Google Map Hack & Chicago Crime Data

joepez writes "In recent weeks we've seen some great Google Maps hacks (HousingMaps, Google's own Ride Finder, etc.), but this weekend Adrian has brought us something truly innovative. He's merged Google map data with Chicago crime data to present a once a day updated crime map of the entire city, including some really nice summarized data. Adrian calls the project Chicagocrime.org. How long till we have real time crime data showing up on Google's map? Pull open HousingMaps next to Chicagocrime.org and figure out if that low rent apartment is truly worth it. Or is this all a clever trick on Google's part to build up more and more third parties dependent upon Google?" There's also a cheap gas hack as well.

Comments

Slashdotted

[/ASCII]

Not a single comment, and the site is already crawling. I guess some people actually read the articles!

Prostitution

[Hieronymus Howard]

If you select 'prostitution' you can check out the best areas to go to pick up a hooker. Not that this is of any use to me as I'm a) not single and b) not in the US.

Re:Prostitution

[geoffspear]

or the best places to get arrested trying to pick up a hooker.

Re:Prostitution

[lildogie]

> I'm a) not single and b) not in the US.

Right. Foreign, married men _never_ use prostitutes.

Re:Prostitution

[fm6]

Actually, Johns tend to be non-local married men.

Re:Prostitution

[Thaelon]

I don't want to know how you know that.

Why not both

[millahtime]

Pull open HousingMaps next to Chicagocrime.org and figure out if that low rent apartment is truly worth it. Or is this all a clever trick on Google's part to build up more and more third parties dependent upon Google?

Why can't it be both. And if there is a way to keep it free the better for me.

Sex Offender's Registry

[killproc]

A better implementation for this would be to link to each individual State's sex offender's registry. This data is readily provided and is in the public domain.

Re:Sex Offender's Registry

[Capt James McCarthy]

Great. You want to punish someone forever from one mistake. Way to have a system of justice dude.

Besides that, you probably don't want to know who really lives beside you.

Re:Sex Offender's Registry

[Gr33nNight]

A friend of mine is labeled a sex offender because when he was 18, his girlfriend was 17 (3 months apart). His girlfriends mother called the policyeabout it and he got arrested. Now he is considered a sex offender.

Not all sex offenders are child molesters and kiddie rapists.

Re:Sex Offender's Registry

[Snoop Donkey Donk]

Our local newspaper had a blurb about a guy who was having problems coaching his kid's soccer team because they did a background check and he came up as a sex offender - he had been arrested during his college days for mooning.

Re:Sex Offender's Registry

[rpresser]

The problem is that the sexual offender registry lists people who are NOT "known sexual predators". These people, who made a mistake -- for instance, a 19 year old whose 15-year-old girlfriend's dad is a raging lunatic -- are now forever branded as sexual predators, EVEN THOUGH THEY DID THEIR TIME ALREADY.

Yes, there are child rapists on the list too. But can you tell them apart just from the list? Are you going to bother to try? I doubt it.

Re:Sex Offender's Registry

[zerbot]

In our state, offenders are coded, and level 1 offenders like your 19 year old with a 15 year old girlfriend don't even show up. Some people think I am paranoid and overprotective about my children, I look at the map of level 2 and 3 sex offenders near my house and feel quite justified in that.

Exact addresses are not given, just stuff like "1900 block of 25th Avenue".

Re:Sex Offender's Registry

[h4rm0ny]

A British newspaper did a bit of shit stirring in an attempt to boost sales. They published locations of sexual offenders names and addresses around the country. It kicked off a wave of assaults, cases of mistaken identity and included one woman whose home was wrecked and she narrowly escaped... because she was a peadiatrician.

You want mob justice? Prepare for trial by gossip, then.

Re:Sex Offender's Registry

[pherthyl]

Bullshit. If that's considered a dumb mistake, then 30%-50% of college students make the same mistake all the time. You think if the guy is a couple months older than his girlfriend, they're going to stop having sex when he turns 18?

This does not fall under a stupid mistake.. It's a retarded law that was excercised because of a hysterical mother somewhere.

My Google Hack Idea

[0kComputer]

Not sure if this has been implemented yet. Or even how to do so, but I think a cool Google hack would be a graphical trace route program simillar to NeoTrace.

Not sure how it would make money, but would be cool as hell with those satellite maps.

Re:My Google Hack Idea

[ShadeARG]

It's already been done.

http://kharkoma.homelinux.com/gmaps/gmaptc.html

A great idea for the rest of us...

[NewbieV]

The NYPD uses a system very much like this, called COMPSTAT.

More about the history of the program here (clicky)

Here's an excerpt from the NYPD website:
"Among the Command and Control Center's high-tech capabilities is its computerized 'pin mapping' which displays crime, arrest and quality of life data in a host of visual formats including comparative charts, graphs and tables. Through the use of MAPINFO software and other computer technology, for example, the CompStat database can be accessed and a precinct map depicting virtually any combination of crime and/or arrest locations, crime 'hot spots' and other relevant information can be instantly projected on the Center's large video projection screens."

Re:A great idea for the rest of us...

[Momoru]

So does Baltimore City

Re:A great idea for the rest of us...

[CrowScape]

So does Chicago, and they make it available to the citizens. It's called ICAM. So congratulations Adrian, you created something that already existed!

I doubt that was their intention...

[garcia]

Or is this all a clever trick on Google's part to build up more and more third parties dependent upon Google?

I doubt that Google intended on getting third parties dependent on GMaps. If they really wanted that to happen they would have released an open API rather than having to have people poke around in the code to figure out how it all worked.

Yeah, you can do some REALLY neat stuff with GMaps now (and even some of the things I suggested should be available when it first came out) but I just don't think that it was Google's main intention.

If anything, they just want to be a player in the same markets as Yahoo and MSN and not have to link to their competitor's mapping products.

Real Time Crime

[Embedded Geek]

How long till we have real time crime data showing up on Google's map?

<obligatory>
It's already been done

</obligatory>

Poor suckers.

[RobertB-DC]

I was able to tell the moment the Slashdot story went online... the chicagocrime.org site suddenly stopped responding. And it's not like we could have linked to a mirror.

So you'll just have to take my word for it -- it was pretty cool. I found out that there were three reported crimes at Chicago cemeteries, for example -- a theft, a trespassing, and a vandalism. Crimes at airports included a "theft by lessee" -- looks like there's somebody at Midway who you shouldn't get your rental car from.

The gas station link is holding up better, though. Hope it's not hosted at a gas station... kablooie!

While not nearly as cool...

[hwyengr]

The Chicago Police Department already has a web interface, called Citizen ICAM, which displays the same info. I do believe that the new site is compiling its data from ICAM. You can check out ICAM at http://12.17.79.6/

OT: SimCity

[Stibidor]

I haven't been able to connect to the site yet, but I'm wondering how closely it resembles the crime map view in SimCity. :)

Ah, what a great game...

The big picture

[RealProgrammer]

(er, so to speak)

Or is this all a clever trick on Google's part to build up more and more third parties dependent upon Google?

I think it's just a case of people using tools in ways their creators didn't envision. As Perl's Larry Wall says, that's the mark of a good tool.

Another way to look at it is that if you serve people, they become dependent on you. Google is trying to build its business by offering services and getting people hooked.

I, for one, welcome our new information infrastructure servant overlords.

Not at all new

[Wabin]

While this might be neat because it integrates with Google, the concept is not at all new. When I was shopping for condos in Chicago a few years ago, I looked at the Citizen ICAM site (forgive the slashdotting...), which actually has a somewhat better interface for search, in my opinion. It may not look as slick as google, but it does allow you to look over a range of dates, and the map icons identify the type of crime.

It let me see that one prospective condo was right in a corner of fairly low crime, bordered by much higher crime. I could have guessed that visiting the neighborhood, but it was nice to see somewhat empirically.

PLEASE make Coral links mandatory

[LanMan04]

How hard is it for the editor who posts these stories to the front page of Slashdot to replace them with Coral Cache links?

Seriously, just make it an automated process or something. ALWAYS make it a Coral link.

heh. the other night

[Harper]

I whipped up a google maps hack of geolocation of Illinois registered sex offenders: http://demon.dopeman.org/sexOffenders/ It was amazingly easy.

I used all of the tutorials and shit that the rancidbacon peeps created. made it rather simple. actually delightful.

now if i was only mapping locations of something cool.. rather than depressing things.

stupid maps.