Activity 12.
0 – GPS Mapping for Field Projects
How to make a simple GPS map of your project
Making a map of your project has many benefits. It can help people in other
countries (like donors) understand exactly where your project is located. It
can help you make better decisions on logistics, and you can use it display the
project results for different target areas.
These days, making a map of your project doesn’t need to be difficult. You don't need
to be a cartographer or geographer. You don’t need any fancy equipment. All you
need is a smart phone, a computer and internet connection.
Just follow these steps to make a simple map of your own project.
Get a smart phone and install a GPS app
You don’t need a GPS device to do GPS. Almost any good quality smart phone will
do. Find a smart phone and install a free GPS app on it. The best (and easiest) GPS
app for an Android device is GPS-Simple for Android. Download via
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.andreabaccega.simplegps.
To use GPS-Simple, you may need to change some of the settings on your phone,
such as enabling GPS.
Go to each location and write down the latitude and longitude from the
app
Once you’ve got your phone you should go to each location you want to map and use
the GPS app to get the latitude and longitude. Latitude and longitude are
imaginary (unreal) lines drawn on maps to easily locate places on the
Earth. If the location is very remote you might need to move around a bit until your
phone can get a lock on it. The GPS-Simple app will even tell you how accurate the
result is (normally 10-20 meters, but it varies).
GPS-Simple for Android
A GPS app interface
Once you’ve got the latitude and longitude write them down on a record sheet, along
with the name of the location and what it is (village, health centre, school, borehole,
etc). An example of a record sheet is shown below:
Enter the data into a spreadsheet
If you decided to write down everything on a paper form then you’ll need to enter
that data into a spreadsheet. The spreadsheet should have one heading row, with
each row after that being used for only one location.
At this point you can also add extra information on each location. For example, if you
are mapping villages for a school program you could add the percentage of children
attending school in each village. If you are mapping boreholes you could add whether
the borehole is functioning or not. When you make your map, this information can
be shown using the colour or size of the dots.
Upload the data onto a map
There are several different mapping providers that will allow you to upload your data
onto their publicly available maps, including Google Earth and Bing Maps.
They all work in a similar way, but personally my favourite is Tableau
Public because it allows you to combine charts and maps together. Tableau Public is
free software that can allow anyone to connect to a spreadsheet or file and create
interactive data visualizations for the web.
To make a map on Tableau Public you first have to download and install the software
on your computer. Then open the data from the spread sheet in Tableau Public.
Once the data is open you just drag and drop things onto the map. Have a look at this
step-by-step guide from Tableau Public to see how it’s done. Here is an example:
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Compiled by:
Joseph Adekunle
External GIS Consultant
Dataville Research LLC
