Recycling Google Maps Directions - Chicago

Recycle City Chicago helps citizens of the windy city find the closet recycling drop-off center from their location.

The application was the winner of the Green Opportunities Award in the Apps for Metro Chicago competition and it easy to see why. If users enter their address into the Google Map they can get turn by turn driving directions to their nearest recycling center.

If you click on a recycling center's marker on the map you can view the opening hours and the materials that can be recycled at the center.

Chicago's Vacant Buildings on Google Maps

The Vacant and Abandoned Buildings Finder is a Google Maps application for finding buildings in Chicago that are not in use and potentially hazardous to the neighborhood around them.

Using the application you can find buildings that are open and unsecured, have fire damage, or are in use by non-residents (gangs, children, homeless, etc).

The abandoned buildings are displayed on a Google Map of Chicago. If you click on a map marker you can read details about when the building was reported, where on the lot it is located, where an open entry point is and view a static Street View image of the building itself.

The application was built using jQuery, Google Maps and Fusion Tables. The code for the application is also freely available on GitHub.

_________________

A Google Map of School Immunizations

The Chicago Tribune has analysed state data for clusters of children without the required vaccinations at public and private schools in Illinois. These clusters seriously raise the chances of school-based outbreaks of serious preventable diseases like measles and whooping cough.

To accompany the analysis the Chicago Tribune has created a Google Map that lets you search for individual schools and view the percentage of students at the school with the recommended immunizations.

The map also shows hotspots where schools don't meet these recommendations.

2010-2011 School Immunization Map

________________

Chicago Now & Then on Google Maps

The Chicago Tribune is the latest newspaper to map the 2010 census. The New York Times, The Washington Post, The LA Times and The Texas Tribune have all also created Google Maps of the 2010 U.S. census.

The Chicago Tribune, however, has taken a different approach in its visualisation of the census data. The newspaper's census application uses two Google Maps side-by-side, one showing the population by race in the 2010 census and the other showing the population by race in the 2000 census.

Users can click on any ward in the city to view a breakdown of the ward's census blocks by race. When you click on a ward a breakdown of the population by race is displayed in the map sidebar, allowing you to compare the ward's composition now with how it was composed in 2000.

The Chicago Tribune: Reshaping Chicago

_____________

Jewish Chicago on Google Maps

Stories of Jewish Chicago

The Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies is holding an eight-part exhibit that explores the Chicago Jewish experience. As part of the exhibit the Institute is creating the Greater Chicago Jewish Memory Map.

Visitors are being asked to contribute their own personal stories of Chicago Jewish life to a Google Map of the Chicago area. You can read the submitted stories on the Stories of Jewish Chicago page. Each of the stories is accompanied by a Google Map showing the location talked about by the visitor.

Eventually all the stories will also be added to the Greater Chicago Jewish Memory Map (currently blank).

Also See

• The Jew Map - this map shows the locations of important landmarks in Jewish history from the Red Sea to Katz' Delicatessen in New York
• Jewish Women on the Map - a guide to physical landmarks in Jewish women’s history

________________

The Chicago Marathon 2010 Route

Going the Distance - The Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal's Going the Distance Marathon comparison tool has the route of this Sunday's Chicago Marathon. The map includes the Chicago Marathon route, an elevations chart and Street Views of the route.

The Wall Street Journal Going the Distance application also has Google Maps of the Boston Marathon route, the New York Marathon and the San Francisco Marathon. Each route is accompanied by an elevation chart and Street View.

My favourite feature of the Wall Street Journals maps is the superb integration between the elevation chart and Street View. If you hover your mouse along the elevation chart the Street View will update to show the respective view. Very cool.

_____________