Mapping Rural Communities with the Canadian Red Cross Missing Maps Pilot
Friday, 2:25 PM – 20 min
When communities experience an emergency, knowing the location of community infrastructure, vulnerable areas, and people will improve disaster planning, response and recovery. Missing Maps is an initiative to build a comprehensive open map of the world by supporting communities in putting themselves on the map. In Summer 2018, the Canadian Red Cross launched a pilot to work with community members in order to assist communities to create and manage digital maps of their area to incorporate local expertise and directly support emergency preparedness using OpenStreetMap. The Missing Maps initiative provides an opportunity to map the large parts of Canada that remain unmapped or poorly mapped. This talk will introduce the pilot, its initial outcomes and some of the challenges experienced when mapping rural communities in OpenStreetMap.