[Imports] Baltimore City GIS Data

Elliott Plack elliott.plack at gmail.com
Thu Jul 5 23:16:26 UTC 2012


Greetings Fellow Mappers!

Abstract: I have come across a large dataset of *public domain* data from
Baltimore City Government that I'd like to import.

Hello all. Some background: I have been mapping on the OSM platform for a
few months, and really enjoy it. I have a bachelor's degree in Geography,
and work in the GIS industry, however my love for maps is lifelong. I'll
never forget the joy when I first experienced a slippy map service on the
web (Google Maps) after toiling with Mapquest's pan and zoom interface for
so long. I can spend hours exploring maps, and I often do.

I got into OSM mapping recently on a more regular basis (daily?) when
Foursquare announced they were switching to map tiles based on OSM data.
When I realized Mapbox was using OSM, I was thrilled. That's because
previously I was using Google Map Maker to make edits to Google Maps.
However now that the web seems to be moving toward open, I went with it.

I work for Baltimore County Government, in the State of Maryland, USA.
Baltimore city and county are separate political entities, though adjacent
geographically. Therefore, I do not work for the government agency that
maintains this data. I've lived in the city and am moving back, motivating
me further to look into this.

My primary goal is converting the building shapefiles to OSM, which the
city puts out on its website for free. The licence is stated to be "Public
Domain". There are loads of other datasets available that I would
definitely consider adding to the mix. I am aware that too much data can be
a bad thing on OSM, as it may discourage people from editing further. The
data is at https://data.baltimorecity.gov/browse?category=Geographic

I have done a fair bit of reading on the wiki about importing, and am by no
means going to just do it. I look forward to engaging this community as
well as the local one. I hope to put my GIS experience and local knowledge
as well as passion for OSM behind this project.

So, what should my starting points be? I'll definitely contact some people
I know at the city GIS department for license clarification. By the way,
Google has their parcel data in Google Maps, which it charges for, so I
have a feeling that using it for a free cause will not be and issue.

What else?

Thank you,

-- 

Elliott Plack
http://about.me/elliottp
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/imports/attachments/20120705/44f11bbd/attachment-0001.html>


More information about the Imports mailing list