DIY Aerial Imaging + Map Knitting workshop at Pratt Institute

As part of Green Infrastructure (GI) projects funded by the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), we, as Pratt Institute, began realizing a series of design and technology workshops on environmental issues as a part of community outreach. We aim to engage the general public into issues related to environmental challenges, like combined sewer outfall, solid waste management and the urban heat island effect.

Our second* design and technology workshop," DIY Aerial Imaging + Map Knitting " led by Liz Barry of Public Laboratory realized on October 25th at Pratt Institute Brooklyn Campus. Participants from Pratt and outside, built a balloon mapping set and conducted aerial imaging of Cannoneer Court Parking lot within Pratt Institute’s Brooklyn Campus. This parking lot, one of the funded GI projects, currently has problems with rainwater ponding.. We aim to solve the ponding problems through a green infrastructure retrofit with a set of bioswales and pervious pavings applied to the parking lot.

The aerial imaging workshop enabled us to document the traces of watermarks from previous ponding, as well as document the space pre-green intervention. We will repeat the aerial imaging after the implementation of green infrastructure elements next summer, after the first rainfall.

During the workshop we:

• Hacked a 4 GB SD card

• Built a container and harness for the camera

• Conducted aerial imaging

• Merged the images in the afternoon using map knitter software

Right after our aerial imaging workshop, Sandy hit NYC. We used our aerial imaging materials and knowledge from the workshop to map contamination traces at surrounding Newtown Creek. Our workshop booklet will be online beginning in December and more research notes will come on our aerial imaging work.

Thanks to all participants of the workshop for their enthusiastic work; Dana Bauer, Sadra Shahab, Wen-Kai Kuo, Christine Camilleri, Erdem Tüzün, Sara Hodges, Lise Brenner, Whitney Hopkins and Andreas Theodoridis. Thanks to Public Laboratory for their support and to Pratt Programs for Sustainable Planning and Development (PSPD) for the funding to realize the workshop. And Thanks to Liz Barry for her fantastic leadership, to Evren Uzer and Jaime Stein for organizing the workshop.

*First green infrastructures design and technology workshop, "Garden Gadgets" happened in September 24th, 2012. You can see the booklet from the workshop from here.