MichaelHeimbinder
From AlmostPerfect
HABITATMAP.ORG - DESCRIPTION
Mission
Habitatmap is an environmental health justice project that unites community knowledge with scientific study in pursuit of just and sustainable urban spaces. Our mapping tools are designed to maximize the impact of community voices on city planning. Currently we are focusing on the neighborhoods bordering Newtown Creek, the slim body of water dividing Brooklyn from Western Queens.
Concept
Our cities are planned but their designs are far from transparent. The connections between the services and commodities we consume, the institutions and corporations who provide them, the infrastructures that deliver them, and the urban environments we inhabit are frequently nebulous. In collaboration with local communities, Habitatmap constructs virtual representations of these substantive but frequently invisible connections thereby enumerating the environmental impacts of every day household choices and illuminating the links between city planning and human health. Habitatmap.org combines this collectively produced, encyclopedic knowledge of the city with web-based and mobile media social networking platforms to support communities as they negotiate more livable and equitable cities.
Tools
1. Habitatmap: All the points on this map will be plotted by the Habitatmap administrators. This map will concentrate on translating publicly available government databases into map form, i.e. documenting combined sewer overflow events in real time using information from the NYS Dept. of Environmental Planning , mapping buildings containing known lead paint hazards using data from the NYS Dept. of Health, keeping tabs on air pollutant emissions by tapping into the EPA's extensive records, etc.
2. Community Map: All the points on this map will be plotted by participants. They can share whatever information they like about their neighborhood and their lives. This feature is supported by participant profiles that encourage mapmakers to network with one another and form politically active groups.
3. Toxindex: The Toxindex is exactly what it says it is, a toxin index. In its current form it reads like a glossary describing the properties of pollutants with emphasis on their environmental and human health impacts. In the future this tool will graphically illustrate how environmental pollutants cause disease using hemisections of the human body and timelines.
4. Toxic Flows: It is difficult or impossible, without scientific instruments, to perceive toxic substances as they migrate from their source, travel through the environment, embed themselves in the human body, and manifest themselves days, months, or years later as disease. Toxic Flows allows participants to explore the connections between a particular site and their communities' health. Using navigable flash animations that are story-boarded like "choose your own adventures" participants can visually trace how pollution moves through the environment, enters the body, and impairs human health.
5. Household Infrastructure Tracker: Have you ever wondered where your electricity comes from or where your toilet flushes to? Or what its like to live in the community that hosts your electric generator or sewage treatment facility. The Household Infrastructure Tracker will allow households to discover what their environmental footprint really looks like. By punching in their zip code and selecting from a few drop down fields the participant will find out where their natural gas, electricity, and water come from and where their sewage and trash wind up.
Newtown Creek
Dividing Western Queens from Brooklyn, Newtown Creek is one of the most polluted waterways in the U.S. and traverses some of the most neglected neighborhoods in New York City before trickling into the East River. The neighborhoods of Community District 1 alone (Williamsburg, Greenpoint, Northside, Southside) host over 20 "Toxic Release Inventory" sites and hundreds of "Right to Know" facilities.
The result of having so many toxic facilities in one area is predictable: residents suffer from asthma at rates 25% higher than the rest of the city, they are more likely to develop cancer than Americans living elsewhere, and their children are more likely to suffer from the effects of lead poisoning. That so much noxious infrastructure has been built in some of the poorest neighborhoods in New York is no coincidence.
The health of the creek and its surrounding neighborhoods have fallen victim to both the industrial boom in American manufacturing during the first half of the 20th century and its subsequent decline post World War II. Sixty years ago when the creek was the busiest industrial port in the Northeast oil refineries, fertilizer factories, and chemical plants lined the banks of the creek and unregulated dumping and production tainted the waters, contaminated the soils, and fouled the air.
Now, although dumping and industrial pollution continue to mar the creek, the decline of the city's manufacturing base has brought a new set of problems: decay, neglect, and unemployment. However, the creek and its surrounding businesses and neighborhoods are still vital. Thousands of manufacturing jobs remain, the neighborhoods near the creek are experiencing a renaissance of sorts as tenants scour the boroughs for affordable housing, and infrastructure absolutely vital to the functioning of the city is sited here.
Contact
Michael Heimbinder Project Director mheimbinder@habitatmap.org (917)318-0480
OUTDATED DESCRIPTION
Contents |
Mission
Habitatmap is an environmental health justice project that unites community knowledge with scientific study in pursuit of just and sustainable urban spaces. Our mapping tools are designed to maximize the impact of community voices on city planning. Currently we are focusing on the neighborhoods bordering Newtown Creek, the slim body of water dividing Brooklyn from Western Queens.
Concept
Our cities are planned but their designs are far from transparent. The connections between the services and commodities we consume, the institutions and corporations who provide them, the infrastructures that deliver them, and the urban environments we inhabit are frequently nebulous. In collaboration with local communities, Habitatmap constructs virtual representations of these substantive but frequently invisible connections thereby enumerating the environmental impacts of every day household choices and illuminating the links between city planning and human health. Habitatmap.org combines this collectively produced, encyclopedic knowledge of the city with web-based and mobile media social networking platforms to support communities as they negotiate more livable and equitable cities.
Tools
1. Habitatmap: All the points on this map will be plotted by the Habitatmap administrators. This map will concentrate on translating publicly available government databases into map form, i.e. documenting combined sewer overflow events in real time using information from the NYS Dept. of Environmental Planning , mapping buildings containing known lead paint hazards using data from the NYS Dept. of Health, keeping tabs on air pollutant emissions by tapping into the EPA’s extensive records, etc.
2. Community Map: All the points on this map will be plotted by participants. They can share whatever information they like about their neighborhood and their lives. This feature is supported by participant profiles that encourage mapmakers to network with one another and form politically active groups.
3. Toxindex: The Toxindex is exactly what it says it is, a toxin index. In its current form it reads like a glossary describing the properties of pollutants with emphasis on their environmental and human health impacts. In the future this tool will graphically illustrate how environmental pollutants cause disease using hemisections of the human body and timelines.
4. Toxic Flows: It is difficult or impossible, without scientific instruments, to perceive toxic substances as they migrate from their source, travel through the environment, embed themselves in the human body, and manifest themselves days, months, or years later as disease. Toxic Flows allows participants to explore the connections between a particular site and their communities’ health. Using navigable flash animations that are story-boarded like “choose your own adventures” participants can visually trace how pollution moves through the environment, enters the body, and impairs human health. 5. Household Infrastructure Tracker: Have you ever wondered where your electricity comes from or where your toilet flushes to? Or what its like to live in the community that hosts your electric generator or sewage treatment facility. The Household Infrastructure Tracker will allow households to discover what their environmental footprint really looks like. By punching in their zip code and selecting from a few drop down fields the participant will find out where their natural gas, electricity, and water come from and where their sewage and trash wind up.
Newtown Creek
Dividing Western Queens from Brooklyn, Newtown Creek is one of the most polluted waterways in the U.S. and traverses some of the most neglected neighborhoods in New York City before trickling into the East River. The neighborhoods of Community District 1 alone (Williamsburg, Greenpoint, Northside, Southside) host over 20 "Toxic Release Inventory" sites and hundreds of "Right to Know" facilities.
The result of having so many toxic facilities in one area is predictable: residents suffer from asthma at rates 25% higher than the rest of the city, they are more likely to develop cancer than Americans living elsewhere, and their children are more likely to suffer from the effects of lead poisoning. That so much noxious infrastructure has been built in some of the poorest neighborhoods in New York is no coincidence.
The health of the creek and its surrounding neighborhoods have fallen victim to both the industrial boom in American manufacturing during the first half of the 20th century and its subsequent decline post World War II. Sixty years ago when the creek was the busiest industrial port in the Northeast oil refineries, fertilizer factories, and chemical plants lined the banks of the creek and unregulated dumping and production tainted the waters, contaminated the soils, and fouled the air.
Now, although dumping and industrial pollution continue to mar the creek, the decline of the city’s manufacturing base has brought a new set of problems: decay, neglect, and unemployment. However, the creek and its surrounding businesses and neighborhoods are still vital. Thousands of manufacturing jobs remain, the neighborhoods near the creek are experiencing a renaissance of sorts as tenants scour the boroughs for affordable housing, and infrastructure absolutely vital to the functioning of the city is sited here.
