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Living Atlas of the World – Canada Edition

Accessing quality data is often the most challenging part of producing a good information product. The ArcGIS platform includes the Living Atlas of the World. Over the last six months, Canadian content has tripled to well over one hundred items from authoritative contributors. The Living Atlas website has improved with new features and content categories to organize maps, scenes, layers and apps.

The ArcGIS platform includes the Living Atlas of the World, the foremost collection of geographic information from around the globe. The Living Atlas contains content that is published by users, partners and Esri. The content is curated to ensure that it originates from authoritative sources and is well documented. Paul Heersink and Brian Kazmerik are curators for Canada. Paul is production manager for the Community Maps program and Brian is a consultant focusing on environmental and earth observation content.

See what’s new and what is trending. Browse items by keywords, category, country and content type.

There are over one hundred web maps, apps and layers for Canada on various topics such as the environment, infrastructure, people, basemaps and imagery. We would like to recognize the following organizations who contributed to the Living Atlas over the last few months:

  • Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada
  • Ducks Unlimited Canada
  • Wildlife Conservation Society Canada
  • The Great Trail (Trans Canada Trail)
  • Alberta Geological Survey
  • Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
  • Historica Canada
  • Esri Canada Education
  • Natural Resources Canada
  • Manitoba Government
  • National Capital Commission
  • Statistics Canada
  • Environment and Climate Change Canada
  • Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada
  • Environics Analytics
  • Elections Canada
  • Elections Alberta
  • Elections Saskatchewan
  • Elections Manitoba
  • Elections Ontario
  • Elections Quebec
  • Elections PEI
  • Canada Post
  • Toronto Public Library
  • Library and Archives Canada
  • City of Toronto Archives
  • University of Toronto Map and Data Library
  • Province of British Columbia

New categories for items in the Living Atlas make organization and discovery of content more intuitive. Other recent updates to the Living Atlas website include a “what’s new” section, featured apps and relevant blog posts.

Content can be accessed directly from the Living Atlas website or through ArcGIS Online, ArcGIS Enterprise and ArcGIS Pro. Contributors can nominate their items within the Living Atlas website or through the Community Maps program.

Esri Canada is reaching out to national and provincial/territorial agencies to increase awareness and content for the Living Atlas. It is a “living atlas,” growing all the time. Benefits to contributors include easy discovery, access to a broad audience and placement of their items among the best available content for Canada and the world. We can all use and benefit from this information.

If your organization has content that it would like to share and is of a national or provincial interest, you can nominate it by logging into your ArcGIS Online account on the Living Atlas website under My Contributions. Once logged in, all your content will be available to nominate. Be sure to complete the metadata as much as possible for the items you wish to nominate before nominating. Once nominated, the curators will review your submissions for suitability. If the content is published in the Living Atlas, remember that the content is still yours and remains on your ArcGIS Online account, but you will not be charged for any increase in usage. If you delete your nominated item from your account, it will be deleted from the Living Atlas as well.

About the Author

Paul Heersink is a cartographer and Program Manager of Esri Canada’s Roads & Addresses Program: an initiative that is aiming to build a seamless topographic basemap using contributor data. He has over 25 years of cartographic experience, working in both the public and private sectors. Paul has always been interested in mapping and drew his own atlas at the age of 10. He took a detour in his career through the fields of psychology and social work before returning to cartography.

Profile Photo of Paul Heersink