By Katie Miller

What is Missing Maps?
Missing Maps is a humanitarian mapping project led by a diverse collective of organizations that aims to create accessible map data for areas where humanitarian organizations such as the American Red Cross operate. The goal of the Missing Maps is to document where people live, work, shop, and cross international borders in at-risk areas. Missing Maps relies on member organizations -- and also individual volunteers to work as mappers.

Volunteers can participate in this international project by working remotely with a global community of mappers. This collaborative project allows anyone with internet access, basic computer skills, and some time to spare to help create digital maps of newer communities and communities experiencing significant changes. For example, almost a quarter million people moved into the foothills around Port-au-Prince after a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck the Haitian capital on January 12, 2010.  According to UNICEF, the massive earthquake destroyed approximately 300,000 homes and initially displaced 1.6 million people, making humanitarian efforts extremely difficult to carry out.

Though one might assume that by now such communities would be mapped by commercial mapping companies like the ones we all use on road trips, for-profit mapping companies often do not document remote areas, including some well-established and populated communities. Missing Maps has partnered with a volunteer-driven open data mapping platform supported by the not-for-profit OpenStreetMap Foundation to help map such remote and at-risk areas.

How does Missing Maps work?
It all happens over a three-step process:

1. Volunteer mappers work with existing satellite images and trace buildings and roads. So far, forty-six million buildings have been mapped by over 100,000 digital volunteers.
2. Local community members flesh out these basic maps by adding important information and cultural context. Missing Maps aims to create maps that are accessible to and respectful of local communities’ naming conventions. Knowing what people call the place they live is essential.
3. The data are used for humanitarian work. For example, such maps guide volunteers on the ground to provide free transportation for children in need of polio vaccinations. Maps can also help track aid shelters built with Red Cross support. They even enhance community health efforts such as contact tracing during pandemics. Many Ebola patients, for instance, live in border regions that are difficult to navigate with traditional maps.

What’s it like to volunteer with Missing Maps?
Recently, I was invited to join a remote mapping session for Missing Maps called a “Map-a-thon,” hosted by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) student chapter of the American Women’s Medical Association (AMWA). AMWA is an organization which brings together those in medicine and health-related fields to promote women’s health and to support members’ professional and personal development. The AMWA Premedical Branch at UNLV is a women's pre-health professional student organization that promotes academic achievement and opportunities for pre-health professional students pursuing professional schools including medical schools, dental schools, PA schools, and nursing schools.

After logging into the video conference, the UNLV-AMWA members and I watched a short training video about the history and goals of the Missing Maps project. Next, we moved into the hands-on training, which included creating accounts on the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT) website and selecting the project for which we’d be collaborating. Then we selected a task appropriate for our skill level (novice, in this instance) and began mapping buildings. If you’ve ever opened a map app on your mobile device and scrolled around an area of interest, this is similar. We each worked within a set area, so we didn’t overlap. It was surprisingly soothing to draw boxes around buildings and tag them using the built-in tools on the HOT site. We chatted while we worked and accomplished quite a bit in our hour spent together.

UNLV AMWA Premedical Branch member Ji Hye Park described the Map-a-thon as a welcome break from the competitive nature of pre-med life. “It surprised me how relaxing it was. It’s easy, convenient, and complements your own time. There’s also no deadline, but you can feel like you’re actually helping people on a global level.”

Ji Hye remarked that making time to volunteer with the Red Cross, and specifically with the Missing Maps Project, is personally rewarding and “a type of self-care because you’re giving back to others, and also combatting some of the pandemic-related loneliness.”

Another UNLV student, An Truong, began mapping with AMWA and now also maps in her own free time. “It’s one of the easiest tasks to do in your free time. You get to help people you normally couldn’t help because of distance.”

After our hour together, I had mapped forty buildings. More importantly, I really enjoyed the opportunity to learn more about the area of Bangladesh we helped map, develop new computer skills, and connect with other volunteers from around Nevada.

To volunteer your time with the Missing Maps Project, visit https://www.missingmaps.org/

For more information about AMWA, visit https://involvementcenter.unlv.edu/organization/amwapremed