A screenshot of one of the maps from the MIT Media Lab's "You Are Here" project, a visualization of which parts of Manhattan can be fastest reached by different transit modes from the East Side of Midtown. 

The map, one of the central elements of navigation, has expanded in capability since the form has been translated to digital. Case in point, the MIT Media Lab’s “You Are Here” project is a collection of maps that visualize a variety of datasets over space. Things from bike accidents to coffee shops, graffiti reports, and transit connectivity are all laid out, using a variety of open data and other online resources, such as Google’s map directions services API.

Sep Kamvar, one of the leaders of the MIT project, says he was prompted to start this project by noticing the subtle ways in which cities differed — often due to deliberate decisions.

“I realized that the cities are quite different, and they’re quite different because of lots of tiny little design decisions that were made, from the width of sidewalks, to the number of trees on the streets, to the proximity of independent coffee shops,” he says....Continue Reading

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