吃瓜爆料

吃瓜爆料's new online campus map helps locate everything from washrooms to microwaves.

吃瓜爆料's new online map makes campus easy to navigate

St. George campus now at your fingertips

吃瓜爆料鈥檚 newest is interactive, layered and searchable. No longer will members of the 吃瓜爆料 community have to find the right map for their interests. It鈥檚 all there in one place. Users of the map will be able to do keyword searches or choose layers based on areas of interest.

鈥淭his means you don鈥檛 have to know the names of buildings to find what you鈥檙e looking for,鈥 said Cheryl Ziegler, project manager for the map and manager of IT and communications projects for the Office of Student Life. 鈥淵ou can search for something as simple as 鈥榬egistrar鈥 and find all the locations of registrars on campus.鈥

Lucy Fromowitz, assistant vice-president (student life), says the new map brings together the best features of the previous maps. 鈥淪tudents were telling us that they wanted a better way to navigate the university,鈥 she said. 鈥淭he map is a coherent response to a complex campus.鈥

A joint effort of the Office of Student Life, Information + Technology Services and the Office of Space Management (OSM), the Google-based map also brings together participants from a wide range of departments on campus, each of them responsible for a separate layer.


OSM Director Steve Bailey says that the partnerships will be central to the map鈥檚 success.

鈥淎s much as people think that buildings don鈥檛 change, there is an ebb and flow to university space,鈥 he said. 鈥淏y having the right people manage the layers, we can get good information back from people. If things aren鈥檛 accurate, we鈥檒l know that sooner.鈥

The university鈥檚 Next Generation Student Information Services (NGSIS) program staff played a key role in building the map. Program Director Siobhan Keogh says the map fits perfectly with the program鈥檚 goals of enhancing student experience.

鈥淧reviously students had to access several different maps to get all of the information they needed. This project brought together many departments to build a single map for the community. It is a terrific example of the collaborative approach for the NGSIS program,鈥 said Keogh.

鈥淲e鈥檙e not just building a map for right now, we鈥檙e building a map for the future,鈥 added Bailey.

Students will notice that the 鈥渕ap your classes鈥 function on ROSI will appear on the new map. As the project evolves, the map will expand to include the Mississauga and Scarborough campuses. The first map layers include accessibility, food, wireless, student services (including registrars), car parking, bike racks, TTC subway stations, green sites (including green roofs and battery drop-off sites), safety, student spaces and washrooms. And there are more layers to come.

鈥淭his new map does more than help people get around. It鈥檚 adaptable to different experiences of the campus,鈥 said Fromowitz. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a living map that will change over time.鈥

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