A Geographic Information System (GIS) software program for mapping, measuring, and analyzing the storm water, summer energy savings, carbon storage and sequestration, air quality, and wildlife of urban ecosystems.
“CommunityViz is advanced yet easy-to-use GIS software designed to help people visualize, analyze, and communicate about important community planning decisions.”
Flickr is a popular online image and video hosting website that allows users to upload and share media. The site is also popular with bloggers as a way to host images that they embed in blogs and social media.
Visioning is a community engagement process that helps people to articulate or define the future they want for their communities. Visioning is often completed in conjunction with a master planning initiative and often looks decades ahead.
GIS software allows viewers to access complex geographical data about their community online including maps and satellite images. GIS systems also analyze and display data such as proposed development plans and statistics, and survey data.
Asset mapping is the process by a community inventories its assets and capabilities. The process can take many forms, but is a positive way of identifying both strengths and gaps and identifying a plan for moving forward.
A start-up project in Vermont, FPF creates online communities for each city neighborhood, where residents can get to know each other, post requests for help or information, discuss neighborhood issues, and make announcements.
Community Almanac is a place on the web where communities can share stories about theirs towns. Community Almanac can host photographs, text stories, and videos; it allows users to map and comment on stories, organized into "almanaces" by place.
MindMixer is a “virtual town hall,” providing a forum for communities to share ideas, discuss, and create plans for the future. Without the time and place constraints, citizens can share ideas online, and leaders can gain input from their communities