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News — 30 March, 2012

Finishing Up in Indonesia...for the Moment

Tomorrow marks the end of HOT's pilot to evaluate the use of OpenStreetMap for collection of information for exposure models in Indonesia. As I sit waiting for my flight back to the United States there is a lot of reflect on and to be proud.  Of course there are always things to do better or explore further, but overall I feel that the past year has been a success. There is much to continue and further expand.

Accomplishments

Tomorrow marks the end of HOT's pilot to evaluate the use of OpenStreetMap for collection of information for exposure models in Indonesia. As I sit waiting for my flight back to the United States there is a lot of reflect on and to be proud.  Of course there are always things to do better or explore further, but overall I feel that the past year has been a success. There is much to continue and further expand.

Accomplishments

What I am most proud of is the poverty mapping we've helped groups within Australian Community Development and Civil Society Strengthening Scheme (ACCESS) begin. When we first had a workshop in March of last year I could not have imagined where we would be today. One of the facilitators commented this month that mapping had become "just something I do when I have free time," this makes me happy. Groups in Dompu and Bima are using OpenStreetMap to map poverty and then help communities make decisions based on that information. Just this week GeoFabrik and HOT open-sourced the Datastore, software designed to allow the collection of sensitive data and link it to OpenStreetMap information. ACCESS will begin to expand its mapping to other areas in the future based on the success and an outline for successful teams created at a workshop for sustainable community mapping that took place this month. All of this alone is much to be excited, but our mapping in Jakarta this month shows a way forward in urban areas as well.


Mapping in Desa Panda with ACCESS Partner SOLUD from Bima

Yesterday was the last workshop, over the past month six workshops have been hosted.  One workshop for each of the districts of Jakarta. Over 500 government officials have been exposed to OpenStreetMap and helped add critical infrastructure information with the assistance from University of Indonesia students.  There is some clean-up to do, but so much information has been added that would not otherwise be available publicly.  I look forward to seeing the final results at the closing ceremony in April.  Those organizations that have participated will be looking at the next phase of this as well, how to get more data and how to ensure it is able to be used by local government.  Our other approach to mapping urban environments through a university competition seems so long ago. Bringing seven students to FOSS4G is something I'm glad to have had a part.

Additionally the Tasking Manager which has expanded beyond mapping in Indonesia to be used for coordination in Haiti, the earthquake response in Turkey and coordination of remote mapping in Ghana to name a few. I believe we will begin to see people forking it and utilizing it in other capacities soon, if inquiries is any indication. I can't wait to see what happens. The LearnOSM website has also been something that has had implications outside of Indonesia.  Currently available in six languages and I expect more to be added soon.

The Future

Over the coming weeks I'll be further discussing with the Australia-Indonesia Facility for Disaster Reduction and other partners where we go next. I expect to continue the programs we've already started and expand them geographically.  We also have some other partnerships and approaches we'd like to expand. Look for more from HOT in Indonesia!