidents for each suburb in Canberra. The numbers are aggregated to regions on zoom out. The application gives user an option to compare statistics (absolute numbers and rate per 1,000 of population) for up to 3 suburbs. However, trends over time cannot be identified using this application. Overall, the map is simple to use, once you understand the logic how it works, and can give a quick snapshot of criminal activity in the ACT suburbia at a selected point in time.

I would also like to mentioning on this occasion another interactive application with crime statistics for the region which was developed by The Canberra Times. It consists of a series of maps presenting 2011 crime data as thematic overlays. Information is available for patrol areas for the following crime categories: assaults, property damage, theft, car theft, burglary, robbery and sexual offences. Very simple but informative although could be much more useful if data was also presented in a tabular format.

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Mapping progress of NBN rollout

National Broadband Network (NBN) is a government initiative to build a national, wholesale-only, open access broadband network to all Australians, regardless of where they live. The aim is to connect 93% of homes, schools and workplaces with optical fibre providing superfast broadband services. The remaining 7% will be connected using next generation fixed wireless and satellite technology. You can monitor the progress of work, and where the network is being rolled out, using NBN Rollout Google Map.

Over the next ten years over 200,000 km of fibre-optic cable will be deployed across the country and up to 6,000 homes a day will be connected to the new network. Users of the map can search by address, postcode or suburb and find out if NBN work is underway or planned to commence soon in their area. Some areas on the map may not appear on the rollout plan, as the map only shows areas where plans for the national network have been announced so far.

The application has a very simple interface that will be very familiar to previous users of Google Maps. Colour-coded markers show indicative locations and status of work, while polygon overlays provide more details as to the extents of geographical coverage. Overall, it is quite informative and straight forward to use.


First spotted on: Google Maps Mania

A year of OSM data edits

If you ever had any doubts about the power of crowdsourcing, or simply about willingness of hordes of anonymous strangers to commit time and resources just to a cause, totally for free, have a look at the following video. It highlights a year of edits of free OpenStreetMap data.

OpenStreetMap: A Year of Edits 2011 from Derick Rethans on Vimeo.

Many question the quality and “authority” of the data but personally, I am very impressed with accuracy and currency of data, where available. Great free resource. Great cause!