Green Maps for socially inclusive Open Knowledge


Description

This session continues the Green Map discussion that began on Tuesday, with international Green Mapmakers as special guests. With so much information at our fingertips, how can a mapping process engage a fresh way of thinking about and interacting with the environment? The Green Map movement has spread to 825 cities and towns in 65 countries, including Helsinki (www.greenmap.fi). The next phase of development is happening now: interoperability is being added, opening the data and platform to new collaborations and innovations.

Bring your hacker spirit and find out how the process of Green Mapmaking can help increase passion for a healthy environment and climate in your community now, and how, though interoperability, OGM’s data will become open standards-compliant, allowing its locally-sourced and pre-existing government and community map data to be shared, mixed, layered, repurposed and analyzed in new ways. Ciprian Samoila and Philip Todres, Green Mapmakers from Romania and Cape Town, will join the conversation too, and together, we can demonstrate how Green Maps turn local information into global interaction.


Session Host

Cindy Kohtala, Helsinki Green Map / Aalto University, Finland, HKIGreenMap (Twitter), helsinki.greenmap@gmail.com, cindy.kohtala@aalto.fi

Wendy Brawer, Green Map System, US

Contributors

Wendy Brawer, Green Map System, USA, @GreenMap (role in session keynote speaker and co-moderator)

Ciprian Samoila, Romania Green Map by Skype (presenter)

Philip Todres, Cape Town Green Map by Skype (presenter)

Arne Purves, City of Cape Town, South Africa by Skype (presenter)


Bios

Best known as Founding Director of Green Map System, Wendy E. Brawer is an eco-designer and social innovator focused on sustainable community development through local leadership. From her original New York Green Map, the movement has spread to 65 countries, supported and linked by the participatory tools, icons, multimedia and events Wendy has co-created and shared at GreenMap.org. Areas of expertise include urban mobility, food and waste reduction. Wendy has been appointed Designer in Residence at Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, an Utne Visionary and a Woman of Earth, as seen at www.EcoCultural.info.

Cindy Kohtala is a Canadian-born doctoral researcher in NODUS, the Sustainable Design Research Group in Aalto University, Finland. She is team leader of the independent Helsinki Green Map working group and also chairs o2 Finland and organizes Helsinki Green Drinks. She has been a researcher, educator and writer in the Design-for-Sustainability field for many years.

Arne Purves was appointed as the project manager for the Cape Town Green Map, as part of the City’s Green Goal programme for the 2010 FiFA Soccer World Cup. He works in the City’s Environmental Resource Management Department, dealing will natural resource management and marine and environmental compliance. http://www.capetowngreenmap.co.za, http://www.capetown.gov.za/en/environmentalresourcemanagement/Pages/default.aspx, @capetwngreenmap

Ciprian Samoila has been involved in Green Map activities since the Global Green Mapmakers meeting 2002 in Bellagio, Italy. In 2005, he followed up with an internship working on the Green Map Icon Update process at Green Map System in New York. Since then, he produced or offered consultancy on various Green Map projects in Bucharest, Bacau, Cluj-Napoca and Bistrita. In 2010 he initiated the Green Map Romania Association and took part in a 4-country Grundtvig-funded exchange program that developed ecotourism-focused Green Map activities. Outside the NGO world, he pursues a research career applying GIS and RS in Ecology, and works to complete his PhD in Biology. Contributor website: www.harta-verde.ro

Philip Todres runs A & C Maps cc, which publishes a range of special interest maps guides, and in partnership with the City of Cape Town developed the Cape Town Green Map. Together with Arne Purves, the city’s CTGM Project Manager, they maintain the website and publish the print map (now in its 4th edition). Philip is working with players in both Johannesburg and Durban to create an even stronger South African green map network. www.capetowngreenmap.co.za, @capetwngreenmap


Details

Location: Hack Cinema 1

Date & Time: Fri 21, 14:00 - 15:30

Target Group: Anyone interested in the topic, Experts on Sustainability, Mapping, crowd-sourcing, icon design, Helsinki

Topic Stream: Open Knowledge and Sustainability

Session Etherpad page: link