A Seminar Series in GIS, Remote Sensing and GeoInformatics

Organised by the Edinburgh Earth Observatory in conjunction with AGI-Scotland

Friday 27th November 2009, 4pm

Robin McLaren
Know Edge

CHANGE OF VENUE Room 2.13, Institute of Geography, Drummond Street

Title: The Role of Urban Sensing in Managing Megacities

Many megacities are growing at an annual rate of over 6% and some will double their populations in the next decade. This incredibly rapid growth of megacities causes severe social, economical and ecological problems. New tools, techniques and policies are required to baseline and integrate the social, economic and environmental factors associated with megacities, to monitor growth and change across the megacity and to forecast areas of risk – all within shorter timeframes than previously accepted.

This presentation explores the role of ‘urban sensing’ that uses cellular phones, sensor technologies, GIS related technologies, Web 2.0 and crowdsourcing (mass collaboration using Web 2.0) to support the creation of a public infrastructure, a ‘data commons,’ that will allow the citizen to increasingly participate in politics, civics (including land administration and management), aesthetics and science. These emerging techniques have the potential to strengthen the Spatial Data Infrastructures and urban change information available to megacities.

You can review previous seminars by choosing "Past Speakers" on the menu to the left

If you wish to receive email reminders of the EEO-AGI(S) Seminars, please email us and we can add you to the list.

This seminar qualifies for 1.5 points under the AGI Professional Development scheme.