Maps, Timelines, and the Internet
GEOMAT Prospectus
Sandra L. Arlinghaus, Ph.D.--Consultant.

Neighborhood Watch Networks:  From Ann Arbor to Baghdad.
Landmark event:  In 2007, a formal Neighborhood Watch program was implemented in Baghdad (check on details).  That program has received accolades from a variety of quarters (to be enumerated) as it puts the indigenous population in charge of evaluating situations within neighborhoods and reacting to them to restore peace in the face of possible conflict.

However, the Iraqi Neighborhood Watch Network is in its infancy.  The City of Ann Arbor has a well-established, highly regarded, and highly studied Neighborhood Watch Network.  Thus, the goal is to cast the time-space components of the established network in the GEOMAT form and use that form as a source of possible guidance and lesson for the emerging Iraqi network.  In creating such a transformation, both similarities and differences in these two very far-flung locales need to be carried along, as well.

The GEOMAT components checklist and format categories offer a convenient beginning to creating the material and reveal where there is already good information present and where more needs to be obtained.  Comments are inserted in bold italics, below, to indicate where there are opportunities and gaps.

Materials from Fall 2007:
GEOMAT components Checklist:
For the full power of a GEOMAT case study to be realized, two sets of intersecting components need to be included.  First is a set of broad categories of substantive data that form an ecological whole:
  1. climatic and weather systems including the water cycle--in good weather, there are more opportunities for criminal activity.  Cycles in weather and climate often reflect cycles in certain types of criminal activity.  The City has digital GIS files showing creek and river position.  Parallel maps for Baghdad desired.
  2. terrain and topographic formation--terrain can serve as a barrier or as a carrier of criminal activity.  To know the terrain is to which is which.  The City has terrain files available in GIS format.  Parallel material for Baghdad desired.
  3. changing natural resources distribution and utilization such as movements of plants and animals both domesticated and wild--habitat trails can offer opportunity for escape routes for criminals; on the other hand, animals such as skunks can inhibit such opportunity.  Knowing these patterns can help one to understand where escape routes might or might not be.  The City of Ann Arbor has an "urbanimals" map.  Parallel material for Baghdad desired.
  4. population settlements and movements such as urbanization and migration--shifting movements to the suburbs can reflect changing opportunity for crime.  There are bus route maps available over time.  Also, population maps are available over time for Ann Arbor.  Parallel material for Baghdad desired.
  5. family establishment and reproduction--family neighborhoods are often "safe" especially with trained "eyes and ears on the street."  Observing the change in the spread of Neighborhood Watch in Ann Arbor is important here.
  6. political institutions' operation--actions of City Council are important.
  7. social institutions' operation--operation of the Network within the general context of the Police Department is important.
  8. economic instutions' operation including land use systems' operation--priorities in City budget allocations are important.
These eight systems interact simulatneously at any place on the earth's surface.  Human individuals and groups are embedded in these systems and act through them.  Analyzing how these systems interact to produce a particular event enables us to identify the essential actors, human or otherwise, which have produced the event.

Second is a set of format categories:
  1. Maps which show the features of the areas where significant events took place--the City has a fine archive of maps, as does the Ann Arbor Observer.  Animated maps merge space and time and would be useful here.
  2. Calendrical timelines showing the sequence of different kinds of events at appropriate scales--the maps in the Observer offer a scale differential; data over time is needed.
  3. Identification of specific events, especially landmark events which irrevocably changed the situation being chronicled by the case study--as above.
  4. Biographies, accounts, and images of human actors--corporate group agents contributing to the sequence of events--a biography of Adele ElAyoubi is one important feature here--as are others.
  5. Reports about and images of other actors such as plants, animals, landscape features, terrain, mineral deposits, productive land use, weather and climate--integrate from police accounts.
  6. Arrays of archival documents, records of messages exchanged, oral history accounts and contemporary images--interviews with Neighborhood Watch advisory panel members and others.
  7. Accounts of, documents and images from contemporary settlements such as cities, towns, villages, resorts.--materials from Iraq would be important here.
  8. Documents and images from archeological sites and records of past settlements--records from the Ann Arbor study--find a transformation to map the Ann Arbor GEOMAT to the Iraqi site and situation.