Derive

While it seems a logical step in the process of mapping our “world” to use information from GIS to quantify and lay-out the multiple issues, processes, infrastructures, and physicalities available to us, I find Corner’s discussion on drift to be one of the more compelling techniques that he urges we assume in our mapping practices.

Is a reader of a map not handicapped if he lacks a basic appreciation of temporal and sensory knowledge of the site (which, I presume, GIS lacks in it’s multitude of data)?

The Situationists understood the importance of the individual’s experience as a valid form of data to be somehow quantified: his ability to lend his perception of a space, his sensory and physical ability to experience it, and his (presumed) goal of revealing the unexplored or “unacceptable” to the reader; and thus making a site familiar. (Quite the task!)

It seems that deriving will become one of the penultimate tasks in being able to understand and ultimately inform our site(s); yet quantifying this information from our experiences into digital 2-D format may be the most challenging task.

If our aim is to have mapping practices play a more intensive and creative role in design and planning, are we limiting ourselves by staying in an abstract 2-D representation (utilizing GIS, maps, modeling, Illustrator)? If the Situationists could have utilized today’s technology, would they not only have you view 2-D representations of a site based on their explorations, but also allow you to listen to the audio of a person transversing the area, while simultaneously watching a video of a pedestrian experience of the site? Or is this no longer mapping?