Seattle Green Map Launched to Celebrate World Environment Day
Online Map Provides a "Living Resource for a Sustainable Seattle"
(Seattle) - On June 2, a coalition of grassroots organizations and individuals will launch the Seattle Green Map, a cutting-edge, web-based map providing residents and visitors with the city's first-ever interactive tool to discover all things "green" and sustainable about the Emerald City.
Seattle Green Map (a coalition of eight non-profit organizations) and City Councilmember Richard Conlin will hold a press conference announcing the launch of the first Seattle Green Map at 10:00 am in the Bertha Landes Room of Seattle City Hall. This launch will coordinate with the Neighborhood Green Mapping "Day of Sharing" where 75 high school students from north and south Seattle will present their findings from a Green Map curriculum designed by Homewaters Project, and funded by a City of Seattle Technology Grant. Seattle Green Map team members will put on an interactive demonstration of the online map and be available for interviews in the City Hall lobby immediately after the announcement. "Sustainable goodie bags" will be given to the first 50 people arriving to the event.
The Seattle Green Map taps into the talents and interest of tech-savvy Seattle, using emerging web technologies and the visually appealing icons of the international Green Map System. Residents and visitors will be able to look up eco-friendly buildings, recycling sites, organic and natural food stores, cultural sites, community centers, trails and transit, polluted sites, and more. The online map (http://www.seattlegreenmap.net) will include detailed site descriptions, locations, and contact information, as well as video features of "sustainable stories" from across the city created by students at Seattle Girls' School.
Completion of the Seattle Green Map caps four years of work by volunteers who worked together to define, organize, and build a new and innovative green resource for Seattle. The first map reflects hundreds of volunteer hours and dozens of meetings and workshops involving 400 citizens and 200 youth. Seattle Green Map is supported by several community groups including Feet First, Homewaters Project, Sustainable Seattle, The Design Resource Institute, People For Puget Sound, BALLE Seattle, the Transportation Choices Coalition, and the Seattle Urban Nature Project. City support has come from Seattle City Councilmember Richard Conlin, and from Mayor Greg Nickels' Office of Sustainability and Environment, among others.
Seattle joins a growing list of Green Map projects worldwide. Since the creation of the world's first Green Map of New York City in the early 1990s, communities in 45 countries around the world have initiated over 285 green map projects, from Sumatra to Dublin, Hiroshima and Victoria, Canada.
Seattle's Green Map is connected to the Green Map System (GMS) and its global network of locally-based green map-making teams (http://www.greenmap.org), which celebrated its 10th anniversary in March 2005. The GMS is coordinated from a New York City office by Wendy Brawer, founder and director, and her staff. Wendy has received numerous awards and international recognition for her work as a designer and innovator.
To learn more about the Seattle Green Map, including a video demonstration, visit http://www.seattlegreenmap.net.
