Map Mashups

According to One World Two Wheels, 24% of all trips are made within one mile of the home, 40% within two miles. Parking the car and proceeding on foot outlines a need for identifying the safest routes available.

Google Maps is a great tool to find your way around town, but they don't have a 'Safest Route' or 'Bike There' option. Choosing a car-free alternative often brings added complications.

The District of Columbia has a solution.

DC's Office of the Chief Technology Officer (OCTO) recognized the lack of neighborhood specific interactive maps available on line and offered up a challenge.

Together with iStrategyLabs, DC's OCTO recently sponsored Apps for Democracy, an innovative contest to visualize DC's Open Public Data.

OCTO's Data Catalog provides real-time data from multiple agencies to citizens, ensuring agencies operate as more responsive, better performing organizations.

The Apps for Democracy contest challenged innovative technologists to use this information coupled with applications available on line to create unique interactive maps for use in DC also known as mashups.

Apps gold medal winner iLive.at is the perfect mashup if you live in or plan to move to DC. Simply enter a DC address and iLive.at will present you with information tailored to that exact location, cleanly organized into categories.

Many of the 47 entries offer fun and exciting map mashups to help live a greener life in DC. Find a carpool, bike lane, metro stop, even a sidewalk.

All entries are listed on the Apps for Democracy Web site along with a link to each interactive map.

"The Apps for Democracy contest is part of our drive toward digital democracy in the nation's captial," said District CTO Vivek Kundra. "Apps for Democracy produced more savings for the DC government than any other initiative."