Mapping
Livability Project uses "livability map" templates to help communities come together and create vision and action plans for the future. Maps help people visualize relationships and provide stakeholders with a roadmap or “sense of direction.” These maps are incredibly useful in helping to identify patterns that track sustainability performance and are used as an internal tool to drive strategy development and consensus building.
“See-it™” mapping and reporting software provided by our strategic partner, Visible Strategies (www.visiblestrategies.com). “See-it™” provides a simple graphical interface that displays comprehensive, interconnected information. This format can incorporate multiple categories and resources including broad community goals, sustainability indicators, listings of community policies and assets, documentation of progress and articles or videos about local projects. People can add to a “See-it™” map directly, and interact further by submitting comments and completing online surveys or through other non-digital means such as an ongoing public mapping display.
The “See-it™” tool is able to help identify and monitor key indicators that guide community’s’ planning. By monitoring indicators for chosen targets, all stakeholders can see what information is relevant and assess progress toward reaching objectives. Objectives can be quantitative like assessing reduction of an area’s carbon footprint or qualitative like assessing public attitudes toward green space. Often, government agencies and citizen groups already track this data. Examples of targets might include the following:
- Percent of population taking alternative transportation
- Solid waste diverted from landfills
- Amount of parkland or green space per capita
- Number of LEED certified buildings being constructed
- Green jobs growth
- Reduced carbon footprint
“See-it™” can also be used to showcase successful businesses, practices and initiatives that the community wants to expand. The maps can be embedded on multiple websites and can provide sponsorship and advertising revenues through showcasing links to solutions, blogs, videos and multimedia content and a click-through e-commerce capability.
