Overview

• The purpose of this website is to demonstrate, through maps, certain sociological aspects of the Afghan experience in the United States.  Users can navigate through the maps to explore demographics within the 22 U.S. counties with a significant Afghan presence.  Topics include:
  • Population
  • Arab Ethnicity
  • Foreign-Born Population
  • Income
  • Education
  • Crime
  • Concentration of Middle Eastern Restaurants
  • Concentration of Islamic Mosques
  • Concentration of Recreation Areas
  • Precipitation


• This will support the UT Arlington OneBook Program during the 2006-2007 academic year.  “OneBook is a program for all UT Arlington freshmen, who will study, discuss, and write about the same book in their first semester English composition classes, freshman seminars, and selected other classes.”  This year’s OneBook is The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini.

How to Operate the Site

• Initial Map State
  • The initial focus of the map is the 48 Contiguous States (excluding Alaska and Hawaii).
  • The initial background map is the Base Map, which shows the political boundaries and streets if zoomed in close enough.
  • The red buffers (circles) outline the areas in the U.S. with at least 100+ Afghan residents.  These buffers cannot be turned off.
• Navigate Around the Map
  • The tools to change the extent (zoom location) of the map are available to the right of the map window.
    • The initial focus of the map is the 48 Contiguous States (excluding Alaska and Hawaii).  Clicking on the ‘All 50 States’ link will expand the extent of the map to also include Alaska and Hawaii.
    • There is a drop-down menu with the 22 U.S. counties with at least 100 Afghan residents.  Selecting any of these counties will immediately focus on and zoom the map to that county.  A marker will also appear in the center of that county.
    • There is a drop-down menu of all 50 states and Washington D.C.  Selecting any of these states will immediately focus on and zoom the map to that state.
    • Above the map, there is a link for ‘Mark an Address or Location’.  Enter an address, city, or state and the map will immediately focus the map to that location.  A marker will also appear at that location.
      • How to enter an address: street, zip OR street, city, state.
        • Ex: 123 Happy Street, 76019 OR 123 Happy Street, Arlington, TX
      • How to enter a city: city, state
      • How to enter a state: type the state name.
    • Double-clicking anywhere on the map window will immediately zoom in to that location.
    • Single-click and drag the mouse to pan.
    • Use the zoom scale on the left side of the map window to zoom in or out.  Click on the + to zoom in and the – to zoom out.
• Change the Background Map
  • The ‘Select Background Map; listbox is on the left side of the map window.
  • Select a map from the ‘Select Background Map’ listbox and click ‘Submit’.  You can only view one background map at a time.
  • The legend on the right side of the map updates to include the color classification.  Click on the ‘Background Map Information’ link to view the complete metadata record for the map.
• Add Point Locations to Map
  • The ‘Add Points’ listbox is on the left side of the map window.
  • Select one or more items from the ‘Add Points’ listbox and click ‘Submit’.
  • The legend on the right side of the map updates to include the color of the markers representing the points.
  • Click directly on a marker for a callout window showing information for that particular marker.
  • Click the ‘Clear Points’ link directly above the ‘Add Points’ listbox to clear all markers from the map.

Data Sources

• Background Map Layers
  • Base Map
    • Google Maps
  • Satellite Map
    • Google Maps
  • % Adults with Bachelors Degree
    • Percent of the 25+ years population with a bachelors degree or higher in 2000.
    • Census 2000, SF3
    • Table P37
  • % Foreign Born Population
    • Percent of the total population born outside the U.S. in 2000.
    • Census 2000, SF3
    • Table P22
  • Arab Population
    • Total number of Arabs in 2000.
    • Census 2000, SF4
  • Income
    • Median Household Income in 1999.
    • Census 2000, SF3
    • Table P53
  • Number of Crimes
    • Total number of crimes in 2001.
    • National Atlas
  • Number of Middle East Restaurants
    • Number of Middle Eastern restaurants per county.
    • ReferenceUSA (UT Arlington Library maintains a subscription)
    • ReferenceUSA does not maintain a total comprehensive list of establishments.  Only establishments included in the ReferenceUSA directory were included.
  • Number of Islamic Mosques
    • Number of Islamic Mosques per county.
    • ReferenceUSA (UT Arlington Library maintains a subscription)
    • ReferenceUSA does not maintain a total comprehensive list of establishments.  Only establishments included in the ReferenceUSA directory were included.
  • Number of Recreation Areas
    • Number of recreation areas per county in 2000.
    • Census TIGER/Line 2000: Landmark Points
  • Population
    • Total population in 2000.
    • Census 2000, SF3
    • Table P1
• Point Layers
  • Colleges Offering Middle East Studies
    • CollegeSource Online (UT Arlington Library maintains a subscription)
  • Islamic Mosques
    • ReferenceUSA (UT Arlington Library maintains a subscription)
    • ReferenceUSA does not maintain a total comprehensive list of establishments.  Only establishments included in the ReferenceUSA directory were included.
  • Middle Eastern Restaurants
    • ReferenceUSA (UT Arlington Library maintains a subscription)
    • ReferenceUSA does not maintain a total comprehensive list of establishments.  Only establishments included in the ReferenceUSA directory were included.

Development Notes

This webpage uses the Google Maps interface to bring together the following web services:

• Google Maps API
• Public ArcIMS Service: Server: magellan.uta.edu, Service: afghanUS
• Point features in XML format

Development Environment: ASP.NET, Visual Studio 2005

The Google Maps interface was used for three major reasons:

1. Students are already very familiar with the Google Map interface.  The idea is that their comfort level will be much higher with this interface than the standard ArcIMS interfaces.
2. The appeal and draw-factor of implementing a Google Map mashup will prompt students to explore the application and perhaps increase interest in GIS.
3. The availability of the base map and satellite/aerial imagery.

Thank You

A big THANK YOU must go out to the following folks who helped us to create this webpage:

• Jeremy Bartley of ESRI (formerly of the Kansas Geological Survey and Mapdex).

• City of Rockford, IL who created and released the following ASP source code for overlaying ArcIMS services with Google Maps.  Here is the post concerning this on the MapDex Blog.

Credits

University of Texas at Arlington Library

• Joshua Been, Geographic Information Systems Librarian

• Kaushal Gala, Graduate Research Assistant