An interactive map was used for the Longitude festival in Dublin

By Oscar Michel, Masters in Journalism, DCU.

14-16th July, the Longitude festival took place in Dublin.  Esri Ireland, the market leader in Geographic Information Systems (GIS), and An Garda Síochána has leveraged its ArcGIS platform to create an interactive map for the festival.

Since 2013, the festival has been held in Marlay park, Rathfarnham, Dublin 16 and crowds have grown steadily since the event began. This year, 16’500 people attended each day of the event.

“Longitude is a great event that attracts people from all over Ireland to enjoy three memorable days of music from their favorite acts. Large numbers of people are expected to head to Marlay Park for the festival this weekend and traffic delays are inevitable. This map allows fans to plan their route to Marlay Park and avoid delays, allowing them to focus on what really matters – the music.” said Paul Synnott, director and country manager of Esri Ireland.

This interactive map was useful because of the need of the Guardaí to monitor the traffic entering and exiting the area. Using Esri’s platform, the map displayed traffic flows around Marlay Park and highlighted locations where traffic-calming measures were in place. This enabled music fans to plan their route accordingly and avoid traffic. As well as this, local residents and commuters were able to use the map to plan their journeys around the event. It was also easy to find the first aid station or the lost and found office, the car parkings, the drop-off points etc..

Paul Creaner, examiner in charge of maps, GIS Garda Mapping Section, said: “With significant numbers of people making their way to Marlay Park for Longitude this weekend, An Garda Síochána will be implementing traffic-calming measures around the park. This map will allow us to monitor traffic patterns in real-time, and ensure that traffic continues to move as efficiently as possible. We would encourage people to travel to the event by public transport, which will not only reduce total CO2 emissions, but also help to reduce congestion in the car parks and on the surrounding roads. Concert-goers can use this map to find the location of the Dublin Bus pick-up area and the stop for the Luas shuttle bus.”

View the map here.

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