Final Revision:
I gathered more feedback both on the design and the message behind the map from classmates and friends (thanks everyone!), which led to these adjustments. I added the alleys force back in, I added parking lot areas in the Wheels category, and I made the buildings colors stand out more. I also added the sun position at a specific time of day (1:00pm, during my lunch hour, which is when I’ve typically observed this area) to show where the building shadows are coming from.
Part 3:
Based on the feedback I received so far, I chose to limit my site to a specific perimeter in this area to help focus my map. I then expanded upon two of my forces: tall buildings and traffic. I gathered detailed images of the buildings in my site and chose to distinguish between low-rise buildings (less than 10 stories) and skyscrapers. Jesse made a fun suggestion during office hours that I’ve played around with – that is to add shadows to the tall buildings/skyscrapers to further emphasize their towering presence in this area. I also broke down the traffic force between wheels and feet/paws to give a better sense of the flow in this area. (I was going to title them vehicles and pedestrians/pets but wheels and feet/paws sounds more fun, and encompasses a few non-vehicle wheeled transportation such as bicycles and scooters.) I did not include alleys and landscape architecture, because these are overlayed with the wheels and feet/paws information that it might be too much information on top of each other. I also chose not to include pop-ups because most of the pop-ups I know of were not located inside the perimeter I chose, and to be honest, I don’t even know how to begin mapping information that is reliant on time.
I’d love to hear any feedback! The changes on this were pretty drastic between parts 2 and 3, and I am open to even more feedback to iterate on. Thanks in advance!
Parts 1 & 2:
The site I chose is in San Francisco’s north Financial District area. For those of you who know SF, this area is closer to North Beach than Market St. and I chose it because it is close to where I work. I enjoy its relatively quiet atmosphere, away from the bustle of “actual” Financial District which is closer to Market. I like that there is no name for this neighborhood that I’m aware of, and it feels like an in-between place (between FiDi and North Beach) with a culture of its own.
My center is the green area, a park called Sydney G. Walton Square which is across from my office, where I walk by every day and occasionally sit to enjoy my lunch outdoors.
Force 1: Tall Buildings
The Transamerica Pyramid is the second tallest skyscraper in SF, and it sits in the periphery of my site area. Also in my site area are other tall structures, mixed-use commercial and residential buildings. The height of these structures are literal forces that jut out of the ground up into the sky.
Force 2: Hidden Alleys
If the tall buildings are like mountains, these hidden alleys in SF are like valleys. They are unexpected and oftentimes quaint in this upscale SF neighborhood. To me, they feel like hidden coves waiting to be explored.
Force 3: Traffic
Delivery trucks, food trucks, personal vehicles, share-riding vehicles, bicycles, scooters, skateboards, feet, paws – the list goes on. The pathways in my site area get quite a bit of traffic. SF is still a big city, and this is still the Financial District after all, however quaint and quiet this neighborhood can feel at times.
Force 4: Landscape Architecture
Nature in a city is usually carefully planned by landscape architects, and my site area is no exception. The “center” I chose is a park that was definitely planned – one obvious example is that it has walkways that lead to the surrounding office buildings. Most of the streets in this area are tree-lined and some of the brick buildings have vines covering their façade. The nature here is the way the humans in this area designed it to be.
Force 5: Pop-ups
Off The Grid hosts food trucks on Vallejo and Front St. every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the office lunch crowd. These food trucks come and go – they are temporary by nature. In the parking lot next to these trucks, there is currently construction rapidly happening for what looks like another pop-up building. A month ago, there was a pop-up in this same parking lot advertising Audi’s new electric car release. Pop-ups generate excitement because of their temporary nature, but in their wake is just a parking lot or an empty street corner.
Hi Kathlyn,
Nice job on the evolution of your mapping. I just have a few callouts that could add some special sauce to your already great looking map.
The simplification of your map space was a good call. From what I know of this space, there is a lot going on, so honing in on the area near your central point is helpful.
This being said, I do think that the “hidden alleyway” component is unique to this space and that by omitting it, you may be missing out on an interesting component that would give your map a lot of meaning and infuse some more fun. From my experience in this neighborhood, these alley ways are teeming with cool new retail and dining spaces that make it special!
I understand that there may be too much overlayed here if we include hidden alleyways, but you could potentially do without so much emphasis on the “feet and paws”, as nearly every street on your map area has pedestrian/animal traffic. Perhaps calling out the most notable areas would be more meaningful rather than all areas.
Overall, I think this is a really well technically executed map. You’ve skillfully depicted common features of downtowns in major cities. They often have large buildings and car/pedestrian/pet traffic– but knowing this what is unique here that the viewer should know about? I suggest these fun alleyways, but there could be other things like the fact that much of this area is built on landfill for instance.
Hope this helps!
Hi Kathlyn,
I really liked the force of skyscraper shadow. I’d love to see the “over time” view. I used to work next to to the TransAmerica building redwood grove and I loved to imagine the redwoods reaching up to our 24th floor of an adjacent building in another 20-30 years. But I digress. We used to hunt out sunlight spots to have lunch in the winter because we knew it would be dark by the time we were off work. So I’m imagining a sweep of the sun’s “shadow” that has a gradient that shows the sun’s intensity. You could show people clustering there. I think you’ve done a great job evolving your project and I hope you’re having fun and learning from it. Me, I have to get up another head of steam to push through the final. Thank you for the really practical comments on my map, I really appreciate it! I hope this was useful as well. Onward!
Hi Kathlyn,
I enjoyed looking at your final synthetic map. Your use of the colors and symbols is clear and self-explanatory. I started my review of the map by only focusing on the creation of the map itself without further looking at the description of your drawing. Because I want to see how my first impression of the map is interpreted later by your annotated observations. Here are the things I noticed from a pure visual perspective of your creation:
• This site consists quite amount of tall buildings
• It strikes me that the site is a commercial area in the city
• The site seems busy with heavy traffic
After summarized my interpretation of the map I then continued on to read the description you included for your final map as well as the detailed observations for each force that contributes to the creation of your mapping site.
The information I have picked up by reading your observations has been rather consistent from what I have interpreted the visual impact that goes on your synthetic map. This approves that you’ve done a very good job to translate your observations of the five forces into a solid final piece.
In your synthetic map, I’m wonder if you could replace the wheels with traffic to be consistent with your individual map presentation, it took me a while to figure out what you mean by “wheels”.
Hello Kathlyn!
I enjoyed reading about the area you chose, as I have never been there in particular. You did a great job selecting forces that were prevalent for you, as they were different from a lot of other posts! Your maps are easy to follow, and the color choice for each force stand out quite a bit!
For “pop-ups,” maybe there is a way you can distinguish between retail, food trucks, and other sorts? Just a thought — I noticed that most of the pop-ups aren’t located adjacent to parks. Do parks have any festivities going on, or is it purely for leisure? Also, for your “traffic” force, it might be helpful to distinguish more dense traffic on certain roads versus others… or add a few modes of transportation.
Kathlyn – I have to commend you on an excellent job of all aspects of this project! I felt your handle of the area was exceptional, and your forces were both concrete but dynamic. I loved the combination of all aspects of the space for these forces; some were social, others purely based on infrastructure, and some even changed with time. This added an incredible life to the area, and to your presentation of it.
I also wanted to talk about how clean and thoughtful your designs were for your maps. I think you have an excellent handle on the design aspect of this project, as the maps were incredibly easy to follow and complemented your writing well. They correlated perfectly to the information that accompanied them. Excellent job!
Hi Kathlyn,
First of all, I LOVE your color choices! The colors really pop on the maps. You did a great job pinpointing all your forces.
However for your force on traffic, I feel that it may be more useful to divide the traffic into categories since I personally feel like the roads do not need to be called out if they are ALL going to be highlighted. In my opinion, highlighting all the roads sort of defeats the purpose because nothing is actually being called out except the obvious. You listed “Delivery trucks, food trucks, personal vehicles, share-riding vehicles, bicycles, scooters, skateboards, feet, paws” as contributors to the traffic. I think it might be interesting to see if you can pinpoint specific roads that are popular for some of these instances. For example, perhaps there’s a road where a lot of bicyclists like to bike, or a road where people like to take their dogs for walks.
Anyway I hope my feedback was able to help in some way. Again, loving your maps! Great job!
Best,
Grace
Hi Kathlyn, I enjoyed reading your post. I really like the consistency of design in each forces. posting the maps right next to your observation information and photos helps a lot in understanding them. Legends are also another amazing elements that you used on your maps. It makes the process of reading maps easier.
Hey Birthday Girl!
I really like all of your maps. I like the angle and crop of your chosen area, because it creates a sense of movement and an interesting perspective. I also like the cool gray and blue base map colors that you chose. The bright force colors juxtapose against the base in a really comforting yet lively way.
My three favorite forces that you chose were tall buildings, hidden alleys, and pop-ups. They all were very creative observations to choose to illustrate. I also like how you described tall buildings like mountains and the hidden alleys as valleys. I could really picture your depiction of that part of the city.
My only comment echoes off of Gillian’s. I also agree that you should provide more detail in your key on what a tall building is vs. a regular height building. For instance: Tall Buildings = 800 ft and higher; Regular Height Buildings = 799 ft and under.
Hope you eat all the cupcakes!!
Kathyln,
I really enjoyed reading your post and now seeing the different force maps. I really like a couple of the design methods you used i the individual maps. In the building height map you used orange for the regular-height buildings and the darker orange for the taller buildings. The darker orange is a more intense version of the regular orange, so I feel like you connected the relationship of regular to tall to orange to dark orange. Well done! Also, I notice that the taller buildings are all the bottom of your map and you mentioned this is north of the main Financial District. From your map, it almost feels like these concrete giants are looming at the edge, reminding everyone where the FiDi is. BTW, thanks for teaching me “FiDI”. Do people say that? My company headquarters ( and my boss) are in the Financial District so I’m always eager to learn what locals say 🙂
The other thing that I like that you did was use the pink circles for “pop ups”. The color you chose and circle shape both feel like they depict a “pop”. Great job!
I loved all of your maps – I think you did a good job of illustrating the forces and making it look graphically pleasing to the eye! For your first force, the tall buildings, I was wondering if you could maybe denote what constitutes a “tall” building? Is it over a certain amount of feet? A certain number of floors? The other suggestion I have is about your traffic map. You are showing all of the roads, but it is not clear to me where the traffic is (unless it is everywhere, which seems entirely plausible in SF!). Perhaps you could find some way to show the variances in the traffic?
I do really appreciate that one of your forces is pop-ups! I think its such an interesting phenomenon in our culture currently, and definitely something that is difficult to map because of their transient nature, but I think you do a great job of displaying it! Well done.
I really enjoyed reading about your force choices. I especially love that you included pop-ups. It seems like these days pop-ups are becoming more and more popular. It stood out to me because it’s your only impermanent force among very permanent forces. Maybe its impermanence can play a role in how you develop your map?
I think your current mapping is very clear and aesthetically pleasing. It seems like there is no set perimeter yet. Is that something that you’ll add later, or is it by design?
Hey Kathlyn, it’s fascinating for me to see these small slices of SF as someone who’s never been, but has heard a lot about it. I guess it fits into my preconceived notions of the city that all of your forces are highly designed and constructed by humans. I’m interested to see what your force maps look like, and if they’ll reveal any patterns. I’m also curious about the socioeconomic status of this part of town, and if it differs from other areas.
Do the alleys have stores or anything in them?
I really enjoyed going through your forces! It’s interesting that although our fieldsites are in the same city, the forces are so different. I really liked how our interpretations of force were so different.
The Pop-ups as a force was probably my favorite. I love that this force only occurs on certain days of the week and how impactful it is to the neighborhood. I have personally searched for specific food trucks just because I am having a craving! I can’t wait to see how you decide to map these out.