Bloomington, Indiana, has a great track record when it comes to open source software. Bloomington’s Open311 uReport and GeoReporter tools are used by several other cities. Its inRoads app for sharing open data on road and sidewalk closures is available as an open source project on Bloomington’s Github page. It’s no wonder they were finalists at the Code for America Awards back in 2015. We’re excited to have them as a partner for Mapbox Cities.
With a population of 84,000, Bloomington is smaller than our other featured partners, Melbourne and the West Midlands Combined Authority. This gives us a chance to work with a diverse set of cities and learn about their unique challenges.
Intersection at the new Bloomington Transit Station and Joint 911 Dispatch Center
Together, we’ll work on displaying the city’s geospatial open data more visually. We will support Bloomington’s IT and GIS team in building an interactive display of historical preservation requirements for its buildings, combined with stories and background information that goes all the way back to when the city was established in 1818.
Open source code is essential to projects with geospatial data in a public service context. Cities need to create even more open projects to share existing smart solutions with each other. Mapbox Cities supports municipalities to build more open source tools with local data and we will share the new tools with other cities out there.
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