1. OpenHistoricalMap:
Mapping History in New York
Richard Welty

2. Background
• OpenHistoricalMap is an OpenStreetMap side
project
• more than 10 years old
• Uses same Data Schema and APIs as
OpenStreetMap
• Has its own time-sensitive rendering engine

3. Background
• Currently organized as a Charter Project of
OpenStreetMap US
• Fundraising through OSM US (a 501(c)3)
• Open Data
• Current License philosophy is mixed
• We encourage uploads with CC0 (public domain
equivalent)
• ODbL for overall database is probably inevitable

4. Background
• Still a lot of experimentation going on
• How to represent change in the OSM schema
• How to represent imprecision and
incomplete knowledge

5. Lower Manhattan
• Well known that there is a lot of
fi
ll
• But how much
fi
ll?
• Project: map evolving coastline

6. Lower Manhattan

7. Lower Manhattan

8. Time
• We would like to think we can document
speci
fi
c dates and times
• But we often can’t
• Our data is frequently point-in-time
• That is, a map or aerial image shows when
something exists (or doesn’t exist)
• Old documents may be missing

9. Time
• OpenStreetMap is not very concerned with time
• pretty relentlessly about now
• has a start_date tag but not a lot else

10. Time
• OpenHistoricalMap is all about time
• Provision for both start and end dates for
entities
• OHM is adapting Extended Date Time Format
• EDTF is a standard derived from ISO 8601
• It can describe imprecision and uncertainty

11. Life Cycle
• Life Cycle goes hand in hand with time
• Highways and Roads
• change route
• are renamed
• change in importance

12. Life Cycle
• Buildings
• change usage
• are recon
fi
gured
• are renamed

13. Semantic Network
• OpenStreetMap uses relations for grouping
• OpenHistoricalMap leans very heavily into
relations
• representing entities across life cycle
• abstract meta data from geometry
• facilitate cross linking to the wikimedia
complex (wikipedia, wikidata, etc.)

14. Harmony Mill
• Textile Mill in Cohoes NY, built during the
Industrial Revolution
• Repurposed more than once during its
existence
• https://www.openhistoricalmap.org/
#map=17/42.78093/-73.70414&layers=O&da
te=1930-12-17&daterange=1923-01-01,202
3-12-31

15. Boutique Mapping vs
Mapping at Scale
• Most mappers are engaged in small scale,
focused projects
• OHM is open to well considered, well vetted
bulk imports
• but data quality is critical
• OHM will be sparse without imports

16. Potential Imports
• Historical Boundaries
• from European Settlement
• Native peoples
• Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps
• Historical coastlines and water features
• Sourcing and Licensing?

17. 1964 World’s Fair

18. Historic Sports Venues

19. Historic Sports Venues

20. Historic Sports Venues

21. Historic Sports Venues

22. Ghost Tracks
• Historic Motor Racing venues, now gone
• New York has many, many Ghost Tracks
• Vanderbilt Cup Races
• early Watkins Glen
• Bridgehampton
• huge numbers of small dirt oval tracks

23. Vanderbilt Cup Races
• Originated on Long Island in 1904
• Initially used public roads (1904-1906)
• Safety when racing on public roads has
“issues”
• http://www.na-motorsports.com/test/VC.html

24. Long Island Motor
Parkway
• William K. Vanderbilt Jr’s half a solution to the
public road problem with racing
• Important step in the evolution of highways
• All concrete, grade separated toll road
• Parts are extant today
• 1906-7 Vanderbilt Cup races used it for one
leg of the race

25. Long Island Motor
Parkway

26. Vanderbilt Cup Races

27. Watkins Glen
• 1948: Automotive road racing returns to the
US after WWII
• Lessons about racing safety on public roads
evidently forgotten
• After the 1952 accident killed and injured
spectators there would be new courses with
improved safety
• www.na-motorsports.com/test/Watkins.html

28. NYC Water System

29. NYC Water System

30. NYC Water System

31. NYC Water System

32. NYC Water System

33. NYS Canal System

34. NYS Canal System

35. NYS Canal System

36. 1952 Aerial Pass
https://mapwarper.net/layers/1186

37. NYS Canal System
• How the Barge Canal changed everything
• https://www.openhistoricalmap.org/
#map=14/42.7996/-73.6917&layers=O&dat
e=1977-11-10&daterange=1830-01-01,20
23-12-31

38. Historic Minority
Communities
• Complex history
• I’ll highlight 2 in New York State
• Seneca Village (Manhattan)
• Rapp Road (Albany)

39. Seneca Village
• Early mid 1800s in Manhattan
• Located near the Reservoir and Great Lawn today
• majority Black, with a lot of Irish
• escaping from 5 points neighborhood
• Taken as part of the e
ff
ort to build Central Park
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seneca_Village

40. Seneca Village

41. Rapp Road
• Settled in Albany during the 1920s
• A community of Blacks moved north from rural
Mississippi, following their Pastor
• Lived in Albany's South End, but eventually
moved west to the Albany Pine Bush
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Rapp_Road_Community_Historic_District

42. Rapp Road

43. Rapp Road

44. Contact
• These slides
• https://www.slideshare.net/nfgusedautoparts/
• nfgusedautopartsrwelty@averillpark.net or
nfgusedautoparts@gmail.com
• in the OpenStreetMap US Slack channel
• https://openstreetmap.us/get-involved/slack
• #openhistoricalmap