Rajiv Shah's surveillance camera map of Chicago
The following article was taken from Rajiv Shah’s Smart Cameras Blog (with permission from the author):
Chicago’s surveillance cameras were used to track Chicago School Board chief Michael Scott from a convalescent home to a lonely downtown spot along the Chicago River. By using the cameras, the police believe that Scott didn’t meet up with anybody else during that time.
This investigation highlighted the vast network of surveillance cameras in Chicago. Chicago has approximately 15,000 cameras at its disposal. Two thousand cameras are used for fighting crime by the CPD. The rest can be found at the CTA, airports, Park District, McCormick Place, public schools, and private cameras that have joined the city network.
Despite concerns about big brother, the current network is totally inadequate at monitoring every possible location. As I have previously pointed out, the current network of cameras covers only 5% of the city. (This does not include private cameras that are not networked to the city’s camera network.) Nevertheless, the city’s network is large and impressive.
To illustrate the camera network in Chicago, I am publishing a data set of 1,200 cameras used by the police. I believe this is useful to help educate people about the camera network in Chicago. I also hope that this data can find other innovative uses. I am very curious how this data will be viewed, used, and manipulated to other ends.
The data set can be viewed within either Google Earth or Google Maps. The KML file for Google earth is at http://www.smartcamerasblog.com/ChicagoCameras.kml
This data can also be viewed in Google Maps, just enter the following in the search box and click Search Maps: http://www.smartcamerasblog.com/ChicagoCameras.kml
I will keep readers updated on how this information is used.
Rajiv Shah is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Department of Communication at the University of Illinois at Chicago. His work examines the public policy implications stemming from the design of communication technology. He is currently working on an NSF grant titled Governing With Information Technologies. The project web site contains a good overview of his research. Check out more information on surveillance cameras at Shah’s Smart Cameras Blog.
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
