by Matt Blair and Gregg Swanson
If the recent conflict in the Republic of Georgia sent you scrambling for some perspective on Google Maps, you may have been in for a surprise: no roads or railroads, no cities, no features that would help make sense out of a dynamic situation in a country of over 5 million people. Even Google Earth, which is typically more comprehensive, had only cities and a few wikipedia links, and some postings of tourist photos, but no additional infrastructure.
According to Google, they were not able to find data that met their quality standards for Georgia, Armenia or Azerbaijan.
Is a map of questionable accuracy better than no map at all? That’s one of many questions we are exploring as part of our Maps 2.0 initiative.
Nearly two weeks after the conflict began, Google’s view of Georgia is still empty. In the meantime, ReliefWeb is aggregating static maps of Georgia from multiple sources. As an experiment, Matt overlaid one of the ReliefWeb status maps on a Google Earth (GE) map of the region. (Click here to view the overlay in Google Earth.)
While the base information in GE is minimal, the value of overlaying critical information on a good quality map (even one that shows only satellite imagery) is clear and compelling. In this case, information on movements of displaced persons could be added, updated, and managed as the user selects the layers that best serve their purpose.
In our recent interviews with humanitarian managers in the field, we are finding that easy and fast access to current regional and local information is an acute challenge that humanitarian teams have faced for years. The Google Earth and Google Maps toolkit and similar map-based, Web-delivered applications have nearly solved the accessibility problem. The next step is the “fast” part – to design and implement a process for loading critical information quickly and efficiently on those maps.
Stay tuned – we will have more updates on this research in September.
Maps 2.0 has been made possible through a generous grant of the Meyer Memorial Trust and contributions from our other donors. You may help support this project with an online donation at our “Donate Now” button.
