Mapmaker, mapmaker ... make me a map - for free

By CHRIS ARNESON for the Missoulian

Watch a video of the “Mapgiving” challenge

Twelve of the nation's top cartographers gathered in Missoula late Tuesday for a 12-hour, all-night mapmaking session in the first-ever “Mapgiving” challenge.

The Mapgiving mission was to create a map, a process that would normally cost thousands of dollars, for a nonprofit - for free.

Participants, called “Way Finders,” didn't know what organization they were making a map for. They didn't even know how complex the project would be.

“They're going to sit in the room as long as they need to attack this problem,” said Mapgiving co-founder Lou Cross said. “We should have one heck of a map when things are done.”

Cartographer Glen Pawelski of Madison, Wis., participates in the “Mapgiving” event during the North American Cartographic Information Society's annual meeting at the Holiday Inn Downtown at the Park. A dozen participants gathered Tuesday to create a free map overnight of the Hank Aaron State Trail, located in Milwaukee. Photo by LINDA THOMPSON/Missoulian

When the 12-hour countdown started, organizers handed each Way Finder a printout showing the Hank Aaron State Trail in Milwaukee - their mission. The trail runs from Milwaukee's Miller Park Stadium to the Lake Michigan waterfront along the Menomonee River.

The trail connects diverse areas of the city, and allows people to walk and bike to work, said Bob Peschel of Friends of the Hank Aaron State Trail, in a phone briefing with the Mapgiving team. He hopes the Mapgiving project will encourage people to use the trail system to get around the city.

“It will connect you with your neighborhood, it will connect you with your workplace,” he said.

Cross hopes the event will inspire more cartographers to join Mapgiving. The 12-hour mapmaking session - from 4 p.m. Tuesday to 4 a.m. Wednesday - was meant to show other cartographers what they could accomplish if they donated one hour every month to charity work.

“What we want to do is to make this talent available to people who can't afford it,” he said. “Our ‘version 1.0' of this idea is to provide maps to nonprofits.” But Cross hopes to create free or low-cost maps for universities and schools in the future.

The Mapgiving project was coordinated as part of the North American Cartographic Information Society's annual meeting. The organization kicks off its conference Wednesday in Missoula. That's when the Mapgiving team will show off the new map.

Co-founder Tanya Buckingham said the idea for Mapgiving started after what she called a “mapping off” event about a year ago. “Mapping off” is a term cartographers use when they get together to make maps for fun.

Six months ago at a NACIS board meeting, Buckingham and Cross realized that instead of just “mapping off,” they could be Mapgiving.

“Wouldn't it be nice if we didn't lose the energy?” Buckingham realized. “What if we gave this map to somebody else?”

Since then, the pair put a lot of time into organizing the inaugural Mapgiving event.

“It has been a very enthusiastic part-time effort,” Buckingham said. “There's been a lot of organization leading up to it.”

But before building a map, they had to find a nonprofit that needed one.

“We ask questions about which groups could really benefit in having a map,” Buckingham said.

Some organizations don't even know they need a map, she said. So Buckingham went to a number of groups and told them how much they needed a map.

“There are some people who haven't thought about the geological component of what they're doing,” she said.

Mapgiving organizers finally settled on building a map for the Hank Aaron State Trail because “it's somebody who really wants a map,” Buckingham said.

The overnight project had two branches. One group was assigned to a printed map that can be carried in people's pockets. The other group was charged with building an interactive online map.

Before starting work on the map, the print team's captain, Neil Allen, said the hardest part of the 12-hour challenge would be getting everyone to work together.

“Most of the people here are managers or own their own business,” he said. “We're an egotistical bunch.”

Allen has done pro bono work before, but he's never done a project this big for free, he said.

Missoulian intern Chris Arneson can be reached at 523-5259, or chris.arneson@missoulian.com.