A free online service was unveiled today that aims to give users instant access to easily digestible statistical data about Ireland.
The decisionmap.ie website is a combination of statistics already available through sources including the Central Statistics Office and the All Island Research Observatory laid over a combination of different maps.
Users can find information on how many people walk or bike to work in different areas of the country, for example; or which counties have the highest concentrations of third-level degree graduates; or even the areas with the most children.
By illustrating this information over maps by county and electoral district, “you can see a lot more, you can intuit a lot more and take action,” said Gabrielle Stafford of Twelve Horses, which started discussing the project with Ordnance Survey Ireland (OSI) some six months ago.
Hugh Mangan of OSI said the concept behind the website is data should drive good decisions. “It’s called decision map because that’s what we want you to use it for,” Mr Mangan said, adding everyone can profit from a better understanding of data.
Ms Stafford and Mr Mangan said they are expecting a broad audience for the site, including academics, teachers, researchers and students. However, Ms Stafford said the company is targeting decision makers across the private and public sector, and that their interaction and needs will be crucial in deciding how the website develops.
She said this evolutionary approach could see the feedback of decision makers holding more weight than those by other users.
It is envisaged decisionmap.ie will use census data released next year to allow users to examine small areas of 90 households throughout the country, as opposed to the much bigger electoral divisions. Other plans included the ability to compare two different data sets on screen and a commercial version of the product for private data.
Twelve Horses is also looking for more information to add to the system. “What we’d like to see decisionmap.ie become is almost like a shop window on the use of demographics,” Mr Mangan said.