Using Interactive Maps to Enhance Healthcare Equity
Zachary Sherman,Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
Our study utilizes a two-step floating catchment area (2SFCA) method to investigate disparities in healthcare accessibility from block groups within Virginia, focusing on both driving and transit modalities across various regions including Altavista, Greenville, Lynchburg, Richmond, Staunton, Williamsburg, and Winchester. By integrating demographic prevalence data from the CDC, we quantitatively assess accessibility scores for different social groups and locations. Our methodology employs advanced geospatial analysis techniques, leveraging Google API for precise travel time estimation. A key objective is identifying the social groups and block groups that exhibit the most significant disparities between car and transit accessibility scores. Preliminary findings indicate marked differences in service accessibility, highlighting areas and populations with critical needs. By pinpointing the block groups with the largest disparities in accessibility, our study not only sheds light on the spatial and social dimensions of healthcare equity but also informs targeted policy interventions aimed at bridging the gap between everyday citizens identifying nearby healthcare services. Leveraging ArcGIS Dashboards and ChatGPT, our team, and collaboration with the American Dental Association, we transform our accessibility data into actionable insights for policymakers and the general population. Our innovative AI integration methods allow policymakers and everyday people to perform spatial queries with an easy conversation-like interface. Using ChatGPT API, we train and leverage our accessibility data to prompt responses for both numeric responses and spatial queries, a limitation in the current status of geographic AI research.
Algorithmic Design Defaults: Implications and Possibilities
Jim Thatcher, Oregon State University; Meghan Kelly, Syracuse University & Craig Dalton, Hofstra University
This talk examines what we call taken-for-grantedness in some technologically-inflected design choices. Beginning from the ideas that maps are a means of telling stories and making claims about the world, this talk provides examples of how oft-unconsidered and routinely deployed algorithms are potential and realized sites of routinized design and algorithmic harm in how they present the world and in who they include and exclude from consideration. We focus on three cases in different registers of map making: projections, generalization, and classification. Each involves common algorithms deployed in cartographic workflows in classroom, government, agency, and research settings.
For Mapping in Folds: Space is Not a Grid
Alexis Wood, University of California, Berkeley
This presentation asks if the limitations of contemporary mapping can be traced to our tools or to limitations in our cartographic theory. Using an approach informed by the Deluzian fold and the Benjaminian constellation, I question cartographic scale and conceptions of spacetime through various material investigations.
The Pasifika Film Database: Mapping Islands, Oceans and Identities Beyond Imperialism and Militarisation
Clancy Wilmott, Sophia Perez & Elizabeth Fiske, University of California, Berkeley
In 2023-24, a team of researchers from the Critical Pacific Island Studies Collective at UC Berkeley assembled a database of films and documentaries set in the Pacific or directed by Pasifika filmmakers. This presentation discusses the myriad difficulties of translating this database into a web-map using pre-established mapping solutions in the context of the ongoing cartographic construction of the Pacific Ocean as a strategic region for militarization, territorialization, and annexation. To foreground self-determination, sovereignty, and epistemic justice, we argue that new cartographies are desperately needed, including island-centered feature sets, anti-imperialist systems of scale, and new visual conventions.
Mapping Reese Street: Black Cartographies and Community Mapping in Athens, Georgia
Jerry Shannon, Amber Orozco & Amy Andrews, University of Georgia
Our paper describes an ongoing community partnership to map the Reese Street neighborhood in Athens, Georgia. This historically Black neighborhood is recognized as both a national and local historic district, but few Black residents remain due to gentrification pressures. Our research works from the 1958 Athens city directory, archival records, and oral histories to map this community at the end of the Jim Crow era. Our partnership includes community members, academic geographers from the University of Georgia, and staff at a local historic preservation organization. This collaboration ensures that the results of this work can be used to advocate for policies that protect its remaining residents from displacement.
